Avaliação semântica do design de interfaces humano-computador em jogos digitais fundamentada em uma abordagem multimétodos.

Abstract

The purpose of this research was double fold: (i) conceiving and parameterizing a semantic approach for evaluating visual and design aspects of human-computer interfaces of digital games; (ii) integrating it into the multi-method approach conceived by Queiroz (2001). Such a research effort can be justified by the contextual particularities of this software application category with regard to other ones, mainly in what concerns use motivation and, the consequent need for a specific usability evaluation approach. The research is also justified by expanding the scope of the original approach, considering, in addition to the syntactic aspects, the aspects of meaning and understanding. The approach was validated from a case study, involving the digital game Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, in which the impact of the inclusion of the semantic component on the evaluation process was investigated. Thus, two experiments were performed, with 30 users each. In the first group, only the syntactic component of evaluation was considered, consisting of: (i) heuristic evaluation, (ii) measurement of performance of use and (iii) subjective satisfaction of the user. In the second group, the semantic component of evaluation was incorporated into the multi-method approach. The research method was mixed, aiming at the collection of data of a qualitative and quantitative nature, under a theoretical-pragmatic premise. The comparison of the results obtained by the considered evaluation strategies revealed positive impacts and contributions of and including semantic aspects to the original approach. This makes it possible to enrich the usability evaluation process of a game interface, by producing complementary and more robust results.