Masters Thesis

Data Collection

Data gathering for this thesis required three separate phases:

First was the pre-play survey in which a player filled out a questionnaire about their gameplay preferences and prior experience with Half-Life 2. This information was necessary since different game genres have more or less dead-end gameplay than others.

The second step was allowing the player to play the level and gathering information about the path that the player chose to take and the order in which the player took actions. This step gathered information on the number of dead-ends that the player examined as well as the priority at which the player prioritized them over the completion of the level.

Video of a playtester that visited every dead-end

Finally, the player filled out a post-game questionnaire and participated in an interview which asked about the areas of the level that the player found the most fun and the least fun. The questionnaire and interview were broad in order to avoid asking leading questions that could invalidate data.

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