It’s common to hear the term ‘playtesting’ in games studios, but it’s an ambiguous term with different disciplines in game development using it, so it's useful to understand the types of playtesting that can exist and how each can help a team at any point in time.

Here are some of the main reasons why teams can playtest, each offers different benefits:

1. To detect possible friction points with your game’s usability (discipline: User Research)
   
   

2. To evaluate various aspects of the player experience (discipline: User Research)
   
   

3. To invite critique and new ideas (discipline: Design)
   
   

4. To create team alignment (discipline: Production)
   
   

5. To share knowledge (discipline: Learning & Development)
   
   

6. To find bugs/technical errors (discipline: QA)
   

This book is focussed on number 1, using playtesting to find your game’s friction points. Using playtesting in this way is known as Usability Playtesting.

Key takeaway

Playtesting has multiple meanings, the focus in this book is to show you how to run a playtest which will identify your game’s friction points (usability playtesting).

Next: 15. Usability Playtesting - The Different Uses