Think-Aloud Protocol

A moderated usability testing technique where the participant narrates their thoughts in real time while playing, revealing the reasoning behind every decision and hesitation.

In games, this means

'I'm pressing this button because I think it's the attack... wait, nothing happened... is the enemy out of range or did I miss? I'm not sure.' That sentence tells a UX researcher more than 1,000 analytics events. Think-aloud sessions are slow and labour-intensive but produce the richest, most specific UX insight available. Five think-aloud sessions typically surface 85% of major usability issues.