Have you ever watched people unfamiliar to videogames trying to play games? At first I usually laugh at the awkwardness when trying to get a grip with the controller’s buttons and the games controls. Sometimes I even think to myself “Is this guy dumb or what?”
Take or example a simple action like reloading your weapon and the thought process involved in executing that.
Gamer’s thought process:
Just Reload or at most press left face button
Now a Non Gamer’s thought process:
Which button is for reloading
Oh yes
It’s X
Look down at the controller to find out where it is
Press X
Look up to see what happens.
But that’s the way it is to people who are not into games. We, as gamers on the other hand, take too many things for granted.
Gamasutra has a very interesting article about an “experiment” they did with a family trying to play games together. It is not just about controls but the entire experience from start to finish and how they view it. It’s a great read which gives you an idea how foreign our hobby is to them and how big the barriers to entry are in spite of the success of the Nintendo DS and Wii.
Click here to read.
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on Friday, May 2nd, 2008 at 13:57 and is filed under Articles.
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