Vertical Slice are back by popular demand!
Hot off the press is the September (what happened to August?) edition of the prestigious Edge magazine. Each month they have a two-page spread on the ‘latest developments in development’ and for Edge 218 they have decided that our work was interesting enough to cover. Read all about how Vertical Slice’s pioneering approaches to video game usability is changing the face of the development process in ‘Codeshop’ on page 139.
Returning to the seaside for another year of game-related talks and conferencing, Vertical Slice will be presenting a talk on the use of biometrics with regard to video games and user experience.
Titled Using Biometrics to Improve Player Experience, the talk will be an hour of fun and fascination and is scheduled for Thursday the 15th of July.
Here is what you can expect to hear about:
Biometrics objectively measures a player’s emotional response to your game, such as fear, excitement and boredom. By using biomedical sensors to capture events directly from the player’s body, insights can be revealed into how gameplay affects the player in the following ways: Excitation, Brain Waves, Muscular Tension, Heart Rate, Behavioural Analysis. Alongside the standard development and playtesting procedures, these techniques can be used to ensure that the design of the game and its desired effects are aligned with the actual experience the player is having. Video footage of biometric playtest sessions are shown, indicating exactly how games like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 affect the player’s biometric responses in real-time, with simultaneous broadcasting of the game, the player and the biometric data. Key events are highlighted that have the most significant impact on the player’s experience, objectively showing which specific parts of the game are most evocative for the player, both negatively and positively.
That’s right, you heard, a studio profile on Vertical Slice can be found on page 146 of this month’s Edge magazine. You can see a delightful picture of the four of us smiling away and get a quick glance at what we do and what we have achieved.We’re quite possibly the smallest company to ever be featured in this section (the previous edition features Codemasters, with a workforce over 50 times the size of ours!).
Pick up Edge 216 in stores now!
Once again, the Vertical Slice wizards Graham McAllister and Gareth White have added their insight to another publication. This time they have a chapter in ‘Evaluating User Experience in Games: Concepts and Methods (Human-Computer Interaction Series)’.
Here is the abstract for the chapter:
“The first step in understanding the user experience needs of the video games industry is to ascertain current practice. The following chapter gives an overview of the game development process and provides background on the time frame and roles involved. We present case studies from three world-class development studios and show how the user experience is currently addressed during a game’s creation. The first case study with Disney’s Black Rock Studio details the development of their most recent racing game, Pure, and describes the usability testing which the developer believes improved the game’s Metacritic score by 10%. The second case study with Zoë Mode refers to several of their recent releases, Rock Revolution, You’re in the Movies, and games in the Eye Toy series. Special consideration is given to understanding and addressing players in a language appropriate to their background as gamers. The third case study with Relentless Software concentrates on the studio’s use of focus group testing and attention to the casual gamer demographic. In addition to showing real-world examples of current practice, this chapter identifies the contribution that HCI can make for user experience methodologies in the games industry. Recommendations are made for generally applying usability techniques earlier in development, and user experience testing later once a playable vertical slice is available. We conclude with some discussion of innovative methodologies and pose the need for a formalised framework for user experience in video game development.”
The piece is listed as chapter 7 in the book, which you can buy here and here. You can buy it from tomorrow
Following on from last month’s successful feature in Develop magazine, Graham has published the second part of his usability/development analysis is in the April edition of the prestigious publication.
The article, titled ‘Experience Points’ (again) is on page 40-41 and outlines the best strategy for focus testing games in the build up to release.
Develop magazine can be found in print or at develop-online.net.
This issue can be downloaded for free here
Our very own Pejman Mirza-Babei is to lend his infinite expertise to the Games Research Seminar next week when he presents his paper at the conference, which is to be held in Tampere, Finland on 8-9 April.
Pejman has been working with Graham McAllister on “Using physiological measures in conjunction with other usability approaches for better understanding of the player’s gameplay experiences” which tracks the biometric responses between players of the games Haze and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
Here is the abstract of the paper/talk: “In this study we capture player’s physiological measures during a gameplay session, to indicate micro-events that have caused changes in their body signals. At the post-gameplay interviews we ask participants to comment and describe their feelings on the selected events. The aim of this study is not to over-interpret physiological measures, but on using blips in measures to help identify key points in a game, which we then use to investigate further with the participant.This approach provides a method that can identify not only the negative user experience and usability issues but also the events which have a positive impact on player’s experience.”
It features a detailed break-down of the importance of usability testing, among other interesting insights into the development/usability process
This issue can be downloaded, for free here
Hey Vertical Slicers,
This is Joel, the new Community Manager at Vertical Slice. I’m here to organise all of our playtesting sessions, spearhead publicity and all sorts of other activities. Anyone looking to contact us about PR, advertising, media collaborations, our work, game trials or anything at all please don’t hesitate to contact me at joel@verticalslice.co.uk
It’s a good time to introduce you to the team too:
Joel, Pejman, Gareth & Graham
Graham McAllister – Director
Gareth White – Playability Researcher
Pejman Mirza-Babaei - Biometrics Researcher
Joel Windels – Community Manager
Vertical Slice are pleased to announce that we are working with Relentless Software on their upcoming murder mystery game Blue Toad Murder Files. We are conducting the usability playtests for this episodic game available exclusively on the PlayStation Network in December.
Twitter: follow Vertical Slice (vsgr) and Blue Toad Murder Files (Blue_Toad).
