More Information About Me

Simeon Peebler started out in the early 1980s programming his Commodore 64 and making his own games and music when he should have been doing "more appropriate" things. Flash forward to the present day; after years in game development and technology, he works as a game designer and programmer and has been working the last few years in teaching game design and game development at a leading digital arts college in Chicago Tribeca Flashpoint Academy In 2011, Simeon created Brain Bump, a trivia game for the Amazon Kindle. He also has been working on composing original music and songwriting (go to his songwriting site and hear his latest album).

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Upping Your Game's Usability

I found this recent article from Gamasutra.com to be very useful. In today's world "user interface" and "human-computer interactive" (HCI) are keys to the either success or failure of interactive entertainment products out there. It's largely about making things clear, simple -- and complementing our typical approach as humans in a) controlling our environment and b) learning more about our environment to control it more efficiently.

Check out this excerpt:

"Upping Your Game's Usability

A common gripe I hear from developers is that a game has a really great concept or aesthetic, but that the user interface (UI) is lousy. Games that are hard to control or that mystify users by not providing useful or sufficient feedback are pretty damn frustrating to play. This can translate into worse sales, so it's worthwhile for game developers to really spend a lot of time thinking about a game's UI."

Web link to full article:

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4110/upping_your_games_usability.php

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