When Aja Hannah tested my game, a few things were going through my mind. She stated that most of her problems stemmed from the fact that she was confused on where to go. Granted, the second floor wasn't finished yet, but her confusion prompted me to change the locations of the rooms and make them easier to go into. I also noticed that she was taking everything that wasn't nailed down (fridges and bookcases). I had to make them scenery and made it more interactable.
Here are something that I want to continue:
Add more NPG's (a difficult tasks)
Finish the upstairs rooms.
Tie the plotline more throughly into the game.
There are some things that I know people who are intelligent should never take, but I guess that is how people play.
If it was a mini-friedge or a small bookcase, I could take it. After all, Krunk is Lost Pig could carry a chair, a pole, and several other big things all at the same time...
But, really, I'm just lazy and I like to "take all" because then things I may not have noticed are picked up also.
some people just like to play around and explore games, rather than follow the plot. I programmed a game in another class where it isn't an option: very few items aren't scenery and action depends on conversation/interaction, not unlocking and taking things-although one item has to be taken in order for the game to advance.
If you want to have taking items as a way to advance the game, here's an example from my game in EL405
Instead of going west from the office when the player does not carry the vial, say "you're not finished here yet."[west is the exit]
after the player has taken the vial: now the description of the hallway is "insert some new game instructions here."[the hallway is what you would enter if you went west]
If there are a few things that are reasonably carryable, that it seems people might WANT to pick up. You can always throw in a command like:
Instead of taking pointless object, say "What could possibly make you want to carry that around."
Then again, sometimes it's fun to throw in a few random objects that seem REALLY useful, but are utterly useless....mostly just to mess with people who like to take everything.