brought to you by robert chen, jacky springer, jonathan piltz CSE 3461 User Interfaces Barbarian

Overview History of Barbarian Quick Demonstration Norman Principles –Visibility, Affordances, Mappings You Try It / Volunteer Session Norman Principles –Feedback, Memory –Helplessness, Gulf of Execution/Evaluation Discussion

History Timeline –Created and released between –Early computer game, originally made for Amiga –Later ported to: Atari, Commodore 64, DOS, etc Interfaces –Keyboard –Mouse (ball mouse originally invented in 1972 at Xerox PARC, became common after 1980) –Joystick (originally with Atari 2600 in Oct 1977, popular in the 1980s) Barbarian –Undoubtedly an early pioneer of using these interfaces in an era where our UI design principles were nonexistent

Quick Demonstration

Norman Principles Visibility ?Is it natural how to operate the game ?Do the controls convey the correct message ?Does interface provide “natural” messages, clues, or signals to interpret –Button icons provide hints on what action the button performs Affordances –Button-like controls affords pushing with mouse/joystick Mappings –Direct mapping between keyboard/controls and results in the game –Spatial mapping (discussed later) Visibility (p4, 17), Affordances (p9), Mappings (p23, 75)

Volunteer Session You Try It Out

Volunteer Session Oops, forgot to mention a few things … Keyboard Commands –Spatial mapping: F1 to F9  screen buttons Intuitive? Memory Load? Speed: Θ(n) or Θ(1)? –Space bar to “change mode” Good mapping? Meta-states? Visible/Intuitive? Interface –Button icons and placement intuitive? What do some of the icons mean? –When you die, was it clear why you died? Monsters (visible) vs. Traps (should they be visible?) Death feedback appropriate? Die too easy? (ie. Barbarian dies if his toenails break)

More Norman Principles Feedback ?Does the interface tell you what action is it doing, or what are its effects –Yes, feedback is immediate –Yes, barbarian performs actions immediately (ie. run away, walk, stop) –No, feedback not immediate (sword attack may be slow) Arbitrary Memory  Pure memorization, no need of “understanding”  Efficient/necessary –Increase difficulty –Ex: Trap locations, Icons Relational Memory  Relate something new with something already known –Makes it easier to play –Ex: Keyboard mappings Feedback (p27), Memory (p67)

Yet More Norman Principles Learned Helplessness  Feel helpless when fail at a task numerous times ?How to move How to attack Why do I keep dying Taught Helplessness  Does failure in Barbarian generalize in helplessness in all software/games? –Not really; this is good! Gulf of Evaluation  How hard is it for me to figure out if I’m doing it correctly? –Game doesn’t tell you that you’re doing something wrong (silently ignores invalid keys) Gulf of Execution  How hard is it for me to directly do what I want? –Non-intuitive key mappings Non-intuitive button icons Helplessness (p42), Gulf of Execution/Evaluation (p49)

Discussion Resources for this presentation: –World of Spectrum –Abandonia –Wikipedia –The Design of Everyday Things, our textbook