Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro / Esta pesquisa tem como objetivo documentar o processo de redução de riscos e incertezas de um jogo eletrônico em desenvolvimento por meio da aplicação de métodos de avaliação de Usabilidade. Foi realizado um estudo de caso da utilização de métodos e técnicas de avaliação de Usabilidade durante a produção do jogo eletrônico Dungeonland, conduzido entre 2010 a 2013 ao longo de diversas iterações do produto, da pré-produção ao lançamento. Foram utilizados os métodos de observação direta baseada em problemas, avaliação cooperativa, questionário e entrevista semi-estruturada. Os dados coletados demonstram a evolução do design do jogo, as diferentes metodologias empregadas em cada estágio de desenvolvimento, e o impacto da avaliação no projeto. Apesar de problemas e limitações no emprego dos testes de Usabilidade no produto em questão, o impacto da avaliação foi visto como muito grande e muito positivo pelos desenvolvedores - através de dados qualitativos como protocolos verbais e de gameplay de usuários, e de dados quantitativos sobre suas experiências com o produto que possam ser comparados estatisticamente, os desenvolvedores de jogos têm à sua disposição poderosas ferramentas para estabelecer processos de Design claros, centrados no usuário, e que ofereçam um ambiente onde problemas são rapidamente identificados e soluções são validadas com usuários reais. / The goal of this research is to document the mitigation process of risks and uncertainty in a video game in development through the application of Usability evaluation methods. A case study on the application of techniques and methods of Usability evaluation in the production of the video game Dungeonland was conducted between 2010 and 2013 and included several product iterations, from pre-production to release. Problem-based direct observation, cooperative evaluation, questionnaire and semi-structured interview were the research methods employed. The data acquired demonstrates the evolution of the game design, the different methods applied in each development phase, and the impact of evaluation in the project. Regardless of problems and limitation in the use of Usability tests in the product at hand, the impact of evaluation was viewed as significant and very positive by the developers through qualitative user data such as verbal and gameplay protocols, and quantitative data on user experience that can be statistically compared, game developers have powerful tools at their disposal to establish Design processes that are clear, user-centered, and that create an environment where problems are quickly identified and solutions are validated with real users.

Há milhares de anos, as imagens visuais impactam significantemente o cotidiano do ser humano, caracterizando-se como um ótimo meio de comunicação e expressão. Com os avanços tecnológicos, evidenciam-se transformações significativas da linguagem visual, que se moldam aos novos contextos no qual se encontra. Os videogames, artefatos digitais amplamente difundidos na sociedade que permitem a imersão do usuário em ambientes lúdicos dotados de interatividade, são alvo de projetos estéticos cada vez mais sofisticados. Uma vez que utilizam linguagem predominantemente visual, tem-se como premissa que a imagem desempenha papel fundamental para que estes cumpram sua função adequadamente. Entretanto, as imagens em videogames nem sempre obedecem a um padrão de qualidade, carecendo de estudos e métodos que amparem seu desenvolvimento e compreensão. Com isso, o presente estudo tem como objetivo desenvolver um método para análise da imagem visual em videogames, considerando a ampla gama de funções que a mesma exerce em artefatos dessa natureza. Para isso, a fim de permitir o desenvolvimento do método e garantir sua replicabilidade, foram definidos determinados procedimentos metodológicos, que envolvem: a realização e avaliação de um primeiro modelo do método; desenvolvimento de um segundo modelo; coleta e análise de dados envolvendo sujeitos de pesquisa especialistas na área; e o desenvolvimento de um modelo final. Como resultados, pode-se perceber que a análise de imagens visuais em videogames pode ser realizada a partir de um método sistemático, todavia, foram apontadas inúmeras ressalvas e considerações a respeito de como o método pode tornar-se mais eficiente. / For thousands of years, the visual images significantly affect the daily life of the human being, characterized as a great means of communication and expression. With technological advances, are evident the significant changes in visual language, which are molded to the new contexts in which it is. Video games, digital artifacts widespread in society that allow the user's immersion in playful environments with interactivity. They are subject to increasingly sophisticated aesthetic designs. Once they predominantly use visual language, there is a premise that the image plays a key role for them to fulfill their function properly. However, images in video games does not always follow a standard of quality, lacking studies and methods that help its development and understanding. Thus, this study aims to develop a method for the analysis of visual image in video games, considering the wide range of functions that it carries on such artifacts. For this, in order to allow the development of the method and ensuring their replication, were defined certain methodological procedures that involve: implementation and evaluation of a first model of the method; development of a second model; collection and analysis of data involving research subjects experts in the field; and the development of the final model. As a result, it can be perceived that the analysis of visual images in videogames can be performed from a systematic method, however, were identified numerous considerations about how the method can become more efficient.

abstract: This dissertation describes Space Vector 1 and Space Vector 2, two video games that introduce Newtonian mechanics concepts. Space Vector 1 is a side-scrolling game, in which players choose to drop bombs or supplies. Players had to identify if the physics was correct during a mission, or they had to plot the trajectory of a falling object, which was then simulated. In Space Vector 2, players were given velocity and acceleration values and had to plot the trajectory of a spaceship across a grid, or players were given a trajectory of a spaceship on a grid and had to program the velocity and acceleration values to produce the trajectory. Space Vector 1 was evaluated with 65 college undergraduates. Space Vector 2 was evaluated with 18 high school students. All participants were given a subset of the Force Concept Inventory, a standard assessment tool in physics education, as a pretest and posttest. Space Vector 1 was evaluated with a single group pretest-posttest design. Space Vector 2 was evaluated with a 2 x 2 ANOVA, where the factors were game mechanic (prediction mechanic or programming mechanic) and bonus questions (bonus question after a mission or no bonus question). Bayesian statistical methods were used for the data analysis. The best estimate for the average change in test scores for Space Vector 1 was a score gain of 1.042 (95% Highest Density Interval (HDI) [0.613, 1.487]) with an effect size of 0.611 (95% HDI [0.327, 0.937]). The best estimate for the grand mean of change scores in Space Vector 2 was an increase of 0.78 (95% HDI [-0.3, 1.85]) with an effect size of 0.379 (95% HDI [-0.112, 0.905]). The prediction/no bonus question version produced the largest change in score, where the best estimate for the mean change score was an increase of 1.2. The estimation intervals for the Space Vector 2 results were wide, and all included zero as a credible value. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Educational Technology 2014

Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2017-04-12T17:35:33Z No. of bitstreams: 1 viniciusdelimaalvim.pdf: 927927 bytes, checksum: 31972cd6d80a0897e5592467b0e4d65a (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2017-04-18T13:12:56Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 viniciusdelimaalvim.pdf: 927927 bytes, checksum: 31972cd6d80a0897e5592467b0e4d65a (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-04-18T13:12:56Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 viniciusdelimaalvim.pdf: 927927 bytes, checksum: 31972cd6d80a0897e5592467b0e4d65a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-05-20 / A dissertação explora o design do segundo jogo da série Witcher de jogos eletrônicos, visando focar e evidenciar aspectos do design que levam a determinadas correntes de pensamento e reflexão entre seus jogadores. Para tanto, buscamos compreender perspectivas fundamentais do design de jogos - explorar como seus designers criam e pensam os jogos eletrônicos, assim como evidenciar os termos e nomenclaturas utilizados dentro da área para determinadas práticas e correntes de pensamento. Utilizamo-nos então das publicações teóricas de game designers e outros pensadores que voltaram suas reflexões sobre esta mídia - entre eles Katie Salen, Eric Zimmerman e Jesse Schell. Após apresentar estes conceitos ao leitor, analisamos Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings sob a ótica destas perspectivas, evidenciando elementos fundamentais de seu design e observando especialmente aquelas características que acreditamos serem importante para a indução de determinados tipos de reflexão. Por fim, exploramos os fóruns oficiais da CD Projekt em busca de indícios que poderiam nos mostrar como certas escolhas feitas pelos designers na criação desta série de jogos impactaram a experiência de seus jogadores. / This dissertation explores the design of the second title in the Witcher series of videogames, aiming to focus and reveal aspects of the game's design that lead to certain trends of thoughts and reflections among its players. With that goal in mind, we strive to understand fundamental perspectives of game design - explore how the designers of videogames create and think about them. Also, we introduce our reader to the terms and jargons used in this field of knowledge to describe certain practices and trends of thought. To do this, we use the theoretical works of game designers and other researchers who dedicated their minds to this media - among them Katie Salen, Eric Zimmerman e Jesse Schell. After describing these concepts to our reader, we analyze The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings under the gaze of such perspectives, pointing out fundamental elements on its design and emphasizing those traits that we believe are important for the induction of specific thought patterns. In the end, we explore the official foruns of CD Projekt, looking for evidence that could show us how certain choices made by the designers of this videogame series influenced the experience of its players.

The purpose of this Grounded Theory study is to investigate the positive and negative effects of Game Analytics and how it may affect the Game Design process within the Game Development process. This is done by reviewing and observing available source material appertaining to Triple AAA Games Industry Experts regarding the topics of Game Analytics, Gameplay, Game Design as well as Game Development. The source material consists of publications, presentations, articles and lectures directly linked to the aforementioned areas in which will be used to reinforce the theory. Through the collected data the theory will emerge which will present the potential positive and negative aspects as well as issues regarding using Game Analytics to track the player’s behavior in order to directly affect and possibly alter the Game Design process. The results highlight the positive aspects of using Game Analytics in the Game Design process in which indicate that it is helpful for the Game Designer to utilize the player’s behavioral data captured from Gameplay. This acts as a powerful extension over the traditional design process. The negative aspects have indicated that Game Analytics is a new practice and is still met with prejudice as it requires a lot of knowledge to be able to be used right in the Game Design process. The theory indicates that Game Analytics is a step in the right direction as it enables the Game Designer to gain further understanding of their players with the end goal of creating a better Gameplay experience. / Syftet med denna Grounded Theory studie är att undersöka de positiva och negativa effekterna av spelanalys och hur det kan påverka speldesign processen inom spelutvecklings processen. Detta görs genom att granska och observera tillgängligt källmaterial som är relaterat till Triple AAA spelindustrin och experter inom spelbranschen med fokus på spelanalys, spelande, speldesign och spelutveckling. Källmaterialet består av publikationer, presentationer, artiklar och föreläsningar som är direkt kopplade till ovannämnda områden som kommer att användas för att förstärka teorin. Genom det insamlade källmaterialet kommer teorin att utvecklas som presenterar de potentiella positiva och negativa aspekter om att använda spelanalys för att spåra spelarens beteende för att direkt påverka och eventuellt förändra speldesign processen. Resultaten framhäver de positiva aspekterna av att använda spelanalys i speldesign processen som tyder på att det är fördelaktigt för speldesignern att utnyttja spelarens beteenderelaterade data tagna från spelet. Detta fungerar som en kraftfull förstärkning av speldesign processen jämfört med den traditionella design processen. De negativa aspekterna har indikerat att spelanalys är en ny praxis och fortfarande kräver en hel del kunskap för att kunna användas direkt i spelet designprocessen. Teorin indikerar att spelanalys på väg i rätt riktning eftersom det gör det möjligt för speldesigners att få djupare förståelse om hur sina spelare beter sig för att nå sitt slutmål vilket är att skapa en bättre spelupplevelse.

Under observationer av den nuvarande läro-spelsmarknaden upplevde vi att den nuvarande speldesignen som nyttjas inte använder spelmediets potential. Detta gjorde att vi började fundera hur spelmediet kan användas bättre för lärande? Vi fann i David A. Kolbs tankar om upplevelsebaserat lärande att det kan kopplas till speldesign och förståelsen av spel. Frågeställningingen “Vad kan vi skapa för spel med hjälp av spel centrerad design och upplevelsebaserat lärande för att skapa en övergång från konkret matematik till abstrakt matematik för barn i förskolan?” växte fram och för att testa våra tankar skapades prototypen Sushi Panic. Genom tester med förskolebarn och förskolepedagoger testade vi olika varianter och hypoteser. Resultatet var positivt men stora skillnader i hur mycket olika barn förstår förändrade synen på prototypen. Kopplingen mellan upplevelsebaserat lärande och speldesign är något som bör utvecklas vidare då det finns mycket som de kan hämta från varandra. / During observatons of the current educational-games market we felt that the current use of game design did not utilize the full potential that games have for education. That made us wonder how can the media of games be used better for education? David A. Kolb’s thoughts about Experiential learning can be connected to game design and the understanding of games. The question “What game can we create with the help of game centred design and experiential learning to create a transition from physical mathematics to abstract mathematics for children in preschool?” came forth and to test our thoughts the prototype Sushi Panic was created. Through tests with preschoolers and educators we tried varying versions and hypothesises. The results were positive but large differences in the understanding between individual children changed our view of the prototype. The connection between experiential learning and video games is something that should continue to be developed since there still is a lot the fields can learn from each other.

Studien undersöker känslomässiga reaktioner vid kooperativt spelande, vilka som är gemensamma för båda spelarna och hur de påverkas av hur svårt spelet är. Arbetet utgick från studier av spelares emotionella reaktioner på spel och teorierna om Flow. Spelet Sanctum användes i en serie tester där mätningar utfördes på två spelare med hjälp av rapportformulär, pulsmätare och hjärna-till-datorgränssnittet Emotiv EPOC. Studien fann att spelarna ibland upplevde samma känslor när de spelade tillsammans och att den ökade svårighetsgradens huvudsakliga effekt var att förändringarna i känslorna blev skarpare och större. Det tycktes huvudsakligen vara motgångar som splittrade spelarnas upplevelser. Resultaten ansågs tyda på att Flow är det optimala tillståndet för känslorna att växa i, och att ohanterbara situationer desynkroniserar dem. Undersökningen omfattade tio personer och åtta tester.

In this research the aim was to create guidelines regarding design of levels in the RPG-genre. This was done relying heavily on a literary study and the work of others but also through exploring the standard of the gaming-industry today. The research results in a proposed set of rules and guidelines are aimed at helping a novice designer to successfully create game levels. Some emphasis on the RPG-genre has been made but the rules/guidelines proposed are adaptable to any game-genre.

This study examines how serious games may be designed and developed to contain engaging working memory (WM) training exercises. Video games have a high potential as WM exercise environment for children with ADHD, but it is still difficult to create a long-term training solution due to their problem to retain attention. This thesis aims for better understanding of ADHD children’s motivation to be trained by describing the creation of a game prototype that was designed with the help from WM experts, workshops with designers working on previous prototypes of the same game, guidance from medical doctors specialized on ADHD, and by using a methodical formal game design approach along with frequent user tests. The results of the presented prototype showed an increase in play-time and in retention of player’s attention over time in comparison to the previous prototype. The study concludes how game design resonated with the target audience.

This thesis investigates the level of focus a player is displaying while playing a role-playing game. The thesis tries to answer the questions if the level of focus is different while a player is watching an event scene versus during gameplay and if there is a difference in the level of focus displayed by new players versus experience ones. To answer this question a playtest was performed in the role-playing game Final Fantasy XIII and the player’s reaction was recorded and documented. The result suggests that the level of focus a player is displaying is lower during event scenes than during gameplay.