Play as if shipping tomorrow. This is the final stress test before polish week.

Even the biggest game studios in the world do dress rehearsals. Valve — the company behind Portal, Half-Life, and Steam — considers playtesting their single most important tool. Watch how they use it:

Valve's "Secret Weapon" — GMTK (12 min)

Mark Brown explains how Valve's obsessive playtesting shaped Portal, Half-Life, and their other legendary games. The key lesson: watching someone ELSE play your game reveals problems you never noticed yourself. This is exactly what you're doing today.

Discussion after watching: Valve's playtesting revealed that Portal needed an antagonist — that's how GLaDOS was born. What might YOUR playtest reveal today? The bugs you find are not failures — they're gifts. Every bug you catch now is one your future players will never see.

Shipping means stable, understandable, and complete within scope. Today each child plays 10 uninterrupted minutes. Parent observes silently. No touching code during play. This is not testing — this is rehearsing.
  • 10 uninterrupted minutes per child.
  • No touching code during play.
  • Parent observes silently.
  • Write observations afterward, not during.

Can a new player understand:

  • What to do?
  • What risk is?
  • How to progress?

This is a formal playtest protocol. Follow it exactly. No shortcuts.

Setup (2 min):

  • Set a timer for 10 minutes.
  • Parent gets a blank piece of paper and a pencil (for observations).
  • Child opens their game fresh — clear the console, refresh the page.

Play (10 min):

  • Child plays silently. No explaining, no narrating.
  • Parent observes silently. No helping. No hints. No touching the keyboard.
  • Parent writes down every moment of confusion, hesitation, frustration, or delight they observe.

Debrief (10 min):

After the timer goes off, answer these questions together. Write the answers down:

  1. 3 things that WORKED (moments of fun, clarity, or satisfaction)
  2. 3 things that BROKE (bugs, crashes, unexpected behavior)
  3. 1 thing that CONFUSED (a moment where the player didn't know what to do)

This becomes your bug list for the final week. Prioritize: fix game-breakers first, then confusion, then minor issues.

Parent silence is the hardest part. When your child is stuck, confused, or frustrated, you will want to help. DON'T. Their confusion is the most valuable data you'll collect today. If they can't figure something out, that's a design problem — not a skill problem.
Ami — Rehearsal Checklist
  • Explore works
  • Encounters trigger correctly
  • Boss unlock works
  • Banking resets risk
  • Loss resets unbanked XP
  • Tiers change correctly
  • Deeper Manhattan accessible after unlock
Ida — Rehearsal Checklist
  • Jobs generate correctly
  • Builds complete
  • Debt applies interest
  • Car unlock works
  • Second block accessible only with Car
  • Tiers gate properly
  • Bankruptcy resets correctly
  • Complete 10-minute stress test (Ami game) — parent observes silently
  • Complete 10-minute stress test (Ida game) — parent observes silently
  • Debrief: write 3 things that worked, 3 that broke, 1 that confused
  • Prioritize bug list: game-breakers first, confusion second, cosmetic last
  • Fix ONLY bugs — no new features
  • Play 5 more minutes after fixes to verify
  • Answer honestly: would you be proud presenting this tomorrow?
    •
    Checkpoint

    Both games are playable from start to finish. No game-breaking bugs.

    Fix only bugs and clarity issues. No new mechanics. No new art. No new features. Period.

    Sneaking in new features during "bug fixes" — a bug fix restores intended behavior. Adding behavior is a feature, not a fix.

    Not playing the full 10 minutes — many bugs only appear after sustained play. Short sessions miss them.

    Helping during the playtest — the parent should be silent. If the child is confused, that confusion is data.

    Fixing cosmetic issues instead of functional bugs — prioritize things that break gameplay over things that look wrong.

    Ask both children at the end: "If we had to present this tomorrow, would you be proud?" If the answer is "yes but I want to add..." — that's the scope discipline working. "But" comes after "yes."

    Your silence during the playtest is critical. This is the hardest thing you'll do in the entire course. When your child is confused or frustrated, every instinct will tell you to help. Resist. Write down what you observe instead. The confusion IS the data — if you fix it in the moment, you'll never know it was a problem, and future players will hit the same wall.

    The debrief is more important than the play. The 10 minutes of play generate raw data. The debrief is where learning happens. Guide the conversation: "I noticed you hesitated here — what were you thinking?" and "This moment looked fun — what made it work?" Help them see their game through someone else's eyes.

    Keep the bug list short and prioritized. Kids will want to fix everything. Help them sort: (1) game-breaking bugs first, (2) confusion points second, (3) cosmetic issues last. If they only fix category 1, that's a success.

    Ship week begins! Tomorrow we hunt every remaining bug. You've tested, you've tuned, you've cleaned. Now it's time to make it bulletproof.