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

Challenge in Digital Games: Towards Developing a Measurement Tool

Challenge is arguably the most important experience that players seek in digital games. However, without a measure of how challenged players feel during the act of play, it is hard to design games that are neither too easy nor too hard and, therefore, truly enjoyable. Especially in industry, challenge is dominantly assessed by means of manual play testing in ad-hoc trials. The aim of this research is to create a more systematic, complete, and reliable instrument to evaluate the level of players' experienced challenge in games in the form of a questionnaire. This paper presents the key results from an extensive literature survey which will inform further development. We survey definitions of challenge, challenge types, and their relation to player experience based on the observations of game designers. We furthermore draw from empirical findings in a diverse range of fields such as game studies, human-computer interaction (HCI) and artificial intelligence (AI)

Player experience and deceptive expectations of difficulty adaptation in digital games

Increasingly, digital games are including adaptive features that adjust the level of difficulty to match the skills of individual players. The intention is to improve and prolong the player experience by allowing the player to have the feeling of challenge without it being overwhelming and leading to repeated failure and frustration. Previous work has shown that player experience is indeed improved by such adaptations but also that the player experience can be improved by simply claiming such an adaptation is present even when it is not. It is therefore possible that claims about adaptations and the actual adaptations could interact and not lead to the intended outcomes for the players or worse disappoint players. This paper reports on two studies that were conducted to experimentally investigate the interaction between game adaptations and player information about adaptations on the player experience, specifically their sense of immersion in the game. For this, two games were developed using two different kinds of adaptations to adjust difficulty based on players’ performance in the game. Participants were provided with information about game adaptations independently of whether the adaptations were present. The results suggest that players felt more immersed in the game when told that the game adapts to them, regardless of whether the adaptation was present in the game or not. This effect was observed in both games despite their different adaptations and it remained prominent even during longer gaming sessions. These findings demonstrate that players’ knowledge of adaptations influences their experience independently of adaptations. In this particular context, the knowledge reinforced the experience of the adaptations. This suggests that, at least in some circumstances, developers do not need to be concerned about negative effects of telling players about in-game adaptations

The Placebo Effect in Digital Games

Play-testing of digital games is a crucial part of any game development process, used to gather feedback about the game and correct any existing and potential flaws with the design. However, due to the nature of human subject testing, the feedback being collected in such experiments is prone to biases. Players' expectations play a great role in dictating their gaming experience, which means the information players receive before trying a new game, as well as the knowledge they already possess, may affect their perception and experience of the game. Two studies were conducted in order to evaluate how priming players to expect a game technology can positively influence their experience. The results supported the hypothesis that even basic instructions can change players' perception of the game, and lead to a higher level of perceived immersion when knowing that the game contains an improved feature, the adaptive artificial intelligence (AI), while it is not present in the game

Exploring social gambling: scoping, classification and evidence review

The aim of this report is to speculate on the level of concern we might have regarding consumer risk in relation to ‘social gambling.’ In doing so, this report is intended to help form the basis to initiate debate around a new and under-researched social issue; assist in setting a scientific research agenda; and, where appropriate, highlight concerns about any potential areas that need to be considered in terms of precautionary regulation. This report does not present a set of empirical research findings regarding ‘social gambling’ but rather gathers information to improve stakeholder understanding

Measuring Uncertainty in Games: Design and Preliminary Validation

Uncertainty is an important element of game play, which is widely believed to act as a precondition for player experience (PX). To investigate the concept and examine its relation to other PX concepts, we should be able to measure it. We present the design and preliminary results of the validation of the Player Uncertainty in Games (PUG) questionnaire. Based on various sources from games user research and work done with regards to searching digital archives, we designed a questionnaire that measures the experience of uncertainty in games. The scale was refined down to 66 items via interviews with players and expert reviews, which was then validated and further refined based on data gathered from gamers in an online survey. The Principal Component Analysis showed high level of internal consistency for the scale and each of its four factors: Disorientation, Exploration, Prospect, and Randomness. This work demonstrates the initial findings towards a validated tool for measuring uncertainty of players in digital games

10 simple rules to create a serious game, illustrated with examples from structural biology

Serious scientific games are games whose purpose is not only fun. In the field of science, the serious goals include crucial activities for scientists: outreach, teaching and research. The number of serious games is increasing rapidly, in particular citizen science games, games that allow people to produce and/or analyze scientific data. Interestingly, it is possible to build a set of rules providing a guideline to create or improve serious games. We present arguments gathered from our own experience ( Phylo , DocMolecules , HiRE-RNA contest and Pangu) as well as examples from the growing literature on scientific serious games

Motivating children to learn effectively: exploring the value of intrinsic integration in educational games

The concept of intrinsic motivation lies at the heart of the user engagement created by digital games. Yet despite this, educational software has traditionally attempted to harness games as extrinsic motivation by using them as a sugar coating for learning content. This article tests the concept of intrinsic integration as a way of creating a more productive relationship between educational games and their learning content. Two studies assessed this approach by designing and evaluating an educational game called Zombie Division to teach mathematics to 7- to 11-year-olds. Study 1 examined the learning gains of 58 children who played either the intrinsic, extrinsic, or control variants of Zombie Division for 2 hr, supported by their classroom teacher. Study 2 compared time on task for the intrinsic and extrinsic variants of the game when 16 children had free choice of which game to play. The results showed that children learned more from the intrinsic version of the game under fixed time limits and spent 7 times longer playing it in free-time situations. Together, these studies offer evidence for the genuine value of an intrinsic approach for creating effective educational games. The theoretical and commercial implications of these findings are discussed

The Industry and Policy Context for Digital Games for Empowerment and Inclusion:Market Analysis, Future Prospects and Key Challenges in Videogames, Serious Games and Gamification

The effective use of digital games for empowerment and social inclusion (DGEI) of people and communities at risk of exclusion will be shaped by, and may influence the development of a range of sectors that supply products, services, technology and research. The principal industries that would appear to be implicated are the 'videogames' industry, and an emerging 'serious games' industry. The videogames industry is an ecosystem of developers, publishers and other service providers drawn from the interactive media, software and broader ICT industry that services the mainstream leisure market in games, The 'serious games' industry is a rather fragmented and growing network of firms, users, research and policy makers from a variety of sectors. This emerging industry is are trying to develop knowledge, products, services and a market for the use of digital games, and products inspired by digital games, for a range of non-leisure applications. This report provides a summary of the state of play of these industries, their trajectories and the challenges they face. It also analyses the contribution they could make to exploiting digital games for empowerment and social inclusion. Finally, it explores existing policy towards activities in these industries and markets, and draws conclusions as to the future policy relevance of engaging with them to support innovation and uptake of effective digital game-based approaches to empowerment and social inclusion.JRC.J.3-Information Societ