64. Playtest Frequency
What To Do Now?
Once you’ve done your first playtest you might wonder how often this should recur.
It’s important to note that usability playtesting is meant to be iterative, repeated as many times as you can manage throughout development, and there’s also a balance to be struck between how many playtests you can do, and how many players you recruit for each. Generally speaking, doing a greater number of playtests with 6 players, is more likely to result in identifying more usability issues than doing a fewer number of playtests with 12 players, due to the principle of diminishing returns. So if you’re trying to figure out how to best spend your playtesting effort, aim for frequency of playtests while recruiting 5-6 participants per playtest.
Here are some reasons why aiming for playtest frequency is helpful:
Start early, test often - Not everything in your game can be assessed with a single usability playtest. During development some parts of your game will be ready before others, you don’t need to wait until everything is ready, you can playtest what you have. Aim to start early and playtest often.
Evaluating redesigns - once you identify issues and address them, you will need to assess if the redesigns actually work by running a playtest.
Uncovering new issues - once higher priority issues are addressed, new lesser ones will surface. Although they may be not as impactful as what came before, they still need to be addressed as there could be many of them, and when combined, can drastically impact the player experience.
Building a culture of playtesting - making playtesting a regular practice helps establish it as a cultural norm.
A good milestone to reach would be that a playtesting schedule is put together at the start of every new project - playtesting has become part of your process.
Key Takeaway
Playtesting is meant to be iterative, start as early as possible and iterate as often as time and budget allow.