Jay Crossler

1
Serious Games Game DesignLecture 2 Course
Book Review - Theory of Fun, Player Archetypes

• Jay Crossler
• Senior Software Engineer

2
The Theory of Fun

• Why is work usually not fun?
• at least, for most people

3
(No Transcript)
4
Consider tic-tac-toe

• Kids will play it continuously and always lose
• Victory seems just barely outside their grasp
• And then one day, all games become draws
• At this point, they dont enjoy playing it
  anymore
• Did mastery and understanding come so suddenly?
• Do they understand its a limited game with an
  optimal strategy?
• Or, do they just see a pattern, and not really
  understand it?
• To us, does it matter if its a O(n) problem,
  O(n2), or O(n!)? Then, do we really understand
  it?

5
The Problem

• Games are very multidimensional
• Game Development has mostly been an art, not a
  science
• Not many teachers understand them
• Even fewer agree that its a valid area of study
• No one really understands what makes something
  fun
• And, in the US, video game fun is a 10B/year
  industry
• Even more important, games teach values and
  problem solving skills, both to children and
  adults

6
Why are games not fun?

• People quit when its too hard to win

7
Why are games not fun?

• People quit when its too easy to win

8
How do we think?

• Humans take in vast amounts of information and
  chunk it into smaller pieces
• Humans can see up to 72 frames per second (60 is
  adequate)
• Humans can distinguish millions of colors (women
  30 more)
• Can recognize image (afterblurs) even at 1/220th
  of a second
• 100M neurons in the retina
• The eye processes 10 Million point images/sec
• Brain holds about 100M Megabytes
• Yet, we are always taking mental shortcuts
• Brain only notices v of what we see (estimated
  at 2000bits/frame)

9
(No Transcript)
10
MIPS/Megabytes program growth
11
The best programmer is a lazy programmer

• To fight this huge onslaught of data, we chunk
  and create icons
• Interface standard Only give 3-7 options
• Most people can only make judgments about 4
  things at once

12
Chunking isnt always good
13
Discovering patterns is fun

• People dislike chaos, they prefer ordered,
  chunkable patterns
• But there is a thrill of delight when you get it,
  and discover the pattern

14
Grokking

• Grok from R. A. Heinliens Stranger in a
  Strange Land
• When you understand something so deeply that you
  become one with it even love it.
• Grokking something is understanding it beyond
  intuition
• Very similar to muscle memory
• Brain has three levels of thought
• 1 Conscious thought logical, mathematical,
  list-based
• 2 Intuitive, associative, integrative
  chunking, no words
• 3 Autonomic nervous system whole sets of
  decisions

15
(No Transcript)
16
Practice is building a library of chunked skills
and decisions
17
What is fun?
18
What are games?

• Games are real
• Theyre just abstracted pictures of reality
• A Magic Circle of disconnection a formal
  system
• Their pattern may or may not exist in reality
• Games are puzzles to solve
• We learn underlying patterns, grok them fully,
  then file them
• Very similar to learning the piano, or learning
  to drive, or fight
• Only real difference is that stakes are usually
  much lower
• Games are concentrated chunks of reality
• Abstracted and iconic, already prepared for our
  brains to use
• They are formal systems, and dont have messy
  details
• Games are very powerful learning tools

19
Play vs. Game vs. Sport

• Iconified representations of human experience
  that we can practice with and learn patterns from
• Whats the difference between a game and a book?
• Books offer patterns to the highest level of your
  brain
• Games offer patterns to one level lower
• In a book, you can read weather is important to
  armies
• In a game, you can get your army beaten and
  really feel it
• You can not practice a pattern or run
  permutations with a book

20
Is fun just learning?

• Play, Games, Sports
• All about recognizing goals and patterns, just
  usually have different risks and rewards
• Why, then, do some people not think learning is
  fun?

21
How can a game be fun?

• Games are exercise for our brains
• As we learn the patterns, more novelty is needed
• Practice can keep a game fresh, but soon well
  grok it
• Games are thus disposable, and boredom is
  inevitable
• Formal games are very susceptible to this
• They usually dont have enough variables to be
  interesting
• The pattern is too easily figured out
• The more formally constructed a game is, the more
  limiting it will be
• Adding physics, psychology, multiplayer all add
  variables

22
(No Transcript)
23
Is this fun?
24
(No Transcript)
25
The theory of fun

• Fun is about our brain feeling good
• Brains release endorphins into our system
• Our brains are on drugs all the time
• Theres a chemical release when we master a task
• Our moment of triumph is rewarded by the brain
• Notice someone always smiles when they get it
• Needed for survival of the species
• It is the act of solving puzzles that makes a
  game fun

26
What is the opposite?
27
What is boredom, then?

• When a game stops teaching us, we feel bored
• Boredom is the brain looking for new information
• It happens when there are no new patterns to
  absorb
• When a book is dull, its failing to show a
  captivating pattern
• Dont underestimate the brains desire to learn
• The brain craves stimuli
• Not necessarily new experiences, just new data to
  make patterns
• Experiences force new chunking, and the brain
  doesnt like to do more work that it has to
  (Thats why it chunks in the first place!)

28
(No Transcript)
29
The Theory of Fun in Games

• Games must navigate between boredom and overload
• Watch out for
• Tic-tac-toe Too easy
• Baseball RBI scores for 20 years Fun but not
  worth my time
• Dont see any patterns Too hard
• Patterns shown too slowly Its too repetitive
• Patterns shown too quickly It got too hard too
  fast
• Players mastered the pattern I beat it
• Fun is just another word for learning
• A successful game is one that teaches everything
  it has to offer before the player gets bored and
  stops playing
• Is this the same for XML classes, then?

30
For more buy the course book Theory of Fun,
by Raph Koster
31
Are grokers experts?

• 1. Experts notice features and meaningful
  patterns of information that are not noticed by
  novices.
• 2. Experts have acquired a great deal of content
  knowledge that is organized in ways that reflect
  a deep understanding of their subject matter.
• 3. Experts' knowledge cannot be reduced to sets
  of isolated facts or propositions but, instead,
  reflects contexts of applicability that is, the
  knowledge is "conditionalized" on a set of
  circumstances.
• 4. Experts are able to flexibly retrieve
  important aspects of their knowledge with little
  attentional effort.
• 5. Though experts know their disciplines
  thoroughly, this does not guarantee that they are
  able to teach others.
• 6. Experts have varying levels of flexibility in
  their approach to new situations.

32
Player Archetypes

• Why do people play games so differently?
• also
• An introduction to Massively Multiplayer Games

33
How people choose games
34
Bartle Personality Types

• ? Achiever
• Players give themselves game-related goals, then
  vigorously set out to achieve them. Build
  cities, accumulate treasure.
• ? Socializer
• Use communication facilities for role-playing or
  to converse and interact with others.
• ? Explorer
• Try to find out as much as possible about the
  game. Search areas and mechanics, fight every
  monster, do every quest.
• ? Imposer (Killer)
• Provide game tools to cause distress on others.
  Usually involves applying a powerful sword to
  another players head.

35
Bartle Personality Types

• ? Achievers Say
• "I'm busy." "Sure, I'll help you. What do I get?"
  "So how do YOU kill the dragon, then?" "Only 4211
  points to go!"
• ? Socializers Say
• "Hi!" "Yeah, well, I'm having trouble with my
  boyfriend." "What happened? I missed it, I was
  talking."
• ? Explorers Say
• "Hmm..." "You mean you don't know the shortest
  route from to ?" "I haven't
  tried that, what's it do?"
• ? Killers Say
• "Ha!" "Coward!" "Die!" "Die! Die! Die!" "N00b!"

36
Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOs)

• Are MMOs
• Games? Like chess, tennis, DD? Yes - to
  achievers.
• Pastimes? Like reading, gardening, cooking? Yes
  - to explorers.
• Sports? Like huntin', shooting, fishin'? Yes -
  to killers.
• Entertainments? Like nightclubs, TV, concerts?
  Yes - to socialisers.

37
People play what is familiar
38
MMO DemographicsSource The Daedelus project

• In MMOs
• Average age is 26
• 50 work full time
• 25 are teenagers
• 36 are married
• 22 have children
• 60 have played more than 10 hours continuously
• 20 play with a romantic partner
• 28 play with a family member
• MMO players spend an average of 22 hours/week
  playing
• Americans spend an average of 24 hours/week
  watching TV

39
Time spent in game

• Given a hypothetical pool of 1000 players
• 840 would be male
• 160 would be female
• Of the 840 male players
• 193 would be playing a female
• 647 would be playing a male
• Of the 160 female players
• 5 would be playing a male
• 155 would be playing a female
• In other words
• About 1 out of every 2 female characters is
  played by a man
• About 1 out of every 100 male characters is
  played by a woman

40
Occupational Status
41
Profession Types, Life Lessons
42
Activity Matrix

• Peoples interests can be broken down into 12
  main categories

43
Activity Matrix

• These types-of interests correspond highly to
  categories of game-player

44
What do players want?

• Players want a Challenge
• Players want to Socialize
• Players want a dynamic Solitaire experience
• Players want bragging rights
• Players want an emotional experience
• Players want to fantasize

45
What do players expect?

• Players expect
• A consistent world (one that they can chunk and
  grok)
• A world with understandable bounds
• Reasonable solutions should work
• Direction towards success goals
• Accomplishment of tasks incrementally subgoals
• Immersion
• to fail
• a fair chance
• not to need to repeat themselves
• never to be hopelessly stuck
• to do, not to watch

46
How do you satisfy people?

• Use Interface conventions
• Let them rely on their existing knowledge
• A familiar topic helps people get right into the
  game
• Give a lot of positive feedback early in the game
• Give them the idea theyre on the right track
• Everything they do, the computer acknowledges it,
  recognizes it, and thinks its really cool
• Prototype!
• In 2 years of development, 1.25 of it is for
  playing/testing
• Balance so that its not boring/too hard is
  crucial

47
Subgames can meet the needs of different
personalities

• In Sid Meyers Pirates, you have subgames for
• Sword-fights
• Navigating your ship
• Raiding a town
• In Sid Meiers Civilization, subgames are
  integrated
• Military system
• Economic Stock Market system
• Production systems ..all of these are
  intertwined
• Do I invent a new chariot, or give the people
  that stadium?
• Scale Starting small with one settler, building
  an empire
• Started with Will Wrights Sim City
• Notice that in some games, there are no goals
  you infer what they should be from real life

48
Classic arcade game traits

• Single Screen Play .. Easy for old graphics
  cards
• Infinite Play .. Keep putting in quarters
• Multiple Lives .. Make you think you have a
  chance
• Scoring/High scores .. Players want bragging
  rights
• Easy-to-learn gameplay
• No Story

49
Classic arcade games

• Input
• How responsive do you want to be to the users
  inputs?
• Interconnectedness
• Keep everything in theme with related metaphors
• Escalating Tension
• Building speed, with temporary periods of relief
• Player Focus
• Keep their attention concentrated on one spot
• Minimize the superfluous distractions

50
(No Transcript)
51
The point?

• Game designers now either build a game completely
  targeted to one or two personality type
• Mortal Kombat (Killer)
• Doom (Explorer, Killer)
• The Sims (Socializer, Achiever)
• Or, they build games aimed at balancing across
  each
• Star Wars Galaxies
• Professions for Dancer, Chef, Image Designer,
  Architect, Droid Engineer, Pistoleer, Bounty
  Hunter, Commando, etc.
• World of Warcraft
• Each class has parts which satisfy desires of
  each personality archetype

52
(No Transcript)