Pelota

What is Pelota?

Pelota is a multiplayer sports game based on the ancient Mayan sport that would inspire soccer (football). Players face off in teams of two to win the favor of the gods. Thankfully unlike the real life inspiration, no one is harmed at the end of this game.

November 2020 - May 2021

My role

As the Usability Lead for the multiplayer sports game Pelota I organized and scheduled playtests that were recorded and archived for later review. In communicating with the Engineering and Design teams I created exit surveys to collect specific feedback about aspects of the game that were under development. Additionally, I recorded my own observations from the live tests. All the information was compiled into Excel spreadsheets that I designed in order for easy review by other members of the team.

What I did as the Usability Lead

  • Organized playtests with groups of testers.

  • Established testing goals after communicating with the Engineering and Design teams

  • Compiled observations into an Excel spreadsheet that all team members could view.

  • Organized observations into distinct categories for review.

  • Maintained archive of playtest recordings for reference.

  • Designed exit surveys to collect feedback from participants

  • Presented results of changes at biweekly reviews

Experience

  • This project took place during lock-downs from the COVID-19 pandemic so I learned quickly how to work with teams when members were not physically able to share the same space or on vastly different schedules.

  • Playtesting was important because the game was very simple at its core so even small tweaks could be impactful

  • Worked with the design team before each test to clearly define what our experience goals were for upcoming tests.

Design Goals

Usability

  • Communicated with the designers and director about what the desired feedback would be from our players.

  • Created a guideline doc that designers would consult when deciding on changes to see if they were inline with our stated goals.

Playtest Spreadsheet

  • Created an excel spreadsheet with every recorded piece of feedback or observations from playtesting that all teams could review.

  • Assigned different types of errors with labels to describe the issue.

  • Elaborated through brief descriptions what a problem was, so design or engineering could get to adjusting it quicker.

Presentations

My other games

  • Presented progress of the game’s development at bi-weekly meetings and used data from playtests to reinforce design decisions or identify areas where improvements were still needed.

  • Used recordings from playtests before changes were implemented to contrast feedback with recently adjusted builds.

  • Included stats from surveys that had quantifiable data points when discussing the future of development.

design goals doc