This week we gathered our assets together to create a new build for playtesting. We created additional robots and put the animations, sound effects, and code together within Unity.
Animations
Griva, Feng, and Aaron created animations for half of the robots. Two example can be found here.
Interface
The final interface used for the playtests. Finalized by Feng. Griva implemented a positive feedback effect for when the problems are correctly answered. The circuits in the background light up and pulse from the center. 
Playtesting
We conducted two separate playtest sessions this week. On Friday, March 31, we traveled to East Franklin to test our game with our target demographic. We had enough time to test the game with six of the eleven students in the classroom. However, we were able to get a nice variety in terms of their age and grade level (as the class spans from 1st-5th grades). Are primary research method was live observation followed by a few short questions. Primarily, we were looking for any issues in the usability and accessibility of the game. Since we are developing this game with these eleven children in mind, we need to make sure that it is accessible to all of them, with their various learning disabilities taken into account. Overall, the playtest was a great success. We received lots of great feedback regarding the game’s UI and created a long list of changes.
Our second playtest took place Saturday, April 1 at the ETC Playtest Day. Unfortunately, there weren’t very many kids within our target demographic that attended. Our game is targeting K-2nd graders, but we ended up testing with 3rd-5th graders. However, we still had the chance to test the game’s UI, the gameplay, and the likeability of the robots. Even though the playtesters here were well beyond the math level presented in the game, we hoped they would find something to like in the robots’ art and animations. We think we found success in that area as well. Even though these testers were older, they gave us great feedback on the robot designs, which ones they liked and didn’t like, as well as what they would like the robots to do as an animation.
Overall, we received a lot of great feedback from our playtests, and we look forward to implementing that feedback next week.
Tasks for Next Week
- Implement playtest feedback
- Finish the remaining robot animations
- Begin writing and implementing robot dialogue.
- Implement music and sound effects