The Cost of Bad UI vs. Good UX
The Cost of Bad UI vs. Good UX
It’s a tale as old as indie game development itself: a brilliant mechanic, a unique concept, shattered by a clunky interface. Many aspiring developers pour their hearts into groundbreaking gameplay, only to see their creations fall flat because players can’t navigate the menus or understand the controls. This isn’t just about lost sales; it’s about squandered potential and wasted effort.
This article illustrates how prioritizing good user experience (UX) and avoiding common user interface (UI) pitfalls from the outset can save significant time, money, and player engagement. We’ll show how consistent habit-building around user testing and iterative design, documented through a tool like a game dev journal, creates a smoother path to player retention and positive reviews, ultimately proving that good UX isn’t a luxury, but a necessity for indie success.
Early Prototyping: The Foundation
Many new developers jump straight into coding core mechanics, delaying UI considerations until much later. This is a common pitfall. The cost of fixing fundamental UX issues post-hoc is astronomically higher than addressing them during early prototyping.
Instead, when you first conceptualize your game, create mockups or even simple paper prototypes of your UI. Think about player flow: what’s the first thing they see? How do they move between screens? How do they interact with the world? Use a game dev journal to sketch these ideas and document your initial thoughts on player interaction. Even before writing a single line of code, you can identify potential friction points. This early documentation is a crucial first step in your game development log.
Vertical Slice: Testing the Waters
Once you have a basic vertical slice of your gameplay, resist the urge to immediately polish visuals. Focus intensely on the user experience. This is the stage where initial user testing, even with friends or family, becomes invaluable.
Observe how players interact with your game. Do they understand what to do? Are they frustrated by the inventory system? Can they easily navigate the skill tree? Document every observation in your game dev journal, categorizing feedback as UI problems or UX issues. For example, if players can’t find the “save” button, that’s a UI issue; if they save but don’t understand where their game is saved, that’s a UX problem. This is where your game development log starts to become a powerful tool to track game development progress.
Alpha Testing: Iteration is Key
As your game approaches an alpha state, expand your user testing to a wider audience. This could be through a closed Discord group or a small pool of external testers. At this stage, your game dev journal should be a central hub for all feedback.
Create a consistent system for logging bugs and UX friction points. For example, you might tag entries with “UI,” “UX,” “Bug,” and “Feature Request.” Prioritize fixes based on severity and frequency of player complaints. Many developers fall into the trap of only fixing bugs, neglecting the deeper UX problems that lead to player frustration. Remember, a perfectly functional but confusing UI is still a barrier to enjoyment.
Beta Testing: Polishing the Experience
The beta phase is about refinement and ensuring the player journey is as smooth as possible. At this point, most major UI elements should be in place, and your focus shifts to subtle improvements and edge cases. Your game dev journal will be critical for tracking minor tweaks and their impact.
Are players still getting stuck on specific puzzles because the UI cues aren’t clear? Are menu animations too slow or too fast? These small details contribute significantly to the overall feel of the game. Use your game development log to track changes and see if they resolve the issues identified in earlier tests. This iterative process, consistently documented, prevents the “death by a thousand cuts” scenario where many small UI annoyances cumulatively drive players away.
Post-Launch: Learning and Adapting
Launch day is not the end of your UX journey; it’s just the beginning. Post-launch, you’ll receive a flood of feedback from actual players. This is where the habits you’ve built with your game dev journal truly shine.
Monitor reviews, forum posts, and social media for common complaints related to UI and UX. Are players abandoning your game after the first hour? Investigate if it’s due to confusing tutorials or unclear objectives. Your game dev journal becomes a living document, helping you plan patches and future updates based on real-world player behavior. Tracking game development progress post-launch is just as vital as pre-launch.
For indie developers and students looking to internalize these habits and consistently track game development progress, a dedicated tool is invaluable. Our game development journal, specifically designed for solo developers and small teams, helps you document every stage of your project, from initial concepts to post-launch reflections. It ensures that good UX isn’t an afterthought, but an integrated part of your development process, saving you time, money, and ultimately, ensuring your promising mechanics don’t become dead on arrival. Start your game development journey with our dedicated journal today.
By making UX and UI a priority from day one, documenting your process diligently, and consistently iterating based on player feedback, you dramatically increase your chances of indie success. Don’t let a great game be undermined by a bad interface.