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2 April, 2008
Use of University Game Testing Labs
I've been eagerly awaiting the advent of the classic board game Settlers of Catan on Xbox 360. How will they implement the design in online space? Joystiq.com has published an excellent interview with the designers exploring the transition from board game to online game; it sounds like they really understand the flavor of Settlers:
Although when you play Settlers of Catan for the first time your first impression is mainly of the map and pieces, the heart of the game system is the trading – the wheeling and dealing with other players is a major driver in making the game fun. So a huge concern for us was creating a "trading" interface which would not only allow players to trade, but which would also make sure players would have fun while trading. We did a lot of versions of this screen, and spent a lot of time in one of our local University's user testing labs while getting this screen just right.
Reading that made me glad I've been able to make use of the IMD game lab as well. Here's a recent photo of Gillies, Brazil and Stein playing a Passively Multiplayer board game prototype:
The author of the interview, by the way, is Scott Jon Siegel, who seems to have worked with some fantastic game companies and weblogs, and has published some fascinating sounding game designs on his numberless web site. He won one of the GDC 2007 scholarships, so he'll be in San Francisco next week.
Posted by justin at February 25, 2007 8:26 AM
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