Walk-Up Acceptability vs. Real Usability? Designing User Interfaces for the Gaming Culture

Abstract

While a good user interface is often defined as one which is immediately intuitive to use, this assumption can be dangerously applied. Designers of web pages know that if they don't get a user's interest in a few seconds, then the user will exit the site and navigate elsewhere. The gaming enthusiasts will reject a game if they cannot learn to play it in a few minutes. These types of applications require different design attributes than an application that will be used for hours by a trained employee or specialist. Many user experience design techniques involve obtaining feedback on low fidelity prototypes or think out loud protocols which emphasize the need that a user interface be immediately intuitive to use. User interface designers feel the pressure of the gaming culture to value immediate intuitivism or preference as the primary measure for design goodness. However, our study shows that the ability to learn how to use a display for some applications may be more important, especially if the less intuitive display reduces errors after minimal training times. Our study also suggests there may be a unique tendency of gamers to be less risk adverse in using a system, taking action without carefully measuring the risks. This has a tremendous influence on the design of high consequence systems where a user must perform critical tasks with high accuracy for personnel safety and task success.

Make it usable: Highlighting the importance of improving the intuitiveness and usability of a computer-based training simulation

“…While this approach is not recommended by UI professionals, it will simply not work for military gaming simulations, as user feedback is commonly collected and acted upon by the Army. A poorly designed game interface will cause loss of user interest, resulting in game rejection (Steinberg and Blume 2013). For the Army, and in general, there is an additional financial cost incurred once resources are expended to correct poor design.…”