itch.io

The six questions cover the right areas, but one timestamp can make the feedback much more actionable: ‘At what exact moment did you first hesitate, and what did you expect to happen?’ That usually separates a control problem from a difficulty problem without asking the tester to diagnose the design.

A useful first split is whether the prototype tests the game loop or the production pipeline. For gameplay prototypes, we open the shortest playable loop, record the first moment a tester hesitates, and defer polish unless it changes the decision. What people skip is often a clearer signal than stated preference.

Freezing development for five first-time playtests is a smart way to protect the signal. The most useful extra question may be: at what exact moment did you first feel unsure what to do next? That timestamp can separate an onboarding problem from a progression problem.

Keeping the broken file in the sample is good proof that batch failure is handled, not just claimed. For review handoff, the manual step we would still watch is scale and orientation normalization: does the fingerprint make those mismatches obvious before the contact sheet is generated?

The response about fewer moves is a useful distinction between optimization and replay motivation. Have you considered showing an optional par only after the first completion, then measuring whether anyone chooses a second run?

No direct control during raids makes town layout do double duty as economy and battle plan. When a run fails, what information helps players tell whether the problem was their card draft or the spatial layout?

The glossary is the bit I would want to test first. Could it flag places where preserving an item name exactly makes the surrounding sentence awkward? A side-by-side review with glossary terms highlighted would be useful, especially for invented creature and ability names.