It's what you make of it.

So here it is. A big long article about user experience and user-testing by User Experience Expert, Gareth Griffiths, from Sidhe Interacitve in New Zealand.

One of their latest games (and an original self-published title) Shatter is doing really well on the PlayStation Network and Gareth wrote a bit of a paper on his part of the job on the game. A really good read and most importantly, it outlines the importance of testing games from the get-go, always keep the user in mind; using Shatter as a case study.

Like if he was conducting some sort of self-reflective exercise, Gareth writes about Shatter and the early user-testings saying: “You move a bat, you strike a ball and you break bricks. That’s it. But after every user-testing session I would get comments such as “So, what’s the point in this game then?” or “I don’t feel connected to my bat.” Inside I was screaming “Hey, buddy, this isn’t a three hour war-epic, you know! Just go ahead and break the bricks!”

Gradually, however, I started to feel that maybe they were right. There was nothing there to connect the user to the bat, nothing there to try and make them want to move forward, aside from breaking more bricks. The game just felt shallow.”

This should surely spark your interest and if you have a few minutes to spare, I recommend having a read through, especially if you are a keen gamer and dream of a job in the game development industry. User experience is probably the single most important element to consider when developing a successful commercial title.

Because really, would anyone buy or play a game if it was not fun!? I leave you all with that question to answer, if you wish.Gareth Griffiths from Sidhe talks about Shatter