Magic Sustenance pros and cons

Magic sustenance

Comments, Pros and Cons given by Intro to Experience Design of Wednesdays 8:30 to 11:30 (a.k.a Predator vs. Prey class)

We voted for the best interaction of the Activate event, and Magic sustenance obtained the most number of votes.

Comments (first impressions and the interaction as we saw it)

- The experience attracted a lot of people because of the large 'table' covered in soil and a crowd of people around it

- Upon entry you are given instructions

- You are then given a seed and asked to plant it in the soil

- Upon exit a veggie or a fruit comes out of a soil and you get to keep it

- As an extension you get to eat your veggie/fruit

- Majority of our class filled out an evaluation for this experience, with positive feedback

- This interaction attracted large crowds and was always full of people

- There was a lot of laughter and people seemed to enjoy it

- People were amused with the reward

- Some wished there was a bit more to the extension

- People tried a few times to see what they can get

- Some people didn't keep the reward if they couldn't eat it right away

- Some thought it was dirty, had to wash your hands after

- A suggested improvement was to improve the accuracy (pop the reward out where the seed was planted)

- Some people didn't enjoy it as much, maybe they had different expectations

- People stood around the table talking and interacting

- The table itself was well design and very cleverly done.

Pros:

• It was a unique experience, different to everything else made it active.
• It had an element of surprise in it, you didn’t know what fruit or veggie was coming out for you.
• It was quite exciting.
• In a way it was delicious, you got food for free
• Wasn’t wasteful at all, everything they used was recycled and the fruits were taken by the people who participated in the interaction.

Cons:

• A good way to improve the experience would have been to give less root vegetables and more easy to eat food at the moment.
• The washing station was a bit messy and disorganized, it could have been better.
• Have a mechanism to re-use the fruit people didn’t really want. i.e there was fruit in the table beside the washroom that people were just leaving there. After a while you could see fruit all around the first floor.
• The concept and purpose of the interaction needed to be a little bit more defined and clear. As a group, we had trouble defining the purpose of the interaction. What was the message intended?