4.1 Prototype I (Visuals): User Testing

First Prototype: User Testing Process

The testing process for this first prototype was held like a group interview, with 2-3 people per session to encourage more feedback and be of a more relaxed setting. While organising the testing sessions, we prepared questions/ aims of what we are trying to find out about the prototype. At this stage we were aiming to find out about:

• What is their first impression of the game?
• Does the prototype clearly relate to reducing the use of plastic bags?
• Would it appeal to the users we are trying to target?
• If there are any design, functionality or other aspects we can include to further get our message across.
• Features they expect or improvements we can consider while continuing development

Results and Insights

A total of 8 users were tested. When asked what they think the game is about, almost everyone directly noticed it’s a game that tries to persuade people not to use plastic bags. Although most users noticed that the scores (amount of plastics) of the two players were added up, most of them do not know the purpose of adding the score together until they see the fourth slide with the motto “Saving the environment requires group effort.”

Regarding the content of the slides, including telling people how many plastic waste they can potentially reduce every year if they stop using plastic bags (5th slide) and how comparing the amount of plastic waste avoided to the size of the Great Barrier Reef (6th slide), more than half of the users said that they would prefer if a relevant image goes with different content, rather than displaying the same image of marine animals surrounding coral reefs. As for the data visualization of the amount of 360 billion plastic wastes, unfortunately only 3 people liked the comparison. A possible reason is that they can relate to this comparison, as they have been there or acknowledge how large the Great Barrier Reef is.

For the overall interface and design, 4 users also suggested that visuals may be too adorable for such a serious issue. The concern is that the visuals may be attracting kids rather than adults, not to mention that the messages are not hard for kids to read and understand. However, 3 of the 4 claimed that they will still want to play with it and they would enjoy such game. One common suggestion brought up by every user is to reduce the amount of words. Too many words are squeezed into one single slide, which can tire the audience’s eyes. Surprisingly, 7 of the 8 users like the fact that we are focusing on the impact of plastic bags on marine animals. The main reason is that most of them have seen relevant news, and so they are familiar with the issue. Additionally, 3 users suggested that they would like to see some other interesting or educational facts about marine life, believing it will motivate people to change their behavior.

For this round of user testing, we are focusing more on the visuals and the content as part of the message we want to deliver to our users. As a result, the major changes we made were:

• Reduce the amount of words and create images that match with the content
• Find more data that can be used to visualize the number of 360 billion and can be related to the users in some way for the comparison to be more effective
• Tone down the color scheme to make it less colorful and less childlike
• Include visualization of interesting facts that will potentially motivate people to make a change