On Thursday, August 2, the FOSSBox set up an event called The Playtestathon to encourage people to try out prototypes and games that students had been working on at RIT. By hosting a Playtestathon we hoped to gain constructive feedback on our prototypes and game. We also hoped to make this event recurring so that students throughout the year could bring their work and have a great learning experience, all the while getting feedback from people who would play their game, making their games even more fun.

Looking back upon the playtest there are several things that went exceptionally well. For starters we picked a very good time and location for our event. We also coordinated the event with other students across campus to playtest their summer projects. By advertising accordingly, we brought in several other teams, volunteers, and even children to the event. Several of these group members playtested our game.

By attracting numerous volunteers we accumulated substantial feedback. We gathered ten playtests of our combat system and twenty-four of our skill selection playtests. Each contains various pools of information that we can tap, including some specific feedback on our playtest. The information we gained ranged anywhere from young children with little game experience, to Graduate students from the school of Interactive Games and Media.

Our playtests proved to be successful. The playtesters were excited and eager to try the prototypes, and they definitely enjoyed the experience. This event paved the way for future playtests. With all of the playtests and playtesters that came, we realized that this was something that would be useful to continue on a regular basis. This event really provided for teams striving to get input and feedback. Each year this is likely to be the same, with various projects in the future also seeking criticism.

Although the Playtestathon proceeded very smoothly, there was definitely room for improvement. In the future, we should raise awareness of the event beforehand as much as possible. We’ll probably be playtesting over the course of the year, and being students, will be able to converse with our peers about the event in class. We also need to get the School of Interactive Games and Media more involved. They should be our allies in the creation of a playtest event in the future.

Two smaller issues that we should address in the future, is to have more time to test, and to have more stations available. During our playtest we had an outlandish number of people, and were very understaffed at the stations. Because of this, not as many attendees were able to test and many of them spent their time idling.

Thank you to everyone that came!