COMP4002/GAM Coursework 1: Game User Research and Design Analysis Summary This coursework is worth 30% of the overall module assessment and is to be conducted individually.

Reflect upon an experience(s) of game play in order to critically document and analyse the game design and play of an existing, publicly available (commercially or freely) video or computer game of your choice. Describe how the designed elements of the game manifest in the experience of playing the game.

Your report should be 2000 words in length*, and should be submitted before:

3pm Tuesday 29th March 2022 Submissions should be made as .doc, .docx or .pdf files electronically via Moodle. Standard penalties of 5% per working day will be applied to late submissions. Instructions Step 1: Plan your data collection This coursework involves playing a game, capturing details about your experience of playing the game, and reflecting on what happened during your experience. Perhaps obviously self-reflection is subject to your own biases, but you will be able to document a first-hand account of your experience. For practical reasons this year there is no scope for studying others. Begin by identifying a game that you wish to study but think practically. You do not need to play the whole game, and you do not need to start playing a new game, but you do need to be able to play representative elements of the game. As mentioned in the introductory lecture many free games are available at https://itch.io/. Step 2: Observe and Capture User Experience Play the game as you would normally. You are aiming to observe and reflect upon your behaviour – the actions that you take in the game in particular situations – and player attitude – your opinions on what you play. Direct observations of gameplay provide direct objective insights into player behaviour while interrogation of your own experience provides insights into your attitude. As you play make note of what you are doing in the game, and how you are doing it, in as much detail as you can. Pay attention to in-game situations (these will be most of your observations), control inputs and spontaneous comments. You might find it useful to record your own game play.

After the game complete the PXI Questionnaire in order to capture your subjective view of the game experience. The aim here is to relate this back to identifiable features of the game, or examples from the recent gameplay experience. Step 3: Report Writing Consider the data that you have captured via the PXI Questionnaire, and also Hochleitner et al’s Heuristic Framework for Evaluating User Experience in Games (available on Moodle). These will highlight key elements of the game that you can consider in your report. Your report should follow the broad structure given below: • A brief overview of the game

• Provide context for the data that you have captured.

• Analysis of the game design

• Identify and characterise the core mechanic of the game. • Apply Salen and Zimmerman’s “anatomy of choice” questions to a common situation

in your game. Identify and characterise choices that you observed in your game play, the game features and elements that they rely on, and describe whether and how they could be considered to be meaningful.

• Finally, describe how the mechanics and choices of the game might account for your

aesthetic experience.

For each of the above you should draw upon 2 or 3 “situations” in total that you encountered during the game. These should be presented as rich, detailed descriptions (“vignettes”) of representative game play that you can use to illustrate your analysis of the following perspectives. It is expected that you will draw upon material and concepts covered in the lectures in order to demonstrate your analytical reasoning.

• References A list of references cited in your report using an appropriate referencing style.

• Appendix

Your appendix should include any additional material to supplement your analysis, for example the completed Game Experience Questionnaire.

*It is suggested that you aim for 2000 words, and ending up within 10% of this is expected. Going much beyond this either way will impact on the marking criteria about “appropriateness” and “quality” of your submission in that regard.

Hints Depth over breadth. As evidenced by Stuart’s paper1 on Counter Strike the unpacking of a brief but representative and often repeated activity provides a wealth of insights with which to understand a game and games of a similar genre, rather than trying to describe everything that happens at a high level. It is expected that you will only observe one participant, yourself, and as such any data that you collect will be in no way statistically significant, nor will it provide saturation. The aim of this task is not to use the two scoring and evaluation instruments to their full effect, rather to provide a set of questions to steer or prompt your analysis. Critical documentation does not mean giving a negative commentary as to why you think a game may have a bad design. Instead, you are aiming to evaluate the design of the game using the lens of game design theory that has been expounded in the lectures. Avoid writing subjectively. Critical analysis is necessarily subjective – you are giving your evaluation as an expert, and the game experience questionnaire is also a subjective measure – however the focus should be on the subject of your analysis, not on yourself. I.e. avoid “I think”, instead “the game can be described as… because…” The aim of this exercise is not to write a walk-through of a game, it is to assess your ability to generalise the elements of a game and describe them in terms of existing frameworks. Screenshots can be used to illustrate a feature in the game that is representative of a key concept or challenge, or a common event in the game play, however they are only valuable when referred to and integrated with the text. When referencing external sources pay attention to both the formatting of the reference but also that the source is clearly identified. A URL for a Google image search query is not an appropriate source or reference. Assessment Criteria The coursework will be assessed against the following areas:

Marks Available

Quality of Analysis The analysis correctly draws on examples to identify and describe key game design elements, reflecting on their relationship to appropriately measured and observed experience, evidence of wide reading and reference to module lectures.

70

1http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~pszsr/files/reeves-2009-experts-at-play.pdf

Quality of Academic Writing The report reflects elements of critical thinking and quality academic writing. That is, the writing should be coherent, precise, objective, concise, succinct, fluent, lucid, original, reflective and exhibit the characteristics of critical thinking in the development of solid arguments.

20

Quality of Presentation This refers to the case study analysis has good structure and organisation, correct English lexicon and grammar, correctly formatted and appropriate citations/references.

10

Total 100

Each area is assessed against the standard marking criteria:

Exceptional (90-100%) …essentially without fault and of the highest possible quality, exhibiting a substantial original component.

Outstanding (80-89%) …should exhibit independent thought and originality. Excellent (70-79%) …displays a complete and thorough understanding of the

conceptual and practical issues surrounding the topic. …well structured with a clear line of argument and the quality of the analysis should be excellent …work should be comprehensive and rigorous. …evidence of reading beyond the core lecture material.

Good (60-69%) …shows a good understanding of the conceptual and practical issues surrounding the topic …arguments should be clearly structured …the quality of analysis and writing should be good …the work should be competently conducted using recognised and appropriate methods.

Average (50-59%) …displays a fair understanding of the key conceptual and practical issues …weakness is present in some areas. …has a basic structure, and there is be some argument around the information available …analytical content is fair

Adequate (40-49%) …displays an incomplete understanding of the central issues relating to the topic. …lacks a clear structure and strong argument …quality of analysis is be below average

Poor (below 40%) …displays a very poor understanding of the area; …no clear structure and the analysis is weak or incomplete

Plagiarism Plagiarism or other academic offenses will be dealt with using the standard University procedures2 , and may result in a mark of zero for the entire assessment, module or year. Pay attention to the correct attribution of sources – specifically you must not copy passages of text without highlighting them as third party and referencing the source. You must not solicit, or attempt to solicit a third party to complete part or all of your report.

2https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/academicservices/qualitymanual/assessmentandawards/academic-misconduct.aspx

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