A Cognitive Psychological Approach to Gameplay Emotions

As David Freeman wrote at the beginning of "Creating Emotion in Games", the subject of emotion in games is a new continent and an almost uncharted one [2004 : 8]. Starting to map the whole territory, I did distinguish elsewhere three types of emotion in video games [Perron, 2004]. Following Ed S. Tan’s study of narrative film [1996], I’ve referred to fiction emotions (emotions rooted in the fictional world and the concerns addressed by that world) and artefact emotions (emotions which arise from concerns related to the artefact, as well as stimulus characteristics based on those concerns). Then, evidently considering the specificity of video games, I’ve talked about gameplay emotions (emotions that arise from the gamer’s actions in the game-world and the consequent reactions of this world). In order to put forward some approaches to those gameplay emotions, this paper will once more rely on philosophical and psychological film theories. For instance, the curiosity theory of Noël Carroll, an object-oriented emotional state developed regarding the monster of the horror genre [1990], is relevant since the video game involves what is literally a play of ratiocination. The «drama of corridors» that Carroll talks about at one point [1990 : 38] applies quite well to the maze structure of video game adventures and the bodily kinaesthetic engagement of the experience of exploration. As for Ed S. Tan’s interest theory [1996], it focusses the attention around the emotional response to the character(s), namely the avatar in a video game, and the investigation of/in the game-world. While the interest in plot structures is not the main concern in games, the notion of action is at the core of our ludic engagement. The emphasis on the fact that emotions are action tendencies [as defined by Frijda, 1986] allows to clearly distinguish film from game and define the main emotional appeal of the 10th art. There is indeed a big difference between a film viewer witnessing a character being stalked by a monster and the possible actions the gamer can make his/her avatar take in the same situation. Depending on the way the gamer copes with it, the situation will be experienced differently (from which the reference to gameplay emotion as opposed to game emotions that would only stress the production from the game and not the singular experiences of the gamers). Then, insofar as the duration of emotions is measured in seconds or minutes, while the playing of a game last for hours, the mood-cues approach of Greg Smith becomes a great tool to analyse video games. For Smith, mood is the primary set of orienting emotions states that can be elicit by various cues. It orients us toward experiencing specific emotions [2003 : 38]. The fearful mood of the survival horror puts for example the gamer in emotional alert and prepares him/her to experience burst of fear. There is certainly a link to trace between the notion of mood and the way the gamer gets emotionally immersed in games. And as Torben Gordal has underlined, video games are often "mood manager" allowing the gamer to participate in a self-controlled arousing experience [2000 : 209] In the final analysis, in order to carry on the work in the space allotted by the conference, this paper will chart in a bit more detail the playground of emotions in video games. References CARROLL, Noël [1990]. "The Philosophy of Horror or Paradoxes of the Heart", New York, Routledge. FREEMAN, David [2004]. "Creating Emotion in Games: The Craft and Art of Emotioneering", Indianapolis, New Riders. FRIJDA, Nico C. [1986]. "The Emotions", Cambride/Paris, Cambridge University Press/ Maison des Sciences de l’Homme. GRODAL, Torben [2000]. «Video Games and the Pleasures of Control", in Zillman, D.and Vorderer, P., dirs, "Media Entertainment: The Psychology of its Appeal", Mahwah, New Jersey, Lawrence Erlbaum, p. 197-213.. PERRON, Bernard [2004]. "Silent Hill. Il motore del terrore", Milan, Edizioni Unicopli. SMITH, Greg M. [2003]. "Film Structure and the Emotion System", Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. TAN, E. S. [1996]. "Emotion and the Structure of Narrative Film: Film as an Emotion Machine", Mahwah, NJ, Erlbaum

A Palette of Deepened Emotions: Exploring Emotional Challenge in Virtual Reality Games

Recent work introduced the notion of ‘emotional challenge’promising for understanding more unique and diverse player experiences (PX). Although emotional challenge has immediately attracted HCI researchers’ attention, the concept has not been experimentally explored, especially in virtual reality (VR), one of the latest gaming environments. We conducted two experiments to investigate how emotional challenge affects PX when separately from or jointly with conventional challenge in VR and PC conditions. We found that relatively exclusive emotional challenge induced a wider range of different emotions in both conditions, while the adding of emotional challenge broadened emotional responses only in VR. In both experiments, VR significantly enhanced the measured PX of emotional responses, appreciation, immersion and presence. Our findings indicate that VR may be an ideal medium to present emotional challenge and also extend the understanding of emotional (and conventional) challenge in video games

A game based approach to improve traders' decision-making

Purpose: The development of a game based approach to improving the decision-making capabilities of financial traders through attention to improving the regulation of emotions during trading. Design/methodology/approach: The project used a design-based research approach to integrate the contributions of a highly inter-disciplinary team. The approach was underpinned by considerable stakeholder engagement to understand the ‘ecology of practices’ in which this learning approach should be embedded. Findings: Taken together, our 35 laboratory, field and evaluation studies provide much support for the validity of our game based learning approach, the learning elements which make it up, and the value of designing game-based learning to fit within an ecology of existing practices. Originality/value: The novelty of the work described in the paper comes from the focus in this research project of combining knowledge and skills from multiple disciplines informed by a deep understanding of the context of application to achieve the successful development of a Learning Pathway, which addresses the transfer of learning to the practice environment Key words: Design-based research, emotion-regulation, disposition–effect, financial traders, serious games, sensor-based game

Affective games:a multimodal classification system

Affective gaming is a relatively new field of research that exploits human emotions to influence gameplay for an enhanced player experience. Changes in player’s psychology reflect on their behaviour and physiology, hence recognition of such variation is a core element in affective games. Complementary sources of affect offer more reliable recognition, especially in contexts where one modality is partial or unavailable. As a multimodal recognition system, affect-aware games are subject to the practical difficulties met by traditional trained classifiers. In addition, inherited game-related challenges in terms of data collection and performance arise while attempting to sustain an acceptable level of immersion. Most existing scenarios employ sensors that offer limited freedom of movement resulting in less realistic experiences. Recent advances now offer technology that allows players to communicate more freely and naturally with the game, and furthermore, control it without the use of input devices. However, the affective game industry is still in its infancy and definitely needs to catch up with the current life-like level of adaptation provided by graphics and animation

Affect and believability in game characters:a review of the use of affective computing in games

Virtual agents are important in many digital environments. Designing a character that highly engages users in terms of interaction is an intricate task constrained by many requirements. One aspect that has gained more attention recently is the effective dimension of the agent. Several studies have addressed the possibility of developing an affect-aware system for a better user experience. Particularly in games, including emotional and social features in NPCs adds depth to the characters, enriches interaction possibilities, and combined with the basic level of competence, creates a more appealing game. Design requirements for emotionally intelligent NPCs differ from general autonomous agents with the main goal being a stronger player-agent relationship as opposed to problem solving and goal assessment. Nevertheless, deploying an affective module into NPCs adds to the complexity of the architecture and constraints. In addition, using such composite NPC in games seems beyond current technology, despite some brave attempts. However, a MARPO-type modular architecture would seem a useful starting point for adding emotions

Defectors cannot be detected during"small talk" with strangers.

To account for the widespread human tendency to cooperate in one-shot social dilemmas, some theorists have proposed that cooperators can be reliably detected based on ethological displays that are difficult to fake. Experimental findings have supported the view that cooperators can be distinguished from defectors based on "thin slices" of behavior, but the relevant cues have remained elusive, and the role of the judge's perspective remains unclear. In this study, we followed triadic conversations among unacquainted same-sex college students with unannounced dyadic one-shot prisoner's dilemmas, and asked participants to guess the PD decisions made toward them and among the other two participants. Two other sets of participants guessed the PD decisions after viewing videotape of the conversations, either with foreknowledge (informed), or without foreknowledge (naïve), of the post-conversation PD. Only naïve video viewers approached better-than-chance prediction accuracy, and they were significantly accurate at predicting the PD decisions of only opposite-sexed conversation participants. Four ethological displays recently proposed to cue defection in one-shot social dilemmas (arms crossed, lean back, hand touch, and face touch) failed to predict either actual defection or guesses of defection by any category of observer. Our results cast doubt on the role of "greenbeard" signals in the evolution of human prosociality, although they suggest that eavesdropping may be more informative about others' cooperative propensities than direct interaction

xDelia final report: emotion-centred financial decision making and learning

xDelia is a 3-year pan-European project building on the knowledge, skills, and competences of seven partner organisations from a variety of research disciplines and from business. The principal objective of xDelia is to develop technology-enhanced learning approaches that help improve the financial decision making of investors who trade frequently using an electronic trading platform. We focus on emotions, and how they affect maladaptive decision biases and trading performance. Our earlier field work with traders has shown that the development of emotion regulation skills is a key facet of trader expertise. For that reason we consider expert traders our benchmark for adaptive behaviour rather than normative rationality. Our goal is to provide investors with the tools and techniques to develop greater self-awareness of internal states, increase their ability to reflect critically on emotion-informed choices, develop emotion management skills, and support the transfer of these skills to the real-world practice setting of financial trading. This report provides a comprehensive overview of what xDelia is about and what we have achieved over the life of the project. In the sections that follow, we explain the decision problems investors are faced with in a fast paced environment and the limitations of traditional approaches to reduce cognitive errors; introduce an alternative, technology-enhanced learning approach of diagnosis and feedback, skill development, and transfer; describe the learning intervention comprising twelve autonomous learning elements that we have developed; and present evidence from thirty-five studies we have conducted on learning effects and stakeholder acceptance

Action

This essay describes two different phenomena: action games, understood as a genre of games in which the player’s sensori-motor skills prevail over his cognitive activity, and a general theory of action-taking in context of the game-playing practice. Through a short history of the main genres and sub-genres traditionally identified with “Action games”, and the conclusion that such a categorization pertains to a mode of action rather than a given genre, the properties of action games are identified as involving a standardized repertoire of actions, emphasis on sensori-motor skills, and short-term action sequences