Production - The Multiplayer Classroom: Designing Coursework as a Game - page 246

instead of simply selling you what you need. I was absolutely astounded when
during the second Skeleton Chase game a restaurant gave us all of the pizza and
sodas we needed for dozens of players for free. They were a new restaurant and
understood that the word of mouth created by their generosity would be the best
advertisement among the campus population. Even big chain stores gave us
coupons as soon as we asked.
You may have to buy a prop or two, or an award or two, but in the end you will
realize that multiplayer classroom games cost very, very little to produce,
especially when compared to video games.

Alpha Testing
Once you ve collected everything you will need, or at least have fabricated

placeholders, you are ready for Alpha. You may not have access to the garden
space as yet. You may not want to disturb it until the real class arrives. Find
another spot. Or even create your garden on paper. You are testing gameplay
here, not the real experience. You will also not need as many testers as you will
ultimately have players. There is no rule of thumb for how many testers you may
need. The number is greater than one, but it may be as few as three (one guild

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membership for Adventures in Gardening ).

If your testers do not exactly match the demographics of your players, you will
need to study how they play, and try to interpolate their behavior more closely to
match your players. If you use your kids, be careful. They know games. They will
take shortcuts that the residents of the Flower Valley Retirement Complex may
not be able to make.

When your testers are assembled, explain the rules of the game to them exactly
as you will when facing your players. You will be tempted to give hints or guide
their gameplay. Resist this! Lock your ego and your emotions away in a safe
place during testing. I worked on a game that cost millions of dollars to make,
but the focus groups testing it had difficulty

they were not listened to. The
designers were confident they knew better. The game was barely released, and a
major company was dissolved.

—

Instead, take careful notes and then survey your testers after the gameplay
session ends concerning obstacles they encountered in how the game was