Cooking Mama (Cookstar)
Role: UX Research, UX/UI Design | Time: Two Month | Tools: Figma, Google Workspace​​
Overview
Cooking Mama: Cookstar is a cookery simulation-styled minigame compilation video game that allows players to experience various cooking activities in a fun and interactive way. As a fan of this game myself, my goal for this project was to re-imagine certain aspects of the game to improve the players' overall experience and make it even more fun.
Purpose​
This case study serves as a demonstration of my passion for UX design and my ability to analyze and optimize the user experience of an existing video game. While I am not affiliated with the official development of Cooking Mama: Cookstar, this project allowed me to apply UX design principles and methodologies in a practical context.
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Disclaimer: This case study is a self-initiated educational project and is not affiliated with any official entities or organizations.
Discover
Gameplay Observation​
To kick off my UX case study, I started by diving into the game, spending a good few hours playing it. As a Cooking Mama fan myself, I'd actually played the game before, but it had been sitting on my shelf untouched for at least a year at this point. My goal was to really get a feel for the game and better understand how players experience it. I wanted to reconnect with my own impressions before diving into my research process.
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After investing some time in gameplay, a few things became clear to me:
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I noticed that some of the controls were a bit vague. There were moments when I wasn't sure if I needed to press the A button quickly or hold it down.
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Whenever I encountered a task that wasn't immediately clear, I caught myself restarting recipes often. If I didn't grasp the mechanics right away, I tended to end up with a lower score than I wanted.
Player Feedback​
To further understand players' experiences, I took a few steps to get some feedback from real players. First, I looked into a bunch of game reviews on YouTube and read several review articles. It was evident that players faced similar issues to what I had previously observed. They were frustrated by some unclear aspects of the controls and how game mechanics impacted their overall scores and cooking experience. I also noted that many players found it frustrating that you could completely ruin a recipe and still move forward in the game like nothing happened.
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After absorbing these insights, I decided to reach out to a few friends who also shared an interest in Cooking Mama. Hearing their perspectives was valuable to me in finding out what pain points really stand out. Combining my various research methods, I selected the quotes that resonated with me the most and displayed them above.
Define
The Problem​
Players universally agree: it's time to enhance controls and revamp the scoring system. Control confusion disrupts scores, while the absence of do-overs impacts recipe ratings. Good and intuitive controls are crucial for creating an enjoyable gaming experience. If controls are unclear, unresponsive, or difficult to use, players might become frustrated and disconnected from the game.
The Solution
With the knowledge I've gathered, I'm set to tackle these challenges in a hands-on manner. My approach involves using what I've learned to reshape the game's pain points that have led to player frustration and dwindling interest. By directly confronting these issues, my goal is to craft an experience that's not just engaging but also deeply satisfying for every player. Even though we all love Mama, my mission is to have players encounter a little less of this infamous screen – let's save the heat for the recipes!
Ideation
Target Audience
Cooking Mama: Cookstar appeals to a wide-ranging audience, including casual gamers, devoted fans of the Cooking Mama series, and players of all ages who simply enjoy immersive and enjoyable gameplay.
Player Persona
Developing a player persona and understanding the target audience of 'Cooking Mama' offers a window into players' preferences and expectations. This insight helps uncover pain points within the game experience, highlighting where aspects like mechanics or interface design might not align with players' needs. By addressing these pain points, we can enhance the overall user experience, ensuring the game resonates more effectively with its intended audience.
Design
[Proposed Solution]
[In Game Capture]
Streamlining Recipe Navigation
Right now, getting around the recipe list involves using the joystick to move left or right. It's functional, but most players are used to using the ZR and ZL buttons for that. Since many of Cooking Mama: Cookstar players have been getting frustrated with the controls feeling all over the place, it just makes sense to stick with the controls they already know and avoid unnecessary confusion.
[Proposed Solution]
[In Game Capture]
Clarifying Controls
The screenshot on the right shows me pouring breadcrumbs into the jar. Now, here's the thing: the A button doesn't really give a hint whether I should tap it quickly or hold it down. In my redesigned version of this screen, I've incorporated a progress bar encircling the button, that tells players that they need to hold the button down for the duration of the progress bar.
[Proposed Solution]
[In Game Capture]
Balancing Challenge with Second Chances
During my research, a standout insight emerged: players consistently faced frustration due to low scores attributed to wonky controls or unclear directions. This often lead to them to abandoning tasks prematurely, resulting in both increased frustration and reduced engagement. My proposed solution? Incorporating an option that allows players to retry recipe tasks, but with a limited number of attempts. This empowers them to adapt to new challenges, correct mistakes, and most importantly, maintains the competitive edge without the hassle of starting over each time.
Conclusion
What's Next
The next steps for my suggestions to improve the overall experience of this game are as follows....
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Create high quality prototypes
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Conduct testing in order to gather feedback about how players feel about the changes
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Make any necessary changes based on feedback
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Collaborate with the development team to implement changes
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Hopefully after implementing these changes, players can see a lot more of this screen!
Wrapping Everything Up
Given the educational setting of this project, my proposed final designs were not executed in a real-world setting, thus hindering the availability of any actual quantitative or qualitative results for this case study. Even so, I found this project to be an invaluable learning experience. Some of my major takeways from this case study can be summarized as follows:
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​Leveling Up in Gaming UX: This project served as an eye-opening experience for me, shedding light on how certain UX principles apply uniquely in the context of gaming. Getting to explore these aspects of user experience within a game environment really depended my understanding of the field and expanded my skills as a designer.
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Designing with Heart: As a big fan of the Cooking Mama franchise, working on this project was a really enjoyable experience for me. Something that set this project apart from my previous projects and made it so much fun was that it introduced me to a different kind of user compared to my previous experiences. Overall I would say that this project was near and dear to my heart, and I'm looking forward to working on my game projects in the future.