Project Overview
Problem:
There was an earlier version of Tenacity Flow, Tenacity, was made for the ipad as part of the initial research paper led by Prof. Kurt Squire that showed that self regulation, player attention and mindfulness is something that could be trained through specially designed games. However, the research paper also reported shallow engagement from the participants. The objective of Tenacity Flow is to address the issue of the low engagement and build a product that students would use in their day-to-day lives. It needs to be able to both train and track the kids in self regulation and mindfulness.
There was an earlier version of Tenacity Flow, Tenacity, was made for the ipad as part of the initial research paper led by Prof. Kurt Squire that showed that self regulation, player attention and mindfulness is something that could be trained through specially designed games. However, the research paper also reported shallow engagement from the participants. The objective of Tenacity Flow is to address the issue of the low engagement and build a product that students would use in their day-to-day lives. It needs to be able to both train and track the kids in self regulation and mindfulness.
Solution:
To better understand the needs of the students and to build a product they would want, we thought it would be a good design approach to have a participatory design framework. This would allow the end users to leverage their interests, opinions and suggestions during the ideation phase of the project which would in turn make the product more suited to users needs and wants. Along with this approach, we thought it would be effective to design Tenacity Flow on a wearable device to enrich the experience and make it more accessible which would result in more engagement from the students.
To better understand the needs of the students and to build a product they would want, we thought it would be a good design approach to have a participatory design framework. This would allow the end users to leverage their interests, opinions and suggestions during the ideation phase of the project which would in turn make the product more suited to users needs and wants. Along with this approach, we thought it would be effective to design Tenacity Flow on a wearable device to enrich the experience and make it more accessible which would result in more engagement from the students.
Features:
- Three games on the WatchOS specially designed to train kids in self regulation, player attention, improving player focus and mindfulness.
- A daily task/quest system that would provide the kids structure.
- Incentives to encourage the students to do these tasks and play these games on a day to day basis which would increase their engagement with Tenacity Flow.
- A companion iOS app where the users could customize the games, equip cosmetic rewards, track their progress and keep up with their daily quests and reminders.
The Games
Before Tenacity Flow, the earlier research project was based on Tenacity, an ipad meditative game that trained focused attention by monitoring breath. The players had to tap the screen at each out-breath. Players had to tap with one finger for 4 breaths and two fingers for the 5th breath. This required the players to focus their attention and concentrate on their breath cycles. We used this as a reference and designed games that improved on the concept.
Breathe Focus:
This game was designed to be the most similar to the original Tenacity game while utilizing the accessibility and intuitive interface that the WatchOS offers.
- The user sets the breath cycle they want to focus on and a time for how long they want to do it. For example, if the user picks 5, after every 5 breathes, the user swipes across the screen.
- We wanted to give the users this freedom of choosing their own breath cycles because of the feedback we received from the students during testing.
- We also changed the default duration of the timer to be lower and the breaths per cycle to 4.
- We changed it to be 4 specifically because it is a lot more rhythmic and familiar with other aspects of life, like music, dance etc
- If the user swipes correctly he gets a “Perfect”, if the user gets it slightly wrong, they get an “Almost” and if the user is completely off, they get a “Try Again”.
- We wanted to make sure the messages weren’t too harsh. We wanted them to still feel encouraged to continue instead of feeling bad that they messed up.
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Breathe Infinite:
Breathe Infinite is a more flexible version of Breathe Focus, where the user doesn’t have to set a breath cycle, but can swipe whenever they choose to do so.
- They do however accumulate points if they swiped at the same breath cycle they did previously. The game rewards correct streaks but doesn’t enforce it.
- The streak can be changed at any time and it’s a more relaxing experience.
- This did end up being the more popular version of the game based on our research.
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Lotus Swipe:
The final game is Lotus Swipe. The game was designed to train memory, focus and mindfulness. It is basically a memory based game where you have 4 shapes with 4 different colors arranged in a certain part of the watch - top, right, left and bottom.
- The users have to memorize the image the game displays initially and then match the shapes that show up after to the right positions by swiping in the direction.
- After a while, a new image pops up which they have to memorize and continue to do the same. This also was a very popular game according to the research.
- We received feedback from some of the students that the game ended up being too easy.
- While we could have changed the difficulty of the game for everyone, we thought it would be unfair to the students.
- Instead we had special customizable content they could unlock by playing the game for a while, that users could equip to make the game harder if they choose to do so.
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Companion iOS App
The objective of the iOS app was to better facilitate some of the experiences we wanted to create that couldn’t be possible on the WatchOS due to its limitations. We wanted the mobile app to be the main hub where the user can control every aspect of the games on the watch, manage cosmetic customizations, unlock pets, create reminders, look at their progress along with meaningful data about their performance and look at their quests.
Home Screen:
The Home Screen is designed to show the user a snapshot of all the important information they need to know while also acting as a guide to help the user progress.
- Contains the progress stats of the player for the games on the watch.
- Then there is a pet/companion which talks to the user, reminds the user and guides them.
- Then there is a goals section which also shows players the progress they have made towards their goals in each of the games.
- Under that is the quests section which shows players a silhouette of a pet they can unlock next if they complete the quest
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Game Stats:
The Game Stats screens are designed to provide the user with an in depth view of their progress and performance with respect to the three games on the WatchOS.
- Players swipe left and right to move between each of the games.
- It also displays the progress they have made towards a goal they have for the particular game.
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Companions:
The Companion screens showcase all the pets that the user has unlocked or can unlock in the future.
- The user can choose between all of his unlocked pets and equip one of them as his main companion.
- The players can tap on the locked pets to check how to unlock them.
- The unlocked pets are shown in color while the locked ones are silhouettes.
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Nudges:
The Nudges feature was designed to encourage self regulation by allowing users to set reminders to complete goals or play games. There are certain quests that appear that require users to set nudges to enforce the behavior.
- We wanted the players to consciously set reminders to play the game.
- The user can set upto 6 nudges (this was a deliberate choice for research purposes)
- We also named them “Nudges” instead of “Reminders” as the term reminders makes it seem like they are reminded to HAVE to play the games while we wanted to only nudge them to WANT to play the games.
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The Pet Sytem
The concept of pets was something we were toying with very early on in the development. We didn’t really commit too many resources into it because it would take a long time and resources that we weren’t sure was worth it. So initially we just teased it in one of our mockups that was being tested by the students to gauge interest for the concept. We received overwhelming feedback and positive responses towards this idea. At this point we decided to allocate time and resources for the pet system. According to the research data and the player feedback we gathered, the pet system was a huge success.
- We decided to have a variety of pets the players could unlock and equip. We made 15 pets each with 3 variants of increasing rarity.
- The rarer ones had better designs and had special elements in them to make them feel worth their rarity.
- Some pets could also be acquired by purchasing eggs if they want a specific pet. We didn’t want the players to be forced to have pets that they would only unlock through quests.
- We wanted to give them the freedom of being able to get a pet that they really liked by just playing the games a bunch and collecting enough in-game currency to unlock the pets they like.
- We also designed the pets to be mentors or companions that would guide the users on their journey of better mental health while using the app.
- The companions will talk to the players, remind them of daily quests and tasks.
- The companions will also send the user positive messages.
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The Quest
& Reward System
& Reward System
The Daily Quest and Rewards system was really important. I designed it in a way that it could provide structure to the player so they would play each game enough that it would progressively train their sense of self regulation and mindfulness if they followed it. I also designed it so that the player would come back everyday to complete them so we could increase the amount of player engagement in the game.
- The quests were usually something where the player had to play either one or all of the games for a specific amount of time or rounds These would refresh daily.
- We also had rewards that the players would receive to incentivize doing these quests.
- While we initially had rewards be customizables for pets like hats, sunglasses etc, we quickly pivoted from it since we decided to make our pet system be more focused on collecting more pets.
- Based on previous feedback, we also noticed that players wanted more options to customize the games as well.
- Specifically for games such as Lotus Swipe, we designed rewards that would not only provide cosmetic changes but also modify in-game difficulty which was something a lot of players requested.
- So the rewards ended up being pet unlocks, game customizations, in-game currency and EXP.
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The Covid-19 Impact
Since our project was designed for research purposes, we focused on making Tenacity Flow research ready first. We were not expanding our resources initially to make it look commercial ready, therefore it didn't have a visually appealing and clean UI. Once the app was research ready, the idea was to then spend a couple of months on the UI, Visual design of the applications, a robust onboarding experience and quality of life improvements. However, our plan was completely shutdown because of COVID-19. The lab had to close and in turn the commercial development sprint of the project was called off. Since the project was already research ready, the research side of the project was unaffected and the paper was submitted for publishing. However we could not work on the app to make it “commercial ready”. We still put the app out on the app store for people to try out but in no means was it ready.
Takeaways
& Next Steps
& Next Steps
This was one of my most important experiences as a UI/UX designer. This project taught me a lot about design, user experience, research and collaboration. The most valuable takeaway from this project was all the tips, suggestions, advice and guidance I got from the PhD students I was working with and Prof. Kurt Squire. I was given a lot of practical knowledge and wisdom collectively from the team.
I also learnt how a participatory design approach works and the benefits it brings to the development of a product. The design methodology showed that enabling students to participate in the ideation phase of the design of the games, features and functionalities. It’s not only valuable to the developers but also the users themselves. Not only did they provide us with amazing and crucial feedback to generate novel ideas, but they also found value in being involved in the design process. Through this design approach, us developers also learned that by framing design problems as usability tests or design workshops with end users, generates insights that we would have been overlooked.
I also learnt how a participatory design approach works and the benefits it brings to the development of a product. The design methodology showed that enabling students to participate in the ideation phase of the design of the games, features and functionalities. It’s not only valuable to the developers but also the users themselves. Not only did they provide us with amazing and crucial feedback to generate novel ideas, but they also found value in being involved in the design process. Through this design approach, us developers also learned that by framing design problems as usability tests or design workshops with end users, generates insights that we would have been overlooked.
