As a game developer and designer, I :

• Created Merlynne with the Unity engine (C#) and Visual Studio
• Used Adobe Photoshop to render art assets
• Consulted with playtesters and experts on game design

As a researcher, I:

• Designed and conducted a mixed-methods study using automatically logged usage data and semi-structured interviews with players
• Analyzed data with SPSS (regressions, inter-rater reliability), Excel, and Nvivo (Thematic Analaysis)
• Presented research in collaborative papers (Overleaf), and presentations (Powerpoint)

Problem

HCI literature purports that stereotypically "heroic" avatars in virtual spaces can influence players to act more confidently, but we do not know if avatars with stereotypically "helpful" appearances can motivate individuals to be more helpful to others.

Findings guide design suggestions to motivate more effective advice from users on mental health peer support platforms,.

Approach

To address the research question of whether helpful-look avatars lead to helpful behaviour, I developed a game tool (Merlynne) where players give others advice on daily stressors using cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) techniques. This is a research-through-design approach which focuses on the particular, rather than the generalizable to obtain knowledge.

I designed a mixed-methods, exploratory study, hypothesizing that players using a helpful avatar in Merlynne would have higher usage rates (time, words, players helped), higher use of the CBT format which includes empathy, and a higher change in helping attitudes scores (HAS) than players using an unhelpful avatar.

Merlynne was created in consultation with health groups, ethics boards, HCI experts, and existing literature in HCI and mental health.

Involving Stakeholders

I made study decisions to factor in needs of stakeholders:

• Early discussions with mental health and education groups identified a need for gamified peer support, with additional interest in understanding how male-identifying individuals used online peer support services.
  • The study would now specifically examine men's responses to avatars.
• Our Ethics Research Board advised us to use pre-written and pre-approved content for players to give advice on, and only simulate peer to peer interactions for participant safety.
  
  • Although we had planned to use real-time reddit posts from university subreddits, we complied with ethics limitations and paraphrased reddit content for ethics approval instead.
  • Participants were convinced of the paraphrased posts' authenticities in interviews.

Design Process

Iterative design was used.

1. Early proofs of concepts of different games designs were presented for roundtable discussions with HCI experts.
2. Experts raised issues included problematic narratives and incentives to cheat.
   • As a solution, we consulted literary expertise and involved social elements to dissuade cheating (changing to peer support instead of solidary gameplay).
3. Prototypes of Merlynne underwent playtests with graduate student colleagues using talk-alouds and interviews in RITE testing.
   • Confusions in flow and causes of breaks in immersion were identified, and changes were applied between each playtest.

Above are two iterative prototypes. A puzzle game and a space exploration game.

For my research on avatar influence, two avatar conditions (Monster and Cleric) were created based on media arts literature with feedback from peers studying language in gaming.

Research Study

A 2 hr in-lab study was held with 36 male participants recruited from a graduate mailing list and posters from the University of Waterloo campus. Participants completed pre-post surveys containing HAS scales before and after a 30-40 minute play session using a random avatar condition, followed by a semi-structured interview.

Peer support responses collected in-game from participants were assessed for adherence to CBT format by myself and two research assitants with whom I achieved high inter-rater reliability with, with the dataset. Data-driven thematic analysis using open and axial coding was used to interpret interviews, supported by inferential statistics with non-parametric tests (Mann Whitney U) of usage data including aforementioned responses coded for CBT format adherence.

Results

Although quantitative results showed no difference in HAS scores, responses, or game usage between the helpful and unhelpful groups, qualitative results supported the hypothesis that those using the helping-looking cleric avatar was more inclined to be helpful, by being empathetic in their responses, while those using the monster avatar felt a need to justify their empathetic responses to their monster character. Specifically, those using the cleric avatar were more willing to perform emotional labour.

Recommendations for peer support games:

• Use a narrative which fits with queries, as the fantasy rpg theme was reported to be too far-removed from modern-day problems from reddit.
• Allow for downtime between peer support activities to maintain empathy and prevent emtional fatigue
• Use avatars which represent an empathetic character understandable to players

*Full paper is currently in submission to CSCW 2020.

Impact

The work on Merlynne has:

• Extended previous work on the Proteus Effect and crowdsourcing CBT

• Developed an artifact for HCI research
• Identified needs for making a peer suport game
• Identified areas of future research in avatars

Publications

Chan, T., & Wallace, J. R. (2018). Changing Peer Support Attitudes with Avatar-based Gamification. In Computer Human Interaction. Association for Computing Machinery.

Chan, T., & Wallace, J. R. (2018). Changing Peer Support Attitudes with Avatar-based Gamification. In 3rd Symposium on Computing and Mental Health: Understanding, Engaging, and Delighting Users. Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Chan, T., & Wallace, J. R. (2018). Changing Peer Support Attitudes with Avatar-based Gamification. In International Conference on Persuasive Technologies.

Chan, T. (2018). Designing for Engagement in Peer-to-Peer Support Using Cognitive Behavioural Therapy with Gamification and the Proteus Effect. Inter-University Workshop, 2018. Toronto. Retrieved from https://iuw2018.wordpress.com/session2/#4

Chan, T. (2019). DO FEMALE AVATARS ENCOURAGE MENTAL HEALTH SUPPORT IN GAMIFIED PEER TO PEER (P2P) COGNITIVE BEHAVIOURAL THERAPY (CBT)?. Retrieved from https://uwaterloo.ca/w3-represents/do-female-avatars-encourage-mental-health-support-gamified

Chan, L. Ting. (2019). Leveraging the Proteus Effect to Motivate Emotional Support in a Serious Game for Mental Health. Public Health and Health Systems. Retrieved from https://uwspace.uwaterloo.ca/handle/10012/15199

Reflection

My thesis was successfully defended, and the Merlynne tool was packaged to be accessible to future researchers looking into peer support through RPG interfaces.

What I learned

Through this project, I adopted a systems-based thinking due to the many moving parts (development, content, research, feedback) within a short time frame. A major personal takeaway was the need to self-organize and learn quickly .

What I would have done differently:

• Selective sampling of persons knowledgeable of RPG mediums to test the Proteus Effect specifically. The Proteus Effect requires the user to recognize stereotypes associated with avatars. Although tested for, many participants revealed they were not familiar with fantasy rpg archetypes in interviews. This change will reduce the generalizability of study results, yet as our purpose was exploratory study focusing on the presence of the Proteus Effect, selective sampling will provide a more accurate measurement.

• Modded a pre-existing game to reduce barriers for immersion due to low fidelity of aesthetics and design.
• Involved the real concerns of individuals, and asked them to validate the effectiveness of the peer support received. Although researchers rated the reponses, we could not measure for true helpfulness given they were not the original posters.
• Recorded gameplay footage either through video or keylogging to understand the participants' gameplay choices. Where the player was clicking, travelling with their avatar, and how they structured their responses was not documented in our study, but the qualitative data could hold insight into the usage data. For example, if a player spent longer than usual on a level, were they exploring the map, rethinking their responses, or just idle? Eye-tracking would also show player behaviour, especially in measuring the amount of attention they gave to the avatar but that would have higher set-up costs and risk inconsistencies.

Specific to technical development, there were many Unity techniques I later learned which would have benefited Merlynne such as linking all text objects to a database (e.g. Firebase, or a spreadsheet) for easier content management, using tags to classify NPCs, and using Scriptable Objects to manage the status of interactive objects.

I would have also stored the incoming data natively to an excel spreadsheet to reduce the risk of losing Google conenctivity or the status of my account if it were to be used by future researchers.

Next Steps and Questions

The following questions were identified:

• How familiar should a person be with an archetype for the Proteus Effect to occur? If the Proteus Effect occurred and suggestions were made to designers about which types of avatars to use, recent and classic media trends would need to be considered. If a current trend was to rewrite a traditional archetype (ie. a helpful monster or a damaging cleric), how long would this trend need to exist for to be relevant to the Proteus Effect? Alternatively, if designers were to build a character behind an avatar, how well would the player need to be familiar with the character?

• What is appropriate feedback for peer support? Participants anticipated more motivation to help if their responses were validated to be helpful, either in-game or otherwise. Designing appropriate feedback that encourages peer participation without encouraging harmful participation would be an area of future research
• Are there gender differences? Given our participant pool of male-identifying individuals, other genders may yield different results. The relationship between genders and gendered avatars is of interest.

In final reflection, I believe the philosophical question of whether peer support should be encouraged with gamification needs to be revisited, as in-game incentives can lessen the reflection of impact of support. Mental health expert involvement is suggested.

My research on the PASS kit involved design based on literature on stress management, and running a pre-post comparative study with over 400 participants between two residences at the University of Waterloo in 2016. Results suggested students with the PASS kit felt more confident in dealing with daily stress.

As a product designer, I balanced costs with customer needs to design, resource, and develop products which have been sold worldwide, leading to a profitable business.

*As the company founder, I took on many, many other roles including accounting, sales, web development, HR, and often janitor.

Summary

The Panic, Anxiety, and Stress Support (PASS) kit was born out of my undergraduate thesis research exploring methods to bring stress management symptoms to students during moments of high stress. Each kit includes a squeezable stress star, ear plugs, a sleeping mask, a pack of gum and a deck of 25 flash cards with steps a person can take when they are experiencing anxiety or stress symptoms. I used surveys and interviews to research my audience and developed personas to drive product design. It is now a sustainable social venture.

PASS Inc. has since developed more products.

Research & Design

The PASS kit was designed through initial round-table disccusions with students and then experts, followed by a comparative study between two residences on the Unversity of Waterloo campus with just under 400 participants.

Above is the development process of the PASS kit. Mixed-methods testing revealed that although stress levels of students did not decrease, students who received the PASS kit felt more equipped to deal with stressors than their counterparts.

The PASS kit contains:

• Flashcards based on CBT encouraging users to re-think their stress symptoms while providing straightforward actions for stress management
• Ear Plugs to block out environmental stressors of noise
• Sleeping Mask to block out environmental stressors of light
• Chewing Gum for grounding exercises and exercising jaw muscles for better bloodflow
• Foam Star to tense and release muscles to assist in the progressive muscle relaxation technique

Further iterations were based on discussions with customers who shared their needs. Through discussions with customers we learned:

• Informative packaging is needed to instruct end-users on the purpose of the kit.

• Rectangular containers were optimal for shipping.
• Clear packaging opens up more opportunities for custom branding to be seen through inserts.

Variations over the years are documented below.

Impact

PASS inc. has since:

• Distributed 50 thousand products worldwide, bringing stress management information to schools, workplaces, and communities

• Created jobs for students and adults from disadvantaged populations seasonally
• Inspired others through invited talks and workshops

Reflection

I was honoured to have been accepted into the St. Paul's GreenHouse and Velocity Garage Incubators and received the support and training to launch a profitable social venture. Through building my own company from the ground up, I developed skills in fundraising through grant writing and sponsorships, supplier and customer relationships by understanding needs through empathy, creative problem solving when things do not go according to plan, as well as self-direction and management including allocation of psychological capital.

My research work on Illuminate involved coordinating interdisciplinary research in unfamiliar areas of study, using game development processes including playtesting in an academic space, and translating scientific concepts in meaningful ways to a generalist audience.

As lead artist, I worked concurrently with the developer and created art assets in Adobe Photoshop for Unity. I also performed user-testing, and designed an art style (ie. line weight, colour) friendly to non-artists tasked with scaling the Illuminate project in the future.

Urban context Coastal context Rural context

Summary

The MUSEUM in Kitchener, Ontario held the ALARM exhibition to press the urgency of action for climate change. In cooperation with the The Interdisciplinary Centre on Climate Change (IC3), the Games Institute contracted myself and others to develop an interactive public display to demonstrate current and future steps which can be done to mitigate effects of climate change to daily life. Titled Illuminate, the display was to be on installed in the MUSEUM in early 2020.

Due to COVID-19 disruptions, the display was pivoted to a mobile app in February 2020. I created all art assets in discussion with climate scientists, and performed user-testing while translating results into concrete changes to the develope.

Team

Tina Chan: Art Lead

Adam Leung: Developer

Problem

IC3 recognized the need to educate families with young children on steps already being done to mitigate effects of climate change on daily life to convey hope in their future. The produced educational game must also teach economic costs of climate change mitigation to avoid unrealistic optimism.

Schedule of Events

I describe two phases of Illuminate's development. The initial phase aimed to deliver an interactive display within a short timeline leading to sacrifices to the economic education piece, and the later phase prompted by COVID-19 related closures of the MUSEUM aimed to deliver a mobile app intended for classroom use while reinstating the economic piece.

As an project leader, I communicated with stakeholders to ensure their attendance, coordinated day-of logistics, and created Qualtrics surveys to manage voting and feedback.

As a researcher, I performed thematic analysis on interviews with NVivo to interpret and present findings into a case study to publish at an ACM conference, CHI 2020.

Summary

In the summer of 2019, two concurrent Hacking Health (HH) hackathons were held in Kitchener and in Ottawa with the annual theme of social isolation in seniors. I provided mentorship at the Kitchener event and was an organizer of the post-hackathon co-creation event at the True North 2019 conference. The post-hackathon event invited stakeholders including seniors with lived experiences to offer hackers feedback through Learning Circles -a facilitated discussion prioritizing the equality of opinions. To assess the merits of the post-hackathon event, I performed thematic analysis on interviews with hackers after the event and revealed addressable barriers and strengths to using Learning Circles in the SDLC.

Problem

Hackathons provide rapid, hands-on opportunities to explore innovative solutions to problems, but provide little support to teams in moving those solutions into practice. This is observed of health hacks in particular due to healthcare's high barrier to entry.

Approach

We explore the use of post-hackathon Learning Circles to connect hackathon teams with key stakeholders, to reflect on prototypes and consider business models. Learning Circles were used due to their documented success in student discussions and the Agile method of software development to encourage reflection and sharing among interdisciplinary teams.

Learning Circles

Mentors made up of health professionals (e.g. physicians, LHIN representatives), technical experts (e.g. software developers, UX designers), business professionals, academics, and seniors from the community formed Learning Circles with hackers around large tables. The circle formation was designed to recognize the equity of voices within interdisciplinary groups, and facilitators emphasized this approach at the beginning of each session. Each session started off with a brief introduction by each member and followed with unmoderated discussion usually prompted by questions by hackers.

Interviews

We conducted a qualitative field study with 4 post-hackathon teams, interviewing 13 hackers over Zoom within two weeks of the post-hackathon event. First interviews were attended by 2-3 researchers with additional researchers performing member checks with the interviewer to ensure the validity of participant responses.

NVivo was used for thematic analysis where three researchers independently coded interviews while reflexively journaling. Codes were compared and themes were identified with group discussion.

Results

Our results show that Learning Circles are an effective way to involve stakeholders early in the development process, and to develop a deeper understanding of users, markets, and technology. Themes were:

• Building a shared understanding. Learning Circles bridge interdisciplinary teams engaged in different phases of the development life cycle.
• Stakeholder culture clash. Seniors were less encouraging of entrepreneurship and more focused on whether the solutions solved problems they understood. Making seniors aware of the 'appreciative rather than critical' expectations of feedback in hackathon culture may improve perceived value of their input.
• Mentor preferences. Although participant equity was emphasized in Learning Circles, teams prioritized certain mentors' time over others. Inviting mentors with experiences specific to particular teams (e.g. experiences with physiotherapy if a team is working on a project related to injury recovery) may be advised in the future without sacrificing interdisciplinarity.

Impact

Through the post-hackathon project I have:

• Advanced business development by connecting early stage startups to stakeholders in public and private sectors.
• Builded a community of interdisciplinary mentors interested in supporting local health technology development for older adults.
• Extended hackathon research at an international ACM conference, with interest of follow-up by international researchers.

Post-hackathon Learning Cirles pose as a method to accelerate startup development and has attracted interest from other researchers in the hackathon space for data comparison.

Publications

Levy, A. M., McMurray, J., Chan, T., & Wallace, J. R. (2019). Building regional health ecosystem capacity: Post-hackathon learning circles to support early co-design of social isolation solutions for older adults. In 5th Annual AGE-WELL Conference.

Chan, T., McMurray, J., Levy, A. Marie, Wallace, J. R., & Sveistrup, H. (2020). Post-Hackathon Learning Circles: Supporting Lean Startup Development. In CHI 2020.

Chan, T., McMurray, J., Levy, A. Marie, Wallace, J. R., & Sveistrup, H. (2020). Hallman Lecture Series with Jane Philpott. Post-Hackathon Learning Circles: Supporting Lean Startup Development. Waterloo, Canada.

Reflection

Post-hackathon Learning Circles may be effective in ideation and product/market validation stages of the startup development from themes identified, but follow-up is needed to understand their direct impact on participating hackers. Future research might explore an extended hackathon format and use of Learning Circles to reduce development time, startup acceleration, and contribution to innovation ecosystem capacity.

What I learned

Through this project I practiced effective teamwork and document management in a short timeline, and was able to keep flexible hours concurrently with my schoolwork at the time without impacting either.

What I would have done differently

When recruiting mentors for the post-hackathon event, I managed three email inboxes, with unique email templates and used a shared Google Spreadsheet with multiple parties. One surprising lesson I learned is that many email inboxes automatically flag emails with the word 'hack' in it, especially academic and government domains. It would have been wise to use an address without the word 'hackathon.' Other than this small lesson, given the resource and time constraints of this project, I believe all decisions were well made.

As a project leader, I kept meeting agendas, coordinated undergraduate research assistants, and kept all parties updated on all components of a project through shared tracking documents.

As a researcher, I wrote provincial grants (OCE) and ethics applications to two university boards (Wilfrid Laurier University (WLU), University of Waterloo (UW)), while creating the SmartSurveys on MetricWire and its onboarding materials with their app developers.

Summary

Healthcare providers (ie. pharmacists, family physicians, chiropractors) request patient experience feedback to improve their workflow and care, but risk patients' poor memory with delayed phonecalls and paper surveys are inconvenient to administer in high traffic areas. Smartsurveys presents as a solution by prompting patients with electronic surveys when they enter a predetermined ('geofenced') location such as a doctor's office. As a researcher, I organized a field study in a team of 4 for 200 participants within the Kitchener-Waterloo community, while co-supervised by Dr. Josephine McMurray of WLU and Dr. James Wallace of UW. The study design was presented at the 2018 ACM International Conference on Interactive Surfaces and Spaces.

Problem

Providers need affordable and effective ways to collect feedback, and smartphone applications present as suitable solutions. However, previous research shows that patients are hesitant to provide smartphone-based feedback in a care setting due to perceived risks and apparent futility of expecting change as a result.

Approach

I extended the work of a previous graduate student who observed that patients had privacy concerns about sharing health information over personal smartphones. The second phase of the project aimed to understand:

• Context Sensitivity and whether individuals would actually report less information to health providers.
• Reasons for declining to give service feedback to providers of any type

A field study was designed to measure individuals' willingness to provide feedback to health providers compared to non-health service providers (ie. banks, theatres, car maintenance shops) using the MetricWire app to host the study tool.

MetricWire is a data collection tool developed in Kitchener-Waterloo by the startup MetricWire Inc., who were also collaborators on the NSERC-Engage grant funding SmartSurveys. In regular meetings with the MetricWire team, I came to discover the limitations and opportunities with their tool concurrently with their startup development.

Research

I led the implementation of the SmartSurveys tool, which included its onboarding materials, development, and testing.

Study Design and Materials

Participants were recruited online and directed to enroll in the SmartSurveys study on the MetricWire app through a one-page website. The website linked to consent letters and installation guides hosted on Google Drive. When SmartSurveys was installed, participants would complete an intro survey to complete enrollment, then be given surveys through MetricWire every time they dwelled in a geofenced location.

Automatically measured variables included situated usage data such as time spent in a geographic area, time between entering a location and submitting feedback, and between the time of exit and feedback submission. Overall activity data like the number of submissions, and the number of words per submission was also tracked to be compared between locations.

Tool Development

I trained two undergraduate research assistants to collect the geographical coordinates and radial size of service providers in Kitchener-Waterloo based on Google map data.

Four lists of geofences were created, containing 100-150 locations on each list.

• On Campus* - Health Provider
• Off Campus** - Health Provider
• On Campus - Non-health Provider
• Off Campus - Non-health Provider

* On the WLU or UW campus

** In the Kitchener-Waterloo region

Tool Testing

After the locations were programmed into the SmartSurveys tool, we tested the sensitivity of the MetricWire app to geofences on foot using different smartphones and operating systems (iPhone, Android).

There were overlapping geofences due to multi-service buildings with multiple floors with different services. It was difficult to differentiate services leading to the over-triggering of surveys. As a solution, an extra question was asked in multi-service buildings asking participants to indicate where they were in a form field.

Some geofences also did not fire when entered, as Android phones were not registering the geofence as quickly to save battery life. This posed as a study problem as iPhone and Android users would have inconsistent participant experiences. As a short-term fix, I changed the trigger from 'dwelling in an area' to 'exiting an area' to at least ensure all participants received notifications after service provision instead of some during and some after.

Results

Project is on hiatus due to COVID-19 and limits on physical distancing in Ontario.

Impact

My involvement with SmartSurveys contributed to

• Ethics approval for a cross-campus field study
• A GPS-triggered survey tool for collecting consumer feedback for service providers
• Presentation on research methods at an international ACM conference

Publications

Chan, T., McMurray, J., Wallace, J. R., & Sidahmed, A.. (2018). SmartSurveys: Does context influence whether we'll share healthcare experience data with our smartphone? . In ACM Conference on Interactive Surfaces and Spaces 2018. Association for Computing Machinery. Retrieved from https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3279912

Reflection

Technological barriers to implementation remained after my involvement, but a good foundation was set for the project to continue once problems were fixed. Strengths were in project organization leading to quick and effective meetings given the competing priorities of all parties.

What I learned

Through this project I learned a lot about knowledge translation and project management within a interdiscinplinary team with remote team members.

What I would have done differently

One major barrier to implementation was the inconsistency of geofences firing for different smartphone users. Despite the investment in tool setup, I would have explored other ways to measure contextual sensitivity.

The study could have sent participants surveys to complete through MetricWire according to a predetermined time schedule. Participants would report where they were and offer feedback if willing. Although less relevant data points may be collected (e.g. if the participant was at home most of the survey times), it would have been independent of GPS error.

As a project leader, I scheduled meetings over Google hangouts, and applied my understanding of social determination theory (SDT) and the agile software development to the context of serious games.

As a researcher, I documented methods and findings for presentation at a local conference, and identified lessons learned which can be applied to future global health projects.

Social media post by LIFEHACK showing their high-fidelity wireframes.

Summary

In communications with Unicef Mongolia and Dr. Plinio Morita of the Ubiquitous Computing Lab at the University of Waterloo, my colleague Marcela Costa and I advised the development of LIFEHACK, an educational simulation game made by youth in Ulaanbaatar around sexual health, drug use, and other topics. The result was an example of global collaboration using local knowledge of the startups and the software development life cycle (SDLC) in Kitchener-Waterloo, and local knowledge of youth experiences in Ulaanbaatar to co-create health products. The project was presented at a Toronto conference on global health.

Problem

An initial meeting over Skype with the LIFEHACK team was facilitated by a translator (Russian to English, English to Russian) from Unicef Mongolia. Mock-ups and pitch decks previously provided were reviewed and the following problems were shared:

• Difficulty sustaining player engagement
• Lack of development talent

It became known in future meetings that a prototype needed to be developed for LIFEHACK to renew funding from Unicef Mongolia, thus the short runway for development was acknowledged.

Approach

The original approach proposed by LIFEHACK was to create 6 personas the player can play as through 6 different lifestyles, through 12 different topics. Each persona and topic combination would feature unique narrative, art, and minigames (ie. a basketball hoop shooting game for the fitness-related topic) to add interest to the narrative gameplay. Although comprehensive, the proposed content and development heavy approach was misaligned with the LIFEHACK team's timeline.

In review of the LIFEHACK's vision, resources, and talent, the teams' strengths laid in their lived experiences as youth growing up in Mongolia, connections to experts in Unicef Mongolia, and artistic talent (graphic design, photography, writing).

Through two more video calls, we further understood the vision of LIFEHACK to bring the game into middle school classrooms, and shared our intentions to use concepts from Self-Determination Theory (SDT) and iterative testing in the SDLC to help them develop their project.

Proposal

The following suggestions were presented to the LIFEHACK team prioritizing prototype development and scaling:

• Prototype. Focus on creating one storyline (one persona, one topic) that has a clear flow and thoughtful content. A minimally viable prototype (MVP) allows for early testing to identify issues and inconsistencies before investing in scaling more content. The perfected flow (including research processes and internal team management systems) can then be replicated for more storylines to reduce technical debt. Developers can be later hired to create high-fidelity products from a tested prototype.
• Focus on narrative. Given the limited programming talent on the Mongolian team, it was advised that minigames would be difficult to create in short time. The assumption that narrative alone cannot be engaging should be tested, as narrative content can be created quickly with art talent and little programming.
• Introduce multiplayer. Providing social relatedness, a psychological need according to SDT, could contribute to intrinsic motivation to continue play. If designed for classroom play, social elements could encourage discussion to explore impacts of life choices beyond the game.

Impact

In consideration of proposed changes, LIFEHACK chose to focus on one topic (drug use), and consider other elements in future designs.

This consultation effort was presented as a poster as an example of global collaboration health research and game development.

Publications

Chan, T., Costa, M., Somani, N., Morita, P., & Wallace, J. R. (2018). LIFEHACK - A Serious Game and Simulation by Mongolian Youth to Educate and Motivate Students to make Healthy Choices in Mongolia. Global Health Students and Young Professionals Summit, 2018.

Reflection

The consultation project demonstrated how local development knowledge from the Kitchener-Waterloo region could be applied to the development of products in international markets. It was an honour being a part of LIFEHACK's development and I believe it will have a positive impact on Mongolian classrooms when successful.

What I learned

Through this project I was able to learn about needs for software development in a global health context such as funding cycles and mobilizing talent effectively. As I was an outside consultant, I practiced appreciative inquiry and refrained from paternalistic suggestions to respect the Mongolian team's vision. I also deliberately made conversation points concise for effective translation over video calls.

What I would have done differently

It was assumed that the availability of developers and classrooms in Mongolia were similar to the Canadian environment. If time and opportunity had allowed it, it would have been worthwhile understanding the startup and game development ecosystem (e.g. talent costs) in Ulaanbaatar outside of LIFEHACK's experiences to provide more insightful advice.

As a designer, I attended team meetings to understand the needs of the event such as their ideal poster audience, required information, and printing specs.

As a illustrator, I created character artwork for three posters for three terms consistent to a theme using Adobe Photoshop and Canva.

Summary

The GI Game Jam is a series of tri-annual 'game jams' held by the Games Institute at the University of Waterloo to celebrate the game-making community in the Kitchener-Waterloo region. I volunteered on the GI Game Jam committee during my MSc career and produced a series of posters to advertise for the event with intentions of attracting greater participant (jammer) diversity.

Needs

I determined the posters needed to:

• Hold a consistent brand over the year to sustain loyalty, where beginners can become veterans with continual attendance.
• Appeal to demographics under-represented in game-making, but using un-intimidating graphics and colours that are not niche to one type of game or game culture.
• Accurately display event information including themes and sponsors, to allow for sponsor's brand visibility and invite them to return. Sponsors also add credibility to an event for potential attendees.

Senior members of the GI Game Jam committee believed that potential participants felt they are unable to participate because they (1) had little or no knowledge of scripting; and (2) had no team to participate with. These misconceptions were noticeably evident among non-computer science students and non male-identifying individuals.

To address these points, I deliberately designed the posters to attract first-time 'jammers.' The poster listed multiple roles in game development in addition to development roles, such as artists, musicians, and writers to appeal to jammers uninterested in programming or wished to create non-digital table-top games. Both teams and solo-jammers were explicitly welcomed to invite jammers with or without team members, and a clear event definition ('Make a game in 48 hours') was added. To purposefully appeal to those interested in the arts, character art was used on the posters in mimicry of anime, movies, and general pop culture. Character art was illustrated in Photoshop CS5.

Process Work

Works in progress are shown below, feedback was collected from the GI Game Jam team over Slack.

Impact

Posters were printed on letter sized paper and placed in approved strategic locations around campus. My involvement:

• Created a brand for the GI Game Jam, where participants were able to recognize the pink/purple/teal colour scheme and descriptions. Descriptive text is continually used as of 2020.
• Introduced a new tool Canva, to the GI Game Jam team which offered collaborative editing on a poster file from any computer. Future poster designers made use of the tool.
• Attracted more women+ and asset creators to attend the game jams. This was observed by a Shopify survey which asked for gender information upon registration. Organizers have observed the increase in women+ attendance and have notably attributed it to the posters. Additionally, due to increased interest from musicians and artists, the GI Game Jam now also encourages game asset creation (e.g. sprite files, textures, background music) alongside full game projects.
• Opened possibilities for swag. The character art files were provided to future teams in formats appropriate for re-use. Asides from re-use on posters, the graphics can be appropriate for swag such as stickers for promotion.

Reflection

This design project was a joy to lead and I am happy that I was given an opportunity to represent the game making community.

What I learned

This experience taught me to ask for and interpret feedback, and improved my graphic design skills through practice.

What I would have done differently

Although this project encouraged experimenting with designs, I would have liked to have standardized a poster layout (e.g. URL location, title position) to be reused. This choice would have sped up design work, built a more consistent brand, and sped up poster-making for future GI Game Jam teams if design talent was unavailable.

Since this project I have also become much better at design principles such as fonts and composition, if I were to re-do them, I would have improved the focal points and flow of items.

As a business lead, I devised a pitch and value proposition for Roze during the hackathon through interviews and a design sprint with my team.

As a researcher, I reviewed literature, and contributed to grants and ethics applications for research after the hackathon.

Summary

In a collaborative team of four, I interviewed persons with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) to design a gamified fatigue management app aimed at young women recently diagnosed with MS. We were awarded $15 000 in research funding to explore our product potential from the MS Society of Canada. The funding resulted in further interviews with MS patients and clinicians in the community and the dissemination of findings at the MS Society.

Team

Tina Chan (myself): Business Model

Marium Kirmani: UX Design

Rui Su: Clinical Expert

Lori-Ann Williams: Web Development

Problem & Approach

In a series of semi-structured interviews with mentors with lived experiences with MS present at H4H, we identified fatigue as a consistent worry of MS patients. Fatigue was limiting their abilities and motivation to participate in daily activities. Clinicians and neurodegenerative disease experts were subsequently consulted on potential solutions to fatigue, and regular exercise was cited as a benefit. However, there was difficulty motivating continuous exercising habits.

We returned to literature research to find MS had its highest prevalence in women, with the common age of onset between 25-35 years. For the duration of the hackathon we chose to focus on designing a product which can motivate young women recently diagnosed with MS to manage their fatigue.

Personas

We first created a persona of a young woman with MS who was:

• A digital native
• Aspirational in school and career goals
• A kitchener-waterloo resident

Her goals:

• Actively managing her MS symptoms
• Maintain energy levels for daily tasks

Her frustrations:

• MS resources were aimed at older adults
• Being seen differently with MS
• Taking time out of her schedule for MS-related check-ups in Toronto

In considering the persona, we decided the app needed to:

• Not be branded in a way which implies treatment or pathology
• Have an appearance competitive to current trendy fitness products (ie. fitbit)
• Motivate returning use without sense of punishment
• Functions are not limited by time or geography

Design

A mobile app 'Roze' was designed as our hack submission. Roze would deliver videos of exercises appropriate for persons with MS by MS experts, and the user could indicate when they have completed an exercise. Progress was visualized as a growing plant to represent the continued growth of the MS journey, and new variations of leaves, flowers, or other plants would be available with constant logging of exercise. Badges and awards would become available for challenges such as trying a new exercise, or continually exercising for a set number of days. It is assumed the woman with MS is already interested in exercise for fatigue management upon app usage.

Impact

Team photo (minus myself) with Dr. Lisa Loiselle (left) and Dr. Karla Boluk (right).

Following our win, we were given the opportunity to apply for a MS Society grant of $15 000 which we were successful in receiving with Dr. Boluk as our PI. We recognized that Roze's concept was feasible yet it was important to further understand our end-user before designing a solution.

Post-hackathon Research

Between 2017-2018, a series of one-on-one interviews with MS experts and young women with MS were conducted after ethics approval with an ethics application lead by Rui and Marium as Roze Labs who wished to take the project further as a entrepreneurial endeavour. At this point, I was no longer actively involved but provided consultation in an advisory role given my qualitative research experience. Results were shared at the MS Society September 2018 in Calgary by Rui and Marium, showing the systemic challenges facing young women with MS, while healthcare professionals acknowledged the need for more holistic tools for patients with MS.

The Roze Labs project delivered:

• Insight into the challenges of women with MS in the current healthcare system
• A research artifact to further explore the role of gamification in MS tools

Reflection

I am extremely proud of my team members Rui Su and Marium Kirmani for continuing the Roze Labs project into 2019. The project is currently on hold and I have taken an advisory role but I look forward to the impact Roze will have in the future.

What I learned

Through this project I practiced qualitative research skills and communicating with clinicians for digital health entrepreneurship. The support and mentorship from the MS society was invaluable, and I am grateful for their trust in our team for making use of their funds.

What I would have done differently

The technology use patterns of women with MS should be adequately explored independent of MS. In retrospect, inclusion of questions about attitudes towards technology in the interviews would have portrayed the MS patients as individuals beyond MS and could have revealed novel patterns worthwhile to HCI research. We should have tested our assumptions that women with MS approach exercise differently than women without MS, women with other health conditions requiring regular visits with health professionals, or other genders.

I would have also looked for publishing opportunities outside of the health space as I see this project being a very interesting case study of co-creation in computer science.

As a research assistant, I assisted Dr. Grindrod in setting up UX research materials for study sessions, interviewed community pharmacists, and set up a content management system using Microsoft Office.

As a designer and developer, I created a functional MVP using Articulate Storyline for research based on pharmacist feedback and communicated with an app development firm and graphic designer.

Summary

The 5in5 Pharmacy project was an experimental initiative in 2014 by Dr. Kelly Grindrod from the UW School of Pharmacy. The goal was to update practicing pharmacists' knowledge of the expanding scope of practice in Alberta and Ontario through short five-minute online modules. As a UX Researcher on this project, I developed a MVP to use in interviews with several community pharmacies at their place of work to understand their needs for extended education. Findings drove the project's later interface development. Today, the 5in5 Pharmacy platform has been recognized by the Ontario College of Pharmacists and has received funding for its development.

Problem

In 2014, Ontario and Alberta pharmacists had an expanded their scopes of practice to be authorized to perform adaptations, renewals, and injections. However, the University of Waterloo's School of Pharmacy recognized hesitations from practicing community pharmacists to perform new duties due to perceived lack of training. Although workshops and lunch and learns for additional training were available to pharmacists, there was poor information retaining a period after the event, and pharmacists reported a lack of free time to commit to sessions (regardless of online or in person).

Approach

Prior to my involvement, a small grant was received to explore the design and development of a short, modular, online continuing education course for pharmacists. The modular format allowed flexible completion throughout the day with repetitive and continuously updating content over time. The tool was named '5in5' as every course had 5 modules with 5 questions which could be completed in 5 minutes.

There was interest in exploring gamification to sustain the motivation of the pharmacist to use 5in5, but further research was required to understand the needs and wants of practicing pharmacists.

Wireframes created by Brad Jennings, a predecessor in my role.

Gameflow:

1. Registration, showing type of pharmacist, location, education, years in practice
2. Dashboard of all available and upcoming modules and courses
3. Quizzes with 5 questions, which pharmacist will complete one by one about their own practice
4. Score out of 5 is visible and resources on that course is unlocke after all five questions are completed
5. Return to dashboard with options to re-do module, other modules, or view unlocked resources

Research

I developed an MVP on articulate storyline through iterative design and visited pharmacists in their pharmacies to understand their experience with the tool. The goal was to identify gamification elements appropriate to motivating meaningful engagement and reflection for behaviour change in pharmacists.

Contextual Inquiry

Through talk-alouds, video-recorded gameplay, and semi-structured interviews with community pharmacists in their workplaces, we observed the following:

• Practicing pharmacists were aware of the expanding scope but needed an assurance of their competency.
• Pharmacists were interested in the actions of peers as well as what was allowed and encouraged by the OCP.
• Pharmacists requested 5in5 content for offline reference. For example, print-outs due to internet and devices not always being available.

In response to these observations, the following additions were added to the 5in5 design:

• Wording. We wanted to capture the right answers to persuade change in pharmacy practice. We separated the simulated case scenario and the pharmacist's own behaviour to encourage reflection:

  'Would Susan the competent pharmacist renew the blood pressure drug?'

  'Would you?'

  The pharmacist was encourage to question the conflict between their knowledge and actions.

• Avatars. Each case scenario had a unique avatar to represent a fictional pharmacist to contrast against the customized avatar of the user pharmacist.
• Score breakdown. Every question would display a percentage of how many other users answered it correctly versus incorrectly immediately after completion.
• Printable posters. The resources were now printable in infographic poster formats to be displayed in offices.

Revised Gameflow

Gamification elements like avatars, immediate feedback, and score comparisons with other 'players' were added.

1. Registration, showing type of pharmacist, location, education, years in practice
2. *Avatar creation, asking pharmacists to create a virtual representation of themselves in 5in5
3. Dashboard of all available and upcoming modules and courses
4. *Case Scenarios with 5 simulations about a fictional 'competent' pharmacist, which pharmacist will complete one by one
5. *Reflection Questions asking if the pharmacist would practice as they had answered for the fictional pharmacist
6. *Question score accompanied by the percentage of others who also scored incorrectly
7. Score out of 5 is visible and resources on that course is unlocked after all five questions are completed
8. Return to dashboard with options to re-do module, other modules, or view unlocked resources
9. *Feedback option for pharmacists to suggest new courses for 5in5

User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ) was later used when the 5in5 tool was matured and hosted online by hired developers and tested by students at the School of Pharmacy. I was not as involved in the research at this stage but had processed the data for SPSS analyses.

MVP

Multiple variations of a 5in5 MVP was developed using Articulate Storyline, through iterative testing. Changes were made between each study session.

Launched 2014 Design

After research with community pharmacists using the MVP I created, Monolith Interactive was hired to build out the app for online deployment. The app was dynamic with mobile screens, and accessible online.

When Monolith tookover the 5in5 tool's development, my role shifted to content creation by reviewing modules created by pharmacy educators with community pharmacists. I set up content management systems which tracked reviewers, contributors, and testers.

However, a large part of the role included testing and using a content management system developed by Monolith Interactive. In use, I discovered usability improvements such as:

• Need for confirmation buttons in case of accidentally deleting content
• A batch question and answer uploading system was needed, preferrably compatible with excel (.csv file uploads) which is the preferred format of contributors.
• Straightforward descriptions for the labels of form fields for new contributors to easily learn the system.

The question management system would often have errors from early development. The above shows errors in ordrring from a drop-down list.

Impact

Through my development, testing, and content curation work I:

• Reduced development costs by 30%, based off a quote by app development firms which factored in MVP and testing.
• Validated a workflow for scaling education content
• Troubleshooted a content management system for future maintainance
• Finalized content for two courses for community pharmacists (Adaptations, Renewals)

The 5in5 app has since resulted in published studies based on the activity of its current users.

Reflection

One of the strengths of this project was definitely the detailed devlog I kept under the advice of my supervisor Dr. Grindrod. The logs have been useful for students who assumed my role when I 'graduated' from the project.

What I learned

5in5 taught me content management, designing scaling processes, and keeping records, but also the discipline to self-manage and confidence to speak out to share ideas no matter how novel at the time.

What I would have done differently

I have improved drastically in leadership and technical skills since 2014. One regret was to not have taken a more active role in development once the project was handed off to Monolith and have had missed out on a learning opportunity.

With my experience today, if I were to re-approach this project, I would have prioritized content management systems in discussions with Monolith. We had conducted a series of user tests with the consumer-side of the tool, but neglected to engineer a process for content curation. For example, the process of how an identified need in education would turn into questions, then reviewed by professionals, and then uploaded with the least developer support possible.

My main role was business development, where I identified market opportunities and potential funding sources, as well as created and presented the final pitch.

I also used my background in public health to consult the app design, such as ensuring accuracy of representation and finding its fit in the consumer's workflow.

Summary

With my friends and colleagues from the University of Waterloo's Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research group, we participated in the 2019 Hack 4 Good hackathon hosted by GeekSpeak commerce in Whitby. The hackathon theme was 'AI' and we developed a mobile app to assist therapy appointment for persons with bi-polar disorder.

Team

Tina Chan (myself): Adoption and Implementation

Marvin Pafla: Backend Development

Kenny Fung: Frontend Development

Andrew Cen: UX design

Joanna L.: Literature Review

Problem

A counselling appointment only captures a snapshot client's state, and recounts risk poor memory. For a client with bi-polar disorder, ups and downs of moods may be of interest to trck. However, self-report or scale-based mood surveys have drawbacks as the client can become accustomed to the questions periodically.

Approach

Journaling has been documented in literature to be an effective way of stress-management though reflection and is often prescribed by psychotherapists. We were also inspired by mood-tracking journals due to their simple visualizations, and wished to leverage AI (theme of the hackathon) to automatically determine mood based on journal entry text.

Example of a mood tracking bullet journal.

Design

A recurrent neural net determined sentiment with movie review data sets used for training. (60% accuracy during the hack)

The app's user flow as well as how Journaly would fit into existing workflows of therapists and their clients was considered using a systems approach.

App Design

It was important that the app did not appear paternalistic and recognize that consistent journaling or consistent positive moods was what to strive for. Journaly is a patient shared decision making tool, helping patients under their weekly patterns and verbalize to therapists their experiences.

UI design demonstrating user flow created by my team member Andrew Cen who was leading UX design.

Upon login the user would:

1. View progress, showing how many entries were logged in a week
2. Log a journal entry or a task. Self-reporting a mood is an option, but sentiment anaysis automaticlally calculates mood as well.
3. View moods over a calendar which would be colour-coded with a mood score. A blue would represent negative mood, a green would represent a positive mood.

Use in appointment

It was very important for the app to be assistive in an appointment and remained flexible to a therapist's individual methods.

During the appointment:

1. Patient reviews mood calendar before appointment, refreshing memory of the week.
2. Shares mood calendar with therapist when appropriate for therapist to get an executive summary of mood changes.
3. Open journal entry of interest by expanding dates on the coloured calendar if appropriate

Implementation and Adoption

NSERC-Engage grants can fund co-operation with academic research with practicing counselors to improve usability. Academic research could also open collaborations in industry. Counselors involved in studies could become champions for the tool, and government grants such as Ontario Centre of Excellence grants and Federal Government funding for Mental Health and Addictions can fund further development costs if studies validate the concept.

Impact

The development of this hack

• Received $5000 in prize money.
• Inspired the 2020 Hack 4 Good Hackathon theme to be 'Biohacking' by drawing attention to the importance of health innovation
• Created an artifact with future research potential.

Reflection

It is recognized that outside of a hackathon the many assumptions we made in Journaly would need to be validated. The assumption that sentiment scores translate to mood is the core one. Furthermore, as with all assistive technology, we need to confirm that the app does save resources (time) rather than instead require the therapist to conduct another timely task of validating Journaly's report with the patient. Journaly is a successful hack evidenced by the win, and has the potential to become a research artifact or tool for an interested researcher.

What is next?

I personally am not confident in Journaly's commercialization potential due to the saturation of mental health apps in the market, but I believe its visualization and AI-driven components should be considered by existing products. I am also very proud of my team members and teamwork through quick effective decision-making over the 36 hour event. (We also all took care make sure everyone got 8hrs of sleep!)

What I would have done differently

If given more time our team would have looked for a more appropriate dataset than movie reviews to train the AI. It would have also been aspirational to incorporate computer vision to convert diaries on paper to text for analysis. A self-report override for mood logging would also be helpful to improve accuracy.

As an advisor, I facilitated the design of user experience research (UXR) and reviewed pitch decks for areas of improvement.

Summary

Privehealth is a social venture founded in 2018 to prevent data breaches in health records through better cybersecurity training. My advisory role at PriveHealth was an opportunity to practice hands-on User Experience Research outside of an academic setting and apply my knowledge of research design and startups. Results from interviews validated the proposed products to secure funding and was valuable market research. A pilot test was scheduled to be conducted at a local hospital, yet Privehealth has been put on indefinite hold due to lack of market need.

Problem

Data breaches in healthcare could be mitigated with cybersecurity training, yet meaningful completion and retaining the knowledge to apply in practice is difficult for healthcare professionals.

Approach

Gamified training modules to encourage regular engagement for health professionals. The content would be initially hosted on existing hospital training systems before becoming a standalone platform.

Research

I cannot share the results of research due to NDA, but I can describe the process.

We approached healthcare professionals with semi-structured interviews which explored their perceived knowledge of cybersecurity, opinions towards existing cybersecurity tools, and their fears regarding information management. The interviews were both conducted at workplaces as well as in PriveHealth's office for professionals unable to invite us into their workplace. Video-recordings were taken with consent to take note of the body language of persons interviewed and provide context of their workspace.

Impact

The research with the health professionals further validated the need of improved cybersecrity training in the Kitchener-Waterloo area. Findings allowed for:

• Further funding from pitch competitions ($2000) due to validation.
• Support from interviewees with offers to champion the product in later stages
• Market research on the needs of health providers to inform future strategy of PriveHealth.

Reflection

As of July 2019, PriveHealth was put on hold due to an identified lack of market need. Although the product was validated, hospitals would develop their own internal training courses for their employees -thus declined the pilot test scheduled.

What I learned

It was my first time interviewing clinicians without an existing tool for them to give direct feedback to. This experience improved my interviewing skills and thinking quickly to get needed information during an interview.

What I would have done differently

The team has moved on to other endeavours but if PriveHealth wished to pivot, I would see value in becoming consultants to larger corporations and pursue intrapreneurship with employees through collaborations. Alternatively, PriveHealth could explore servicing smaller independent health providers (e.g. optometrists, counselling offices), or pivot further to teaching cybersecurity to non-traditional handlers of health data. With linkable data posing as threats to exposing individuals' health data, there may even be a market in creators of wellness e-commerce shop owners.

As an designer, I created designs in Adobe llustrator and for print in Tokyo.

Task

A SV t-shirt was to be designed with feedback from the conference chairs of the ACM ISS 2018 conference. T-shirts were worn by the SV team who acted as guides for conference attendees.

Needs

The T-shirt was to fit three criteria:

• Easy for conference attendees to identify SVs
• Relevance to the conference theme and location
• Able to be printed in Tokyo within budget

Bright colours unusual with locals in the financial district of Tokyo where the conference was held were chosen to allow SVs to be easily identified as SVs. Pink and blue were specifically chosen as they were the branding colours of the 2018 ISS conference.

Design

Discussions with conference chairs in Waterloo Ontario and Tokyo Japan took place. Colours were decided on together, and then I forwarded designs for approval.

'Student Volunteer' in both japanese (translated by Tokyo-based volunteers) and english were written on the back of shirts to commemorate the conference's location. Extra T-shirts without the 'Student Volunteer' print were printed to be sold to attendees as souvenirs at cost price.

Impact

Shirts were worn by SVs and extras were sold as conference souvenirs to guests.

Reflection

The T-shirts contributed to the success of the conference.

What I would have done differently

In reflection, the choice of colours was not preferable for sale due to its deliberate harsh contrasts which some attendees disliked. It is advised that future T-shirt designs would ideally be appropriate for both volunteer use and sale to attendees. A balance could be reached between conference brand visibility and potential for daily wear post-conference when it comes to design.

Future Work

I later submitted to the CHI 2020 SV T-shirt contest but it was unfortunately not the winning entry.

Design

Given identified needs, I first familiarized myself with aspects of Hawaii unique to the region ranging from tourism to the arts. I chose to focus on the exports of Hawaii (pineapples, coconuts, flowers, sugarcane) due to their aesthetics being translatable to recognizable simple design and its international relevance.

The shirt was to foremost represent the conference's focus on Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), thus a desktop computer with the conference name was chosen as the main point. A pair of human hands framed the screen to emphasize the human aspect of HCI. Orange was chosen as the shirt base as it was one of the colours (the other being green) of the CHI 2020 logo.

In reflection of my previous SV shirt designs which served the purpose of SV visibility but were not preferable to daily wear post-conference, I decided to borrow from graphic design trends of late 2019 and used an astrology themed layout.

As a game designer I designed the game flow with my partner and created all art assets within 36 hours.

As a game developer I published Mr. Goose's Dressup on the Play Store with Google Play Console after modifying it to an appropriate .apk file in Unity.

Summary

With my partner in the developer role, Mr. Goose's Dressup was created at a 36 hour game jam. It was both our first time creating a mobile app on Unity. Given the short time we wanted to use a simple game loop (cick for clothes) which could be incrementally scalable (more clothes). Mr. Goose's Dressup was uploaded onto the Google Play store and attracted interest from the University of Waterloo student community.

Gameplay

1. Player taps/clicks the goose to 'honk'
2. The numbers at the top of the screen increases by one with each honk
3. When the number matches or exceeds a number in the grid a the bottom of the screen, a new clothing item is unlocked.
4. Player taps the item and it appears on the goose

The game ends at 999 honks.

Impact

Mr. Goose Dressup has since:

• Received 100+ downloads from Google Play

• Been displayed for students and visitors at GI game jam showcases
• Inspired others to express interest in making mobile games at the GI game jams.

*Bonus: Goose-themed games were jokingly discouraged for the following GI game jam by organizers because of how 'annoying' Mr. Goose's Dressup was.

Reflection

I had a lot of fun making this game and I was very happy that others enjoyed it as well.

What I learned

I learned about publishing games on the Google Play Console, especially app signing by Google Play; Keys, certificates, and keystores.

What I would have done differently

As we did not plan to scale Mr. Goose's Dressup, a proper content management system was not set up. All assets were hard-coded into Unity scripts, resulting in a rather large file size. If we were to reapproach the project, I would like to host the game's assets online so players have access to new content as it is added.

As an artist I created all game art including UI elements in World Smash, and configured the files to be appropriate for browser (itch.io) and Android (Google Play).

Summary

The GI Game Jam theme for the term was 'worlds' and my team and I developed an Android game using Unity with the idea of a multiplayer game with one screen. The learning goal for me was to improve my drawing skills over a quick period of time.

Team:

Tina (myself): Art

David Dufour, Phil Downey: Development

Gameplay

1. Player 1 would pick a planet.
2. Player 1 would choose two items to equip their planet with. All items have certain stat bonusses.
3. Player 1 hands the phone to Player 2.
4. Player 2 would pick a planet.
5. Player 2 would choose two items to equip their planet with. All items have certain stat bonusses.
6. Player 2 places phone the table and a countdown starts with instructions to tap the screen when countdown finishes.
7. The player who taps at a time closest to when the countdown ends wins and the other player's planet explodes. Items chosen bonuses factor into the final score.
8. Item stats would be revealed over time with a certain number of battles.

The game would reset at the end of every battle.

Impact

World Smash has since:

• Received downloads in 3 continents on Google Play

• Been displayed for students and visitors at GI game jam showcases

*Bonus: The game was tested for fun on large screen displays and was recognized as a potential study tool.

Reflection

This was the second mobile game app I created with a team at a game jam, and I was able to apply previous learnings into the project. Content management was in lists which made updating content simple throughout the jam.

What I learned

The file was created in two different versions of Unity (2017 and 2019) and it proved more difficult to convert into an .apk file appropriate for Google Play. There were inconsistences in display and minor differences in code. In re-writing and re-designing sections within the Unity environment, I improved my understanding of Unity.

What I would have done differently

The planets were of different sizes which meant some items drawn using a larger planet as base model (Jupiter) looked off on a smaller planet (Mercury). If re-approaching the project, I would have made sure all items were appropriate for all planet sizes by design (e.g. floating), or automatically scaled to the size of the planet chosen. If we were given more time, I would have also liked to add more sound effects to the game to give players feedback on their interactions.

As an artist I created game spritesheets and animations.

Summary

The Global Game Jam theme for the 2020 year was 'Repair' and my team and I developed an browser-based game where, as a skeleton doctor, you repair other skeletons by providing them with organs. It was a novel spin on beat-em-ups where you 'beat them up' and you instead heal the injured comically. Javascript and Adobe Photoshop was used.

Team:

Tina (myself): Art

David Dufour, Adam Shepley: Development

Animations

Sprites were created in Adobe Photoshop. The attacks of the skeleton doctor had to align with the head, chest, and abdomen of the skeletons. Separate spritesheets were made when the skeleton received organs.

Gameplay

1. Left and Right Arrows to walk back and forth.
2. When in close proximity with a skeleton, use A, S, or D keys to insert an organ:
3. A: Insert Lungs
4. S: Insert Eyes
5. D: Insert Guts
The organs must be inserted in the ASD order. Some skeletons already have lungs or eyes.
6. Repair 15 skeletons without incurring too much damage to win.

s

Impact

Dr. Skelly has since:

• Been displayed for students and visitors at GI game jam showcases

Reflection

This was my first global game jam, and it was very exciting to be working alongside game makers all across the world in one weekend. I was very happy in our browser-based game since it could be easily enjoyed by anyone when given the link.

What I learned

I gained a lot of experience creating frame-based animations and spritesheets. When planning for animations to interact with eachother, it was important for me to have guidelines to make sure artwork lined up and made sense to the player.

What I would have done differently

I would have used a more consistent naming convention for all the animation frames. I had difficuty predicting the number of frames and sprite sets as development moved on. Next time I would use a number system that is both descriptive and scalable.

As a programmer I made use of Powerpoint's multiple animations and buttons to create gameful interactions.

Summary

Prior to the Game Jam, some students have mentioned to me that although they would have liked to make games, they were neither coders nor artists. We took it as a challenge to create a game using Powerpoint, a tool many students were familiar with as an example that anyone can start making games. We explored as many game mechanics as possible that were translatable to a click and point interface and in the end we created Hit ESC which was a series of mini-games within a room escape adventure from dialogue systems and puzzles, to shooter games. Hit ESC's narrative asks the player to survive a regular work day as a software developer by navigating minor inconveniences.

Team:

Tina (myself): Development

David Dufour: Art, Narrative

Gameplay

There are 5 mini-games in the series.

1. Find items need to go to work in an object finding game.
2. Navigate traffic using arrow keys to choose the free lanes in a driving simulation.
3. Find items to remind you of your password to log into the computer.
4. Close popups before the timer runs out to finish logging in, in a shooter game.
5. Get out of an uncomfortable situation with a co-worker by choosing the correct dialogue options.
6. Find items which would help you escape from a locked supply closet.
7. Figure out which e-mail to forward to your co-worker through a logic puzzle.

The player is instructed to hit ESC to exit the Powerpoint file.

Impact

Despite its simplicity, Hit ESC has made a large impact. Hit ESC has:

• Been displayed for students and visitors at GI game jam showcases
• Inspired non-coders to make games at game jams. New teams in 2020 Global Game Jam used Powerpoint as a tool.
• Been used in computer science classrooms to demonstrate that Powerpoint is a fast prototyping tool.
• Been recognized by Microsoft for its innovative use of Powerpoint:

Reflection

It was rewarding to later see teams of non-coders say they used Powerpoint as a game-making tool after seeing Hit ESC. We achieved our goal of showing that almost anyone can make games. I was also happy to hear university-level lecturers use the game file to teach their students about prototyping.

What I learned

I learned a lot about Powerpoint and its animation and 3D libraries . In the future, I would love to create interactive presentations for group meetings or online courses.

What I would have done differently

This project was almost designed in reverse, where we identified available mechanics before designing gameplay. With my current knowledge of Powerpoint's features, I would have designed for a looped experience instead of linear minigames by making use of linked slides. Embedding other Microsoft product files like excel and word would also be worth exploring.