Using our lo-fi prototype and design justifications, we put together a protocol for our simple evaluation. We structured our evaluation into three stages: pre-observation questions, observation, and post-observation questions. The pre-observation questions gathered demographic data to construct participant profiles. During the observation, participants were instructed to complete three different tasks, one at a time, while thinking aloud. The team member holding the evaluation session took notes. Afterwards, post-observation questions asked for verbal user feedback in completing these tasks.
Through analysis of this simple evaluation, we translated usability feedback into concrete design suggestions, informing the reiteration of our lo-fi prototype before increasing its fidelity.
Our user demographics consisted of one undergraduate student and two graduate students. None of them studied Human-Centered Design & Engineering. They all considered themselves to be experienced in social gaming as well as frequent users of gaming platforms, such as Discord.