Tutorial Styles in Multiplayer Games : A Case Study of the Game Haunted Heist

In this study, two types of tutorials, referred to as a separate tutorial and an embedded tutorial, were studied and compared in order to find their strengths and weaknesses in onboarding players to networked low-complexity competitive multiplayer games. By utilizing our own game, Haunted Heist, we used practice-based research and developed these two types of tutorials ourselves in order to perform a qualitative A/B test, which gave us insights into when and why one tutorial type may be preferred over the other. This is beneficial to know, as tutorials in multiplayer games can be quite disruptive and prevent new players from joining multiplayer sessions with their peers, so exploring different types of onboarding to find methods that are more tolerated by players can potentially be very useful. The main findings of this research were that while separate tutorials are more consistent in their ability to teach, and generally give players a deeper understanding of the game’s mechanics, embedded tutorials can still reach a comparable level of understanding while simultaneously taking less time for the players to complete - meaning they are able to join their friends in play faster. Our findings suggest that embedded tutorials, which generally seem to be underutilized in multiplayer games, can be a viable onboarding method for these types of games.