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• Introduction
• Target audience analysis
• Justification for existence <--You're Here
• User Testing Design
• Low fidelity sketches
• User Testing “Typhon”
• Animation
• Appendix
  • User Interviews Final Boss
  • Testing Sessions Sketches & Design Concepts
  • Final Boss Typhon Sketches
  • User Testing High Fidelity Design

Justification for Existence of the Final Boss

The basic structure [1] of any story typically consists of an introduction to the main plot, followed by the effort required to achieve the result, which leads to the rising tension within a storyline between "Hero and the Enemy" [1], and finalized by the resolution. It is this act of resolution [1] that provides meaning to the final chapter in the book, conclusion for a movie, or the ending part of a video game.

Considering that there are various methods to finish the game, during the user interview stage we deployed the Open Ended methodology and asked participants to express their personal opinion, as opposed to just trying to force our own vision on them by asking questions related to the final boss Appendix: User Interviews - Final Boss(https://github.com/UQdeco2800/2022-studio-1/wiki/user-interviews-final-boss). That way the data became unbiased and clean.

Interview Methodology

Referring to the target audience analysis, participants for the user interview session were selected based on their values (as opposed to age, gender, location, etc.) To find out whether they match our preferable user group, we asked two probing questions about their favorite game and whether they love retro games. That way we were able to understand whether they match "Super Swipers" (Casual Gamers) or "Retro Enthusiasts" profile.. If a response was neither of those, individual wasn't picked as a potential interviewee.

Summary of the interviews.

A couple of suggestions were made towards an increased level of difficulty or making the enemies spawn in 3x-4x times the normal rate. However, designing a primary evil villain is something that the majority expects to see in the game. In addition, most participants want to experience the feeling of being victorious.

This is because it's a mix of action and strategy, players associate the conclusion with victory or feeling of achievement. Furthermore, derived from the target audience analysis, due to their lifestyle our user group prefers to play games which don't require a lot of devotion nor time.

In addition, we found that introducing a final boss in the last act corresponds to the main storyline (by Team 2) in which “a noble hero emerged” who strives to cleanse the land from evil. Thus, we can infer that an antagonist is a much better fit, as opposed to, for example, an increased level of difficulty because it resembles the balance between Good and Evil.

This concept is further backed up by the interviews, where participants expressed the need for a “primary creature that tries to steal the crystal” Appendix: User Interviews - Final Boss(https://github.com/UQdeco2800/2022-studio-1/wiki/user-interviews-final-boss). Consequently, introducing an antagonist in the final scene of the game seems a more reasonable conclusion for Atlantis Sinks game.

Appendix:

References (IEEE Format) [1] J. Gardner, “Storylines,” SubStance, vol. 40, no. 1, pp. 53–69, 2011, doi: 10.1353/sub.2011.0008 https://www-jstor-org.ezproxy.library.uq.edu.au/stable/41300188?sid=primo