Usability is an integral part of software development and has been so for the past 20 years. For one reason or another, usability has not gained similar popularity in game development. This, however, is about to change.
Every time I give a talk, someone always asks, ”That’s all good and nice that helping users learn is the key to creating passionate users… but who’s going to do all that extra work? Who’s going to make the extra tutorials and better docs?” Answer: your user community.
Users should not have to think too hard when they are using your website. They should not have to refer to help screens and they shouldn’t be made to feel stupid. Simply by observing your customers you can avoid this.
Serious games occupy the training-based category of game development products. Serious games are utilitarian and goal-oriented, offering the user protocol-driven functional engagement, acknowledgment of task achievements, and almost zero entertainment value or fluff (outside of the necessary local and peripheral “traffic” caused by natural interaction with other life and environmental elements – human, animal, plant, mechanical, and weather). Serious games subject matter is typically taught to employees-in-training, re-assigned employees, or emergency preparedness / non-profit volunteers within any line of work, from leadership to trench-level roles. That learned material is, then, put to use in real world employment or deployment scenarios, from how to properly drain and dispose of vegetable oil from a fish-and-chips fryer to how to properly disassemble, diagnose, and repair the turbines on a military helicopter.
User-centered design (UCD) is an approach for employing usability. It is a structured product development methodology that involves users throughout all stages of Web site development, in order to create a Web site that meets users’ needs. This approach considers an organization’s business objectives and the user’s needs, limitations, and preferences.
Situated learning focuses on learning in situ, in the environment or context for which that knowledge applies. At Situated Research, we focus on examining technology in the actual environment in which it is used, in order to uncover user practices and behaviors that suggest ways in which technology is expected to behave.