Playtesting results final prototype v3

Playtester: Alastair

• Stated thought objective was "To survive and gain a high score. "
• "The strategy was mostly about patience. Avoid killing the trees by being too greedy. Only use your stink bug if you have to (i.e. prefer to avoid the enemies where ever possible)"
• "I did have to read the instructions to really understand the array of objects that the game presented you with, but I did understand it quickly after that. "
• "I understand it's more about the design that the graphics, but the representations of the birds and the farmer were especially confusing, and a small amount of time even just creating a stick man would have made it clearer as to what that object was supposed to be."
• "Also, after a while playing, I was no longer sure what my objective was. I was expecting to be taken to a new orchard, but this never occurred for me. After reading the instructions again, I realise there was a timer counting down. I think this time was far too long. If it was set much shorter I would have felt like I received a reward and would have been more encouraged to keep playing."
• Keyboard controls were easy to use
• "I like the idea that if you eat too much fruit, the tree dies, thus cutting off your food supply. I never actually found myself so low on energy that I *needed* to kill a tree, but I could see if the difficulty level went up, this would be one of the major tactics the player would have to consider."
• "I'd like to see more of a slow introduction (more on that below). Also, more rewards to the player to encourage them to keep playing. I feel having a timer until the level ends feels a little abstract, and doesn't pull the player in to the game. Possibly just reducing the timer would help here, but I wonder if having to eat a certain amount of fruit (or special fruit) would be more appealing. That way the player can visually see how far they are through the level, and how well they are doing. For example, pacman is a good example of this. With a glance the player can see how many dots are left to collect and thus how far from completion they are."
• "I wouldn't introduce everything at once. I'd start by letting the player get used to the controls and eat a bit of fruit, and then quickly reward them by moving to the next level. In between levels, I'd have a short explanation that now there is a bird that wants to eat you. So the second level you have to eat fruit and avoid the bird. Again, this would be quite quick before you move to the next level. Then... you introduce the farmer as a new enemy to avoid.
• This way, the player is slowly being introduced to the game elements, and is getting small rewards by progressing through the levels. I think this would encourage people to play for longer. "
• "Once I understood what all the graphical objects were supposed to be, I enjoyed the basic game mechanics of collecting fruit whilst avoiding enemies, however, as mentioned previously, not receiving any form of reward after a minute or two's play, in the form of progressing to the next level meant I got bored."

Playtester: Sharon

• Hey pesky bug, stop eating my oranges… haha I love it.
• Great game, and v addictive J I played it a couple of times, mainly cos the first time I played it I was expecting there to be another level so got confused when I couldn’t figure out how to move on.
  
• Objective: To last as long as possible
• Strategies for winning: If you hold down the spacebar while flying you can eat the fruit more efficiently. Also don’t eat all the fruit too quickly or you’ll die
• Able to learn quickly - v easy and straightforward
• I was expecting a second level so got a bit confused the first time I played as couldn’t figure out how to move on from level 1.
• Info that would have been useful at the start: What you have to do to move on to the next level. My initial reaction was to eat all the fruit as quickly as possible while avoiding the farmer and birds. It was not until I died from doing this that I realised that slow and steady wins the race as far as this game is concerned. Also, what effect does the stink bomb have on the farmer/birds?
• Controllers easy to use - It’s quite a basic, straightforward game. Perhaps you could add an element of challenge by including a list of special items the bug has to collect within each level. This could be incorporated in a couple of themes:

1. i) the more special items you collect the higher your score
2. ii) you have to collect x number of special items to move up to the next level
3. you can’t complete the game unless you have collected all the special items

• Some additional functionality for the bug would be good like the addition of alternatives to the stink bomb + more bonus items to pick up.
• The health bar went down too quickly.
• Had fun playing

Playtester: Maurice

• Objective: to outlast the clock for each level – whilst husbanding energy/fruit resources and dodging birds and sprayman
• Strategies: trying to find clusters of fruit, nibbling without denuding trees… and also taking into account the “seasons” as the fruit ripened etc.
• Were you able to learn how to play quickly? Very…. I read the instructions, just in case… but probably didn’t need to. Either way, I was playing within a minute
• I didn’t even try the stinkbomb itself, though… was too engrossed in trying to find the closest fruits
• The keyboard controls were fine (but I’m an old hand at cursor-arrow games)
• I found the mix of strategy (marshalling resources) and real-time action surprisingly engaging. More brainpower used than I would have anticipated (in a way, similar to how I found Tetris to be engaging). And the music was great, where’d you find that?? :-)
• For additional levels, maybe different tree layouts? Some fencing or other obstacles to consider whilst flying around the trees? Maybe scarecrows? Just to add another level of complexity J (unless of course, the game already does this but I just haven’t seen because I keep bombing out on level 1….)
• Probably have a “high score” page just like most arcade games…
• Had fun - I will probably play again when I have more time (I’m determined not to bomb out!)
  

Playtester: Sarah

• I've been having a play for the last 20 minutes or so. Anyway, I'm impressed! The gameplay is intuitive and easy to use and the game itself is addictive and challenging enough to keep you coming back (I still can't get past level 1, I keep getting killed by the square flying thing that I assume is a bird).
  
• Also love the voice over :P The only thing that really bugged me was the music, I think if I were to play the game more I would want an option to either mute it or turn it down.
  
• Oh yeah, and when I open the game there's a game builder link that pops up, is that meant to be there?

'Observer' notes:

• ARRRGGGHHHH!!!!! Why didnt' this feedback come sooner????
• The good news is people are getting all aspects of strategy I'd thought of when writing it. Even better, people are actually enjoying it!
• The sounds seem to be engaging, but perhaps a sound turn off option would be good (esp if you were playing it secretly at work!)
• I like the idea of needing to find a secret object to move to the next level. It could be a time released thing, which might work well.
• I like Alastair's point re splitting the levels into smaller ones - having intro pages for each with a new predator/concept might be a good way
• I really wish I had a high score table on display on the front page....
• Also glad I made the farmer sprite - will do the bird and only fix other stuff if I get time

Production plan (I can't believe this is due tomorrow!!!!)

• Create bird sprite
• split rooms
• New level intro page for each room
• Secret key to advance rooms
• Record the game/put together presentation
  

Prior