Posts Tagged rewards
11 November, 2009 at 9:23 am
· Filed under design, game design, life, quote, research ·Tagged rewards
We can easily become slaves to novelty, especially in the form of shiny technological toys that push novelty to us every hour of the day.
“…The brain is built to ignore the old and focus on the new….
Novelty is probably one of the most powerful signals to determine what we pay attention to in the world.”
“Researchers have found that novelty causes a number of brain systems to become activated, and foremost among these is the dopamine system…
…research shows that dopamine is more like the "gimme more" neurotransmitter.”
“…the role of dopamine is not in the pleasure that one may get from the drug, but in establishing the craving that keeps one coming back for more…
When dopamine is released, it is a signal to the brain that is it now time to start learning what is going on.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/russell-poldrack/multitasking-the-brain-se_b_334674.html
http://thisthatotherthing.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/multitasking-is-the-brain-seeking-novelty/
Permalink
28 July, 2009 at 9:19 pm
· Filed under game design, quote, research ·Tagged rewards
“Youngsters tend to live for the moment whilst older folks are more concerned about their futures.”
“A key difference emerged between participants who were aged thirteen and younger versus those aged sixteen and older, with the older group being more future oriented. There were no age-related differences among participants aged thirteen or less, or among participants aged sixteen or more, whilst fourteen and fifteen-year-olds were mixed…”
http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2009/06/our-changing-attitudes-to-time.html
The younger age group tends to favour immediate reward, while the mid-adolescent & older age groups tend to value immediate rewards less.
Permalink
13 May, 2009 at 8:07 pm
· Filed under game design, quote ·Tagged rewards
“One of the reasons we like crosswords is that they let us have an intellectual triumph on a small scale”
Amy Reynaldo, Wired
Permalink
12 May, 2009 at 8:18 pm
· Filed under game design ·Tagged rewards
Permalink
17 April, 2009 at 5:11 pm
· Filed under game design, life ·Tagged rewards
Game rewards can sit in a structure & have a purpose of generating emotion and loyalty for a game. Loyalty is a slightly different, more conscious and perhaps more positive version of addiction.
Is there a good loyalty encouraging structure for your game’s rewards?
“Finding the right reward model
…loyalty programs provide a good basis for understanding the basic levers of incentives and rewards…
- The frequent flyer model — Participation -> richer experience — …reserve exit row seats in advance, get a United representative on the phone quickly, and — best of all — board before the unwashed masses.
- The credit card points model — Participation -> cash …most, an accrued currency ("miles" or "points") are exchanged for tangible goods…
- The American Express model — Participation -> manufactured exclusivity — "Membership has its privileges." Amex marketing has taught us that simply using the card communicates a sense of status. Invitation-only web services …offer a certain cache to the users as representations of geek cred.”
http://www.cooper.com/journal/2009/04/loyalty.html
Permalink
14 April, 2009 at 7:50 am
· Filed under game design, life, project management ·Tagged rewards
“Pavlov was on to something. Ding… Recognition is the bell that drives human behaviour”
The Recognition Microscope: Fuel for Human Acceleration
Recognition or game rewards should be;
- Positive – recognition is not a time for correction or feedback, it is a time to detail the positive
- Immediate – the closer to the event or behaviour the better
- Close – best presented in the same environment as the behaviour
- Specific – recognising specific behaviours have the greatest impact, clear and direct link to an event or behaviour
- Shared – peer feedback is as or more valuable than top down
Permalink
21 February, 2009 at 12:05 pm
· Filed under game design, life, quote ·Tagged design language, rewards
Careful flattery of the player works well as a valid game reward. Focus on making the player feel good, it’s a game, make them feel good and they will play again.
Flattery is the act of giving excessive compliments, generally for the purpose of ingratiating oneself with the subject.
wikipedia.org
“Flattery is telling the other person precisely what he thinks about himself” Dale Carnegie quote
“The aim of flattery is to soothe and encourage us by assuring us of the truth of an opinion we have already formed about ourselves.” Dame Edith Sitwell quote
Excessive, overly false and repetitive flattery will become tiresome and transparent.
Careful flattery could be called a compliment, which might be ‘better’ than flattery, although risks being too subtle for gamers in the heat of the action, where most activities are very unsubtle.
Compliment an expression of praise, commendation, or admiration: A sincere compliment boosts one’s morale.
dictionary.com
Plutarch recognized that flattery, “which blends itself with every emotion, every moment, need and habit, is hard to separate from friendship.”
quoted from “In Praise of Flattery” By Willis Goth Regier
Carefull flattery should be focused on helping the player achieve their goals, which is likely to be to feel good and enjoy themselves.
Permalink
10 February, 2009 at 8:49 pm
· Filed under game design, life ·Tagged rewards
It is believed that the impact of a frustration or negative experience is double negatively, that of a positive experience.
Permalink
27 January, 2009 at 10:48 pm
· Filed under game design ·Tagged rewards
A positive feedback loop rewards the successful ‘player’ and means that it is easier to be successful in the future.
Failure means things get harder.
Permalink
11 October, 2008 at 10:36 am
· Filed under game design, quote ·Tagged design language, rewards
Permalink
7 October, 2008 at 9:26 pm
· Filed under game design, quote ·Tagged rewards
Has the trend to market heavily to kids/teens changed their requirement and expectation from rewards? Is it necessary to provide more rewards, bigger or more extravagant rewards to saturated kids?
“Parents have been rewarding their kids for just showing up. These teens have grown thinking everything they touch is perfect. Even marketers have rewarded teens with free stuff for just coming to the site, walking in the store or walking by a rep on the street. Marketers need to learn to give rewards for free, but also teach teens not to expect it every time. Sharon Lee of Look-Look talked about the need for brands to stay engaged (beyond just freebies).”
Permalink
8 August, 2008 at 9:30 pm
· Filed under game design, quote ·Tagged design language, rewards
Apply ‘Extreme Fever’ to reward design, don’t be too subtle or coy about celebrating player success.
First, he added a rainbow flying across the screen. Then Brian piped in musical accompaniment: Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy.” When it all came together, the experience of Extreme Fever was an exhilarating (and hilarious!) reward for passing a level. Our test players found themselves thrilled every time they saw it.
Despite the insane wonder of Extreme Fever, the team never fully intended to keep it in the game. As Brian explains, “At first, it was just a joke… it was so over the top, it was just funny.” But Extreme Fever was one of those rare entertaining and rewarding features that people loved so much that it simply had to stay in the game. In fact, when people brought up concerns about the phrase, even Jason Kapalka, PopCap’s Creative Director, chimed in: “If there is one thing that will never change about Peggle, it’s ‘Extreme Fever.’”
Permalink
15 May, 2008 at 9:10 pm
· Filed under game design ·Tagged rewards
- Currency rewards: the acquisition of a game resource that can be spent represents a fairly universal reward system…
- Rank Rewards: the player gains benefits from acquiring points towards an eventual step up in rank.
- Mechanical Rewards: such as increases in stats that the player can feel the effect of.
- Narrative rewards: a little narrative is effective for certain players as a reward.
- Emotional rewards: when the player feels they have done something for someone in the game.
- New Toys: anything new that can be experimented with is a ‘new toy’.
- New Places: are a mimicry reward for players driven to explore
- Completeness: achieving completeness (chasing 100% for instance) can be a reward in itself.
- Victory: defeating a challenging foe (or a boss).
(This is stolen/paraphrased from the blog Only a Game) via Andrew Chen
Permalink
4 May, 2008 at 6:53 pm
· Filed under game design ·Tagged mystery, rewards
It helps for player’s to understand why they get a reward or score, it links them to the simulation at the core of the game. Occasionally, and for certain types of rewards it might add to the enjoyment if there was more mystery about the reason.
“We try to reduce our uncertainty by explaining positive events and thereby reduce the amount of positive emotion we feel.”
“Research shows that when people are exposed to traumatic events, the sooner they ‘make sense’ of what has happened, the sooner the negative emotion is reduced and they recover.
Exactly the same process seems to operate for positive emotions. We try to reduce our uncertainty by explaining positive events and thereby reduce the amount of positive emotion we feel. It’s an unfortunate consequence of an adaptive process that normally helps us recover from traumatic and upsetting events.
So, the next time you give someone an unexpected gift and they ask why, just smile mysteriously and let them enjoy the moment for a little longer. Sometimes explanations really do kill the magic.”
Permalink
3 May, 2008 at 12:18 pm
· Filed under game design ·Tagged rewards
While money has more importance to people in their real lives, score shares many of the same influences to gamers when they are playing and in the gaming zone.
“We’ve all got money on the mind.
Not a day goes by when we aren’t thinking about money in some way. We’re deciding how to get it, what to spend it on, saving it up or wondering where it’s all gone. Whether we like it or not we spend much of our everyday lives deciding what to do with our money, from a simple cup of coffee to buying a house.
Despite this, most people understand very little about their relationship with money. We are remarkably insensitive to how it warps our thoughts, tugs at the emotions and changes our behaviour towards other people. Money seems to have an almost magical effect on us.”
http://www.spring.org.uk/2008/04/psychology-of-money.php
Permalink
26 April, 2008 at 8:54 pm
· Filed under game design ·Tagged rewards
“…and I was rewarded for it! Not just with the sheer joy of the act itself — even though that would have been, for a while, reward enough. No, the more you explore and leap, the more your powers increase, and the higher and farther you can go. Rewards are so frequent that it keeps you hooked, because there’s always “just one more” thing to do before you take a break. You never take a break.”
Permalink
12 March, 2008 at 10:25 pm
· Filed under game design, project management ·Tagged rewards
For many reward situations; use immediate and intermittent responses to player actions.
“One of Skinner’s most important discoveries is that behavior reinforced intermittently (as opposed to consistently) is the most difficult to extinguish. In other words, intermittent rewards beat predictable rewards. It’s the basis of most animal training, but applies to humans as well… which is why slot machines are so appealing, and one needn’t be addicted to feel it.”
http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2007/03/is_twitter_too_.html
Good use of (positive) reinforcers requires;
- reinforcement of behaviors as soon as they occur
- starting with continuous reinforcement, changing to irregular reinforcement when the player has repeated successful
- setting small tasks for a small rewards
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
11 March, 2008 at 9:49 pm
· Filed under game design, life, project management ·Tagged rewards
“creating human energy is what zapp is about”
Zapp, William C. Byham with Jeff Cox
Human energy = player passion & engagement
Zapp rewards are moments of recognition or encouragement that energize players rather than frustrate or sapp them. They are given during play rather than at the end of action; they excite action, engagement and fun. A zapp creates energy and encourages the player to keep playing and enjoy themselves.
Set out a ratio of zapps to sapps, and measure in user tests.
Permalink
13 February, 2008 at 9:38 pm
· Filed under game design ·Tagged rewards
A game is something which player’s take part in to get something out of. They are looking for experiences which in some way are rewarding for them. A place you go for rewarding experiences. They are social objects; either online in real time through chat and VO, or offline after and between game sessions.
“The Third Place” is a term used in the concept of community building to refer to social surroundings separate from the two usual social environments of home and the workplace.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Place
“The future of brands is interaction, not commodity. It’s not something you buy, but something you participate in. i.e. a brand is not a thing, but a place.”
http://pages.citebite.com/x1i4b3v2w0alr
“Consumer benefit” – products need to make people be more powerful
http://www.gapingvoid.com/Moveable_Type/archives/001271.html
Permalink
1 February, 2008 at 8:55 pm
· Filed under design, game design ·Tagged journey, rewards
Create and Strictly Follow an “Aroma First” Rule
“I believe we overlooked the cause and the affect of flavor lock in our stores. We achieved fresh roasted bagged coffee, but at what cost? The loss of aroma — perhaps the most powerful non-verbal signal we had in our stores; the loss of our people scooping fresh coffee from the bins and grinding it fresh in front of the customer, and once again stripping the store of tradition and our heritage?” – Howard Schultz email
Since coffee is Starbucks core, and scent is the strongest cue for our senses – make aroma the highest priority. (Yes, even more important than perceived increased sales). Maintain Howard’s original desire to preserve aroma and implement an “Aroma First” rule. It’s simple, for every decision; ask, “Is this going to negatively affect aroma in any way?” If the answer is “yes” do not do it… http://www.idea-sandbox.com/blog/2008/02/starbucks_and_the_aroma_first.html
What are the ‘Aroma First’ rules for game design?
‘Always Allow Progress’ – from the moment that player starts they are on a journey; developing skills, being challenged, being rewarded, anticipating rewards or challenges and be reminded of their progress along their journey.
Permalink
Older Posts »
