This writeup documents two playtests: one with Krystal in class 5B, and one with Brian over the weekend. Link to the newest twine prototype is HERE: https://github.com/madifan/cs377G_P2

10/22 Playtest #4

This playtest was done with prototype V2, which was a figma flow chart documented in my last P2 writeup. 

P2 Version 2

 

Player profile

 

Name	Age	Testing Environment	Background (Family, Culture)	Other comments
Krystal	~20	Class, Figjam	Asian family culture, has experienced family member loss

 

What worked well

• Player said they felt sad (find quote from Zoom)
• Branching logic for endings make sense

What did not work well

• I need to better establish context of family dynamics and setting:
  • “Why is the mom making you do this?” (1:41)
  • “Wow she’s a really tech savvy grandma”(5:59) → Need to establish context more around Grandma’s age and background
• Characters feel too generic:
  • “It’s obvious that they don’t talk that much, but this could be anyone…maybe that’s what you want?”
  • Krystal suggested to have different texting styles across characters to add more characterization
  • It doesn’t make sense why the grandma feels lonely: “she feels like this American grandma…so then why don’t you talk to me? She clearly has friends and she texts, so why can’t she text her kids? She’s going to water color classes, she seems really independent…why is she sad?” (14:20)
• Character relationships feel a bit flat:
  • “People do have a relationship with their grandparents, even if they don’t talk much…It would be cool to see more of these memories”
• Krystal wished to see visuals: “[text-based] will be less impactful…Like if I could see grandma in a christmas photo I would be really sad”(3:48)
• The parallelism between the grandma-mother and mother-protag relationship isn’t standing out as much
• “Good ending” feels a bit cheesy but not totally unrealistic: “this situation could definitely happen.”. However, the ending feels too strong: “for a family that doesn’t talk, would this really get them to talk?” (8:25)
  • “It feels very generic, I can’t relate to them because me and my parents wouldn’t immediately be like ‘what’s going on’ after this, it has to be a slow change” (9:32) 

Ideas

• There could be forced pacing mechanisms: e.g. Album reveals a new picture every couple seconds
• Mom could prompt the protagonist to go back and search more at the end, if the user has not looked enough: e.g. “Was that the best picture you can find?”
• Interactions could reflect bittersweet moments in addition to just straight up sadness

Screen recording of Krystal’s playtest

10/19 Playtest #5

Player profile

 

Name	Age	Testing Environment	Background (Family, Culture)	Other comments
Brian	22	At home, Twine	Felt like the theme was universally relatable	Second time play testing

 

Iterations since V2

Based on the three playtests I have conducted on V2, which is the Figma flow chat prototype, I have synthesized the feedback into the following design changes for prototype V3, which is now in Twine:

Design Issue	Issue Details	Supporting Evidence	Design Change
Need more character building and character dynamic building	Previously, players found the characters to be generic: the relationship between them, motivations, and personalities felt unclear, even the names felt like “generic white names”. The lack of characterization led to confusion around some of the emotional tension points.	It doesn’t make sense why the grandma feels lonely: “she feels like this American grandma…so then why don’t you talk to me? She clearly has friends and she texts, so why can’t she text her kids? She’s going to water color classes, she seems really independent…why is she sad?” (14:20) – Krystal Also noted by Brian & Luna	After going through the tarot card character writing exercises from class 5B, I made the characters come from an Asian immigrant family so the distant communication style makes more sense, make characters feel less generic, and allow myself to connect more personal experience to the character building. I wrote down some backstory around how the three generations built emotional distance over the years for my own reference, and distilled some of it into the introductory text, dialogues and narrator reflections.
Need to have less spoon-fed emotions in the narrative	All 3 players for V2 felt like the language and narration were too heavy-handed. It felt like the story was telling the emotions, not showing. This felt especially unrelatable for immigrant families who rarely communicate with explicit emotional language and reflection.	“I can’t relate to them because me and my parents wouldn’t immediately be like ‘what’s going on’ after this, it has to be a slow change” (9:32), Kyrstal   The browser history felt “heavy handed”. Some dialogue, including the ending felt like it was spoonfeeding emotions (15:00) – Brian Also noted by Luna	I tried to create more show not tell moments in narrator reflection and dialogues. Specifically, there are less explicit descriptions of emotions from everyone – dynamics and emotions are reflected more through what people do & say versus not with each other. The overall tone is more suble now.
Need more exploration content to build out context	All explorable information in Version 2 contributed to some sort of emotional revelation in the Narrator, but that can feel dramatic and too intentional from the game designer’s pov. There needed to be more contextual information that build up to that emotional revelation	“People do have a relationship with their grandparents, even if they don’t talk much…It would be cool to see more of these memories” – Krystal “I just want to have more, I like the concept and everything”(21:35) – Brian	I added more exploration content in all parts of the phone and notebook to paint the picture of who Grandma is. Some of it is not emotional, e.g. her grocery list.
Need to resolve Grandma’s tech savviness, her community engagement, and her loneliness	Previously, players didn’t feel like the characterization of the grandma was very consistent. Why would she be lonely if she seems to be able to speak her emotions, make friends through hobbies, and even go on social media?	“She clearly has friends and she texts, so why can’t she text her kids? She’s going to water color classes, she seems really independent…why is she sad?” (14:20)-Krystal	I toned down the tech savviness of Grandma by making the phone exploration content more logistics and function centric (e.g. storing photos, messaging, and notes for basic grocery). I added a physical notebook to the exploration artifact that would appear later in the game to reveal deeper inside thoughts from the Grandma. The player would understand different degrees of it based on how much they’ve explored the phone.
Need more explicit guidance around exploration pacing	Version 2 showed information in bigger chunks (e.g. describing a full album of pictures with 2 sentences), which allowed players to glance quickly. This was the opposite of the design intention – which is to encourage people to slow down to get to know their loved ones better.	Krystal suggested forced pacing by having players browse each photo one by one, or each phone conversation one by one.	I made the album exploration more granular. Instead of having a description for each album, players can now view the first 3-5 pictures of the album one by one, each with their descriptions and narrator thoughts. Players will have to click through the pages, which both slows them down but also creates more branching opportunity for the ending if the player decides to speed run through less options.

Prototype V3 on Twine

Feedback

What worked well

• Brian liked the additional exploration content. He felt like it painted more context and characterization before
• Brian did feel like the language and narration felt less spoon fed. 
• The structure of the three endings makes sense to him in terms of learning goals. 

What didn’t work well

• The cause of death felt too jarring, which is not relatable. It might feel better to have a more common cause of death for elder people for higher relatability. 
• More clarity is needed to onboard the player to the task list: how did the player get to these tasks, and how do they know how to interact with the UI?
• The language and narration can be even more subtle to highlight relatability and make it feel realistic to Asian culture. “More ‘underspoken’ tone would be powerful” – Brian
• It was unclear at times if it was the protagonist’s inner reflection or the narrator speaking. Be more clear of the distinction, and when it’s the protagonist, the narration should dive even deeper into the emotions, backstory, anecdotes, etc. 
• Characterization was better than before but could still be improved (e.g. Brian wanted more typos from Grandma to make it realistic to her immigrant background). He wanted the personalities of each person to come through more through dialogues and narrator reflections. For the narrator, he mentioned it’s the designer’s choice to make them more relatable (generic) versus more characterized. 

Ideas

• Brian thinks it would be very powerful to see the images in the album if scope permits. 

Screen recording of Brian’s playtest

Things I’d like Feedback on

1. How can I build in more characterization without being too over the top with describing emotions? Any tips on show but now tell for character personalities?
2. How characterized should I make the protagonist? I can see it going either way – more characterized to make her fit into the story more, or not as characterized to allow more relatability from the player.
3. How does the distinction between the physical notebook and digital phone feel? I have yet to flesh out the narration for the notebook, but the idea is that the more emotional, introspective thoughts from Grandma are written in the notebook. Does the distinction make sense? Is it necessary?