Game Design

LESSON #2: Design Through Playtesting,

Focus-Playtesting, and Radical Revision
 TODAY:
1. Game Design through
Playtesting and Focus Testing: principles and
methods.

2. Game Design through Radical Revision

3. Design for Excitement

and for Collaborative Games

4. Intro to Photoshop for 2D asset creation

5. Unity Q & A (time permitting)

 How Do We Direct Player Behavior?
According to Jesse Schell, a game is not a game unless it is
being played. The players make it a game through their
interactions and behaviors.
As designers, we have a set of tools for directing player
behavior, to provide them with the opportunities to make
interesting choices, experience good Flow and Fiero.

What are those tools?

• How do we encourage specific behaviors in our players?
• How do we make them more competitive or cooperative?
• How do we encourage careful consideration vs bold
action?
 How Do We Iterate Quickly?
Game Design is a lot like wandering through the dark, trying
to find your way. We can imagine and discuss and debate
solutions to design problems all day infinitely, but the way
forward is always through playtesting, to see what actually
works or does not with actual players. Those players should
ideally have not seen your game before.

CONSIDER
• “Failing Faster” to get past the bad ideas towards good
ones: https://youtu.be/rDjrOaoHz9s?si=iHoKMJ-
D6dbMvDzv
• What do we want to learn from a playtesting session?
• Why are we designers the worst playtesters for our own
games?
• How do observe without tainting the results?
 PLAYTESTING PRACTICE:
Today we will playtest your games!
Please prepare the Whiteboard for your team’s game.
Enter the rules link and the game link (if on PCIO–
otherwise type “non-digital”)

Talk with your teammates about the pitch sentence:

summarize your game to help your players know what
they are getting into, and to build excitement!
List a few key mechanics, starting with the number of
players. Offer a few words about the settings. For example:
“2-player asymmetric competitive game set in the
Lorax by Dr Suess!”
 PLAYTESTING PRACTICE:
1. Set up your game and chairs, clear the playspace!
2. Leave one team-member to run the game (practice
explaining the game in 1-2 minutes: flavor context,
Goals, main game mechanics to achieve those goals).
3. All players stand and gather on a side of the room.
4. Those running the games hold up fingers for the
number of needed players.
5. Players choose games to play, sit down and begin
(teacher may need to re-arrange a bit)

• Only 15 minutes to play, so get right to it!

 PLAYTESTING CHECKLIST:
• Testing Set-up: be sure you have all parts.
• Communicate to Testers the Plan:
– Thank you for being here!
– Game is broken: it is bad at being a game!
– Ask them to talk out-loud while playing
– Say you plan to be quiet, but will write notes
• During Playtest: Take lots of notes: where they get stuck
or confused, and what they enjoy. Only speak when they
get too completely stuck to proceed!
• Post-Playtest Debriefing: When game is done (or tried
for 15 minutes), discuss highlights and problems. List 3
big change suggestions to explore. Thank your testers!
WHY DO WE PLAYTEST?
 WHY DO WE PLAYTEST?

• Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision.

 WHY DO WE PLAYTEST?

• Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision.

• Our reality is not the only reality.

 WHY DO WE PLAYTEST?

• Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision.

• Our reality is not the only reality.

• Culture: common modes of consumption,

presentation, or interaction.
 WHY DO WE PLAYTEST?

• Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision.

• Our reality is not the only reality.

• Culture: common modes of consumption,

presentation, or interaction.

• Testing is how we come to understand our

Audience’s needs.
 Accessing Audience

• PRODUCT FIRST: We have a game we want to

make, and must identify the audience that will
enjoy that game.

• AUDIENCE FIRST: We have an audience we

want to reach and so we design a game to
fulfill their interests.
Testing as Marketing Strategy
Testing as Marketing Strategy
Testing as Marketing Strategy
 CREATING GAMES
FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE
• 30 years of game history and conventions to
integrate in your game mechanics and interface.
• Developers of games for core Gamer audiences
need a level of knowledge of past games to
understand the expectations of their audience
• Testing can help illuminate Gamer expectations,
but you also need to play many games. For
example:
 CREATING GAMES
FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE
 CREATING GAMES
FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE

Why can’t I punch something spiky?

 CREATING GAMES
FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE

Why can’t I punch something spiky?

Even something soft in the front,

with only a few spikes on the head
or the back?
Because Mario Bros
defined/ruined
spikes for everyone
 GREYBOXING
• When testing digital or tabletop games to decide if core mechanics
are fun, avoid including much art: use simple forms so the audience
can focus on the mechanic: “Greyboxing”
• Good Mechanics = fun game.
• Art+ Audio can create greater immersion, a more memorable
experience, but cannot fix a mechanic (or game) that is not fun.

FAIL FASTER
• Do not spend a ton of time thinking or arguing about whether to
include a mechanic: try it! See if it works,
• You don’t need to try EVERYTHING, but if you have
collaborators/stakeholders excited about an idea, don’t dispute the
idea– try it out and see if it works.
• Burn through a lot of bad or mediocre ideas as fast as possible to
get to the good ones.
 GAME DESIGN METHOD #2a: PLAYTESTING
Designing through playtesting is a way to put player experience first.
Have an idea for a game? Don’t spend a lot of time obsessing about
the design until you have tried it with players!
1. PREPARE A PROTOTYPE: Keep it simple (greyboxing) to quickly
test ideas (failing faster)

2. OBSERVE OTHERS PLAYING YOUR GAME. Avoid influencing their

experience, where possible.

3. LISTEN: Ask them to speak while playing and write down

everything they say (and you see them do) which offers a new
perspective on any aspect of gameplay or user interface.
4. INTEGRATE: Iterate your game mechanics and interface with this
feedback in mind, while also listening to your own instincts. In
other words, listen but do not treat all feedback as infallible.
 GENERAL PLAYTESTING, ROUND 2
1. EACH TEAM: choose one member to be Play-Runner:
stay and observe the playtest.
2. Everyone else moves to the side of the room.
3. Play-Runners raise one hand showing the number of
Playtesters they need for their game, and update as
Playtesters sit at their tables.
4. When they have everyone they need, Play-Runners
give a concise explanation of the gameplay and the
Playtesters play the game, verbalizing their
experience as they go.
5. Play-Runners observe, and take notes, and try not to
interfere but help if players are stuck on a rule.
 GENERAL PLAYTESTING, ROUND 2
EACH TEAM: Return to your group, discuss the
playtest, decide what major change/s your team
will try out in the next playtest.
GAME DESIGN METHOD #2b: FOCUS TESTING
What does it mean to test with a focus?
GAME DESIGN METHOD #2b: FOCUS TESTING
1. IDENTIFY A SPECIFIC PLAYTESTING GOAL: What about
your game do you want to improve? Do you want to
change how long it takes to play, how awesome a
player type feels to play, the balance between players,
the use of assets, etc?
2. DEFINE PARAMETERS: How will you keep track of the
thing in the game you want to improve?
3. OBSERVE OTHERS PLAYING YOUR GAME. Avoid
influencing their experience.
4. LISTEN: Ask them to speak while playing and write
down what they say and do related to the parameter
you want to improve.
5. INTEGRATE: Iterate your game mechanics and
interface with this feedback in mind.
 FOCUS-PLAYTEST DESIGN EXAMPLE:
Dragon Day Care
“Nurturing” card game by Jason Wiser
 Three cards types: Egg, Love, and Poach
3-6 players sit in a circle, draw a hand to lay down Egg cards and
then play “Love” cards on them to hatch eggs into dragons.

Play “Poach” cards on each

other to interfere or steal eggs.
When one player has a dragon
of each color the game ends,
and player with most hatched
dragons wins.
Lots of terrible egg puns!
 Dragon Day Care Focus-Playtesting Goals:
Speed-up gameplay and dragon hatching
PLAN: Multiple days of playtests, make changes
between each to playtest rule adjustments.
Time each game and frequency of egg hatches!
SOME TESTED VARIATIONS:
• Adjust deck balance: number of each card type
(increase love cards)
• Reduce number of Love cards needed to hatch
an Egg (from 8 to ?)
• Remove most devastating Poach cards and
overly- complicated Love cards (that took longer
to read/understand/play)
 Coolest Innovation: Stack Eggs
A Playtester asked: Is there a benefit to stacking eggs of
the same color? And we decided there could be! If a
single egg needs 4 love to hatch, an additional egg adds
2 more Love for a total of 6 (rather than the 8 they need
separately).
To balance the
reward we
added a risk: a
poach card that
normally effects
one egg will
impact all eggs
in a stack.
 PLAYTESTING ROUND 3: FOCUS TESTING
1. EACH TEAM: choose one member to be the third
Play-Runner, who stays, implements the chosen
changes, and observe the playtest.
2. Everyone else moves to the side of the room.
3. New Play-Runners raise one hand showing the
number of Playtesters they need for their game, and
update as Playtesters sit at their tables.
4. When they have everyone they need, Play-Runners
give a concise explanation of the gameplay (including
new features) and the Playtesters play the game,
verbalizing their experience as they go.
5. Play-Runners observe, and take notes, and try not to
interfere but help if players are stuck on a rule.
 PLAYTESTING ROUND 3: FOCUS TESTING
6. AFTER PLAYTEST: Teams re-meet to discuss results, and
post a response to the team homework post on Piazza:
What changes were testes and the apparent results.
It is worth noting that a proper focus test will include
many run through with many groups, to get data that
includes varied perspectives and player abilities (casual
gamers and “Rules Lawyers”).

XKCD, in memory of Gary Gygax

 Design Method 3: Radical Revision
Question: What is Radical Revision?
 Design Method 3: Radical Revision
Question: What is Radical Revision?
Revision that explores complete overhauls of
your ideas: Dangerously sweep away all of the
sweat and blood you have shed so far and
imagine impossible new directions.

You don’t always have to follow those paths—

you just need to give yourself the chance to
consider them, to permit those ideas to
percolate and enrich your games.
 Design Method 3: Radical Revision
What should you change?
Playtesting can help us understand where our game is more
fun and less, and to identify when players get stuck or
bored. Change those parts in a big way, rather than small
incremental ways, for more productive development.
Like being asked to guess a number from 1-1000, where
answers will tell you if you guess is too high or too low. Are
you going to start with guessing #1 and then guess #2?
 Design Method 3: Radical Revision
What should you change?
OF COURSE NOT.
Start with 500, then split the difference again and again. GO BIG
with your guess-jumping. Same with Game Design changes!
We want you to keep one thing from your first game, and try
MASSIVE changes with everything else.
FOR EXAMPLE: What if you kept the way your characters move,
but change the victory and lose conditions? Or what if you added
assets that could be used to help balance poor dice rolls, or mess
with other players?
WHAT IF YOU CHANGED A CORE MECHANIC?
Read this list of mechanics for inspiration (also in the course site):
https://boardgamegeek.com/browse/boardgamemechanic
 Design Method 3: Radical Revision
What should you change?
Instead of a race to get your one pawn to the same end, what if
each player had multiple pawns, and the goal was to control the
most regions of the board (“AREA CONTROL mechanic”)?
What if you added a BETTING / WAGERING or VOTING
mechanic, or ways to PLACE TILES that changed the board, or
asked your players to sing or tell stories?
What if instead of dice-based movement, you gave each player
points to distribute among multiple actions, to trade
randomness for choice and strategy?
What if you made your game COOPERATIVE, or TEAM-BASED?
What if it took your core mechanics into a NEW STORY / ART
SETTING, that then inspired big changes to the core mechanics?
 Design Method 3: Radical Revision
How do we focus our new design?
Try focusing your new design around one of these design
constraints (and please note which you are using in your doc):
Newly Cooperative: Was your game competitive the first week?
Consider a cooperative redesign this week. Typically, players vs a
"clock": How far can they get before the cards run out, the island
sinks, they all become werewolves, etc?
One-Room: Set the entire game in a very limited space: a cubicle
farm, a backyard garden, a kitchen, an air traffic control room, etc.
3D: For object movement, add a vertical dimension to the
horizontal board: Ladders, airships, upper floors, astral plane, etc.
Army: Did your first game give each player a single piece to
manage? Try giving the player multiple pieces!
Fire Hose Games: Fall 2008
Fire Hose Games: Fall 2010
Builder Brawler #1: Initial 2D Prototype:
Builder Brawler #1: Initial 2D Prototype:
Builder Brawler #2: 3D Build-out:
Builder Brawler #2: Building materials
from shattered enemies:
Builder Brawler #2: Moving screens,
long boss fight:
 USER TESTING:
Lukewarm responses:
“Somewhat fun”

Tried to fix with better art, but just

wasted time.

We didn’t know what “really excited

playtesters” looked like.
 Builder Brawler #3: Competitive weaponized
tower- building using pieces from beaten monsters.
Just a mini-game?
 Builder Brawler #3: Just a mini-game?
Nope. HUGELY positive responses. We refocused
on this direction, scrapping a year of development.
 Builder Brawler #3:
Build-out of multiple competitive levels.
 Builder Brawler #3:
Build-out of multiple competitive levels.
Builder Brawler #3:
Campaign Mode
Builder Brawler #3:
Campaign Mode
Design Exercise #2a: Radical Brainstorming!
1. Review notes from playtesting. Where did
players get stuck/confused? Where did the
game drag? Where was there less awesome?
2. ID at least one core idea in your game to
radically reposition in new modes of play.
3. Consider a mechanic: how players move,
gather assets, interact with other players.
Look for opportunities to streamline play.
4. Focus more on big changes rather than
smaller tweaks.
 DESIGN FOR EXCITEMENT
How designing a game is like writing a novel: Brandon
Sanderson talks about the “three Ps” in writing an engaging
page-turner: PROMISE, PROGRESSION, PAYOFF. He says the
writer makes promises to the reader at the start about where
the story is meant to end up, and the reader will be most
engaged if every part of the book shows progression towards
fulfilling those promises. A scene that is objectively exciting–
characters doing cool things in cool ways– but which does not
serve the progression towards the promised end will feel
boring to the reader.
In a game, the PROMISES are the goals, big and small, and
every turn the players should feel good FLOW: that they can
PROGRESS their agenda towards achieving those goals. There
should be multiple PAYOFFS: FIERO achievement each time a
small goal is achieved, and then the big payoff at the end to see
who wins.
 DESIGN FOR EXCITEMENT
Consider your GOALS:

There is a big goal that is the win state, and multiple

smaller goas along the way. Each smaller goal should serve
the big goal in order for the player to feel they are making
Progress.

Excitement builds through the sense that we are making

progress, a sense supported by the smaller goals we
achieve along the way.
 DESIGN FOR EXCITEMENT
A simple example of a game that
does this with enormous
elegance well is Happy Salmon.
Happy Salmon is a combination
competitive and collaborative
game with simultaneous,
standing gameplay for 3-6
players.

It takes about 1 minute to

explain and 2 minutes to play.
 DESIGN FOR EXCITEMENT
PREP: Each players gets a deck of
cards with 4 types: High 5, Pound It,
Switcheroo, and Happy Salmon.
PLAY:
1. Players stand in a circle with their NOTES:
shuffled deck face down. • Switcheroo is a finger twirling
in the air, and successful player
2. After ready-set go, they each pairs swap places.
turn over the top card and hold up • Happy Salmon is a flappy hand
a hand, gesturing for the desired like a handshake, that slaps the
action (high five, fist bump, etc). partner’s lower arm.
3. If someone else in the circle is • If 3 have the same card, only
the first 2 to see each other and
holding up the same hand gesture, perform it succeed.
they perform it together and each
get to put the card face-up on the • Wiser House Rules: after a time
of waiting, a second card can be
bottom and reveal the next card. flipped, and the player signals
4. First to finish their deck wins! both (to avoid feeling stuck).
Designing for Collaborative Gameplay
BASIC COLLABORATIVE GAMES FORMULA:

MUSTS:
1. The game presents a ticking clock to destroy
the players. Consider a spinner at the end of
each round, or dice, or a deck of cards.
2. Players have goals to accomplish before time
runs out. Consider both final goals and sub
gols to accomplish the bigger, final goals

MAYBES:
3. Players may be able to strategically delay
the doom clock
4. Players may have asymmetrical abilities to
use in achieving their goals.
Designing for Collaborative Gameplay
Forbidden Island is a collaborative game by Matt
Leacock, published by GameRight (Newton, MA).

The players are team of explorers trying to

escape a sinking island with 4 ancient artifacts:

The board is made up of

colorful square tiles.
• The player pawns each
• Have a starting place,
• The artifacts have two.
• The final escape tile is
• a helipad called
• “Fools Landing”
Designing for Collaborative: The Clock
DID WE MENTION THE ISLAND IS SINKING?
Every player turn ends with the player
taking cards from the blue DROWNING deck.
This deck has a copy of every board tile.
When a card is drawn, that tile is flipped over to
the desaturated “Underwater” side.
Most players cannot land on or move through
underwater cards!
Worse, there is a mechanic called “Waters Rise”
where a special card will cause all the previously
drawn cards to be put back on top, to be available
to get pulled again. If an underwater tile is pulled
again, it sinks to the ocean floor.
EVEN WORSE: if the players lose the helipad tile,
or all tiles for any one artifact before it is claimed?
Game Over: There is no path to victory.
Designing for Collaborative: The Players
Thankfully, the players can do things, too.
Players get 3 actions per turn.
These can be spent moving to a new tile,
giving an artifact to another player on the
same tile, or collecting one o the four
artifacts if they are in possession of all 4
needed cards.
Critically, an action can also be spent
“shoring up” an underwater tile– flipping
it back up before it is lost forever, and so
stalling the doom clock! At the end of each turn, the
player gets two cards from the
orange artifact deck (to try to
get the cards needed to collect
the artifacts, hand limit=5).
Sometimes player find a special
airlift card or a free shore up
any tile card.
Sometimes they get “Waters
Rise”…
 Photoshop: Making 2D Assets
(Don’t yet have Photoshop? Try the free online emulator: PhotoPea.com)
1. ALL 2D assets for games MUST be 72 ppi, no
exceptions. This is screen resolution. Do not use
150, 300, etc (print resolution)
2. MOST game assets should be sized power-of-two
(16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048) and most
should be SQUARE power-of-two (256 x 256 at
72ppi, etc)
3. The exceptions to this sizing rule includes:
• Splashscreens (Mainmenu, etc: 1280 x 720)
• User Interface elements (buttons: 300 x 80, etc)
• Assets for PlayingCards.io cards / boards /etc
(size to the defined shapes)
 DUE NEXT WEEK
HOMEWORK #2: With your first team, radically
revise your first game based on usability testing.
Type your design document:
• 1 typed page of instructions (3-sentence game
idea, goal, materials, gameplay rules)
• 1 paragraph of notes on your revision
• board design, set-up photo and win photo.
Post to Piazza and print to bring with board and
pieces to class for playtest!

ALSO: See course site for assigned reading, and

reference reading for radical revision write-up.
 IN DETAIL, FOR NEXT CLASS:
Please bring a physical copy of your game, ready to test at 6pm!
By class, please post digital copy to Piazza: INSTRUCTIONS and
IMAGES. Make sure the names of all your team members (including
yourself) are listed in the Piazza post body, not just the attached rules.
INSTRUCTIONS (1 page) should include:
• Game Name and Creators at top.
• Short summary of game (can include flavor text) including the goal
• List of Materials and Steps for Set-up
• Steps for play, including win state
• (second page, 1-2 paragraphs) Discuss your Radical Revisions and how this game
relates (if at all) to the reading
• Image of the final board (which you are welcome to modify as much as you want
from the originals), photos of set-up and a win-example.
Please be clear and concise! Read your writing out loud to revise, and remove
repetition and grammar errors. Make sure the entire team gets to see it and help
revise it for clarity. And have fun!