-- Playtest Notes --

Playtesting in class was a smooth process. Our playtest consisted of the painting puzzle, as well as the first locked door jumpscare. What we wanted to know about the first playtest was the difficulty of the puzzle and the fear of jumpscare. There was no criticism of the length or difficulty of the puzzle. However, for the painting hint, the playtester wanted the hint's design to be a little more natural. In the part to give fear, the design of the character was enough to give fear, but there was feedback in terms of the size of the scary character and the action of the character. I felt the need to add more dynamic motion or AI to the scary character.

There were a few technical aspects missing from our game demo that we were sure to note. For example, the first playtest did not have a clear introduction-- the player simply spawned in the room with the puzzle. While this was effective for playtesting our puzzles, we needed to make sure to add a clear intro to the story. Another small issue we had later on was the stairs-- the player’s ability to climb up the stairs was inconsistent, and oftentimes left them stuck. This would make it difficult to progress in the level, so we were sure to add that to our list of future fixes. 

The last issue we discovered during playtesting later into development was the jumpscare. It seemed to only work some of the time, leaving us to believe it may be an issue similar to the stairs. Because of our previous playtesting with the stairs, it led us to understand issues found in our game later on. Another bit of feedback we received in regards to the jumpscare, was a suggestion that the bunny should teleport directly behind the player. This will be taken into consideration for future jumpscares (perhaps not the same one). We also discovered that the player still had the ability to toggle the lights with “Q”, although this did not interfere with the mini door puzzle. 

Overall, constructive feedback was helpful in the design process. It was especially helpful for bug fixes and slight errors. This was especially important for a horror/puzzle game, where players will explore the map with close attention to detail. Some of our friends specifically attempted to get past colliders and other obstacles in order to wander out of bounds-- gameplay like this allows us to see every loophole and small errors in the code.