Design and Evaluation of an Authoring Platform for Therapeutic Digital Games

Abstract

Therapeutic digital games aim to support rehabilitation treatments and help patients understand, motivate and persist in therapeutic practices. Although there are several therapeutic digital games available, their development highly depends on the involvement of computer science professionals. This paper’s contribution is about how RUFUS was designed as a platform to provide EUP (End-User Programming) for healthcare professionals. This platform enables these professionals to author digital games aiming at performing therapeutic activities with their patients and/or caregivers. The platform has a web interface for game authoring, currently composed of three different game mechanics, as well as the possibility of viewing interaction reports. It also encompasses a mobile app that displays the games created for patients. Participatory design techniques were used during the design and evaluation of the three games to engage different stakeholders and also empower healthcare providers. A preliminary evaluation of the RUFUS point to an easy-to-use design solution, but which still needs further testing to ensure intuitiveness for users who have no experience with games or with authoring interfaces.

A Hybrid Evaluation of Emotional Responses to Interactive Systems

“…In this work, we conducted a usability assessment on RUFUS 1 platform for authoring digital games [9][10][11]. The aim was to collect the emotional response of volunteers when trying to create games on an End-User Development (EUD) platform [12].…”

“…The RUFUS platform [9][10][11] allows professionals from different fields, extra Computing, to create their own games and use them with their populations of interest in pedagogical or therapeutic practices. There are currently five predefined game mechanics: quiz, puzzle, collecting, storytelling, and inverted storytelling.…”

“…The platform was developed by a multidisciplinary team comprising designers, specialists in Health, Education and Computing. This cooperation aims to involve users in the design of the interface, making it more understandable to other users [9]. The interface evaluated in this study is the interface for creating storytelling games mechanic.…”

“…the system very cumbersome to use; [9] I felt very confident using the system; [10] I needed to learn a lot of things before I could get going with this system [10].…”

Caixa de Ideias - Criando Jogos de Narrativa a partir de um Template Pré-definido

“…A criac ¸ão da narrativa invertida é feita na plataforma de autoria de jogos digitais chamada RUFUS 1 [da Hora Rodrigues et al 2023]. A plataforma tem duas interfaces: a Web, acessada pelo profissional e na qual ele pode planejar e definir quais jogos e elementos de cada jogo o jogador terá acesso; e a interface mobile, um aplicativo em que o jogador vai interagir com o jogo criado.…”