I came across this article called 5 Creepy Ways Video Games Are Trying to Get You Addicted. I was just curious as to how many of us will incorporate these tactics into our games? Is this a good thing or bad? You can read the article here: http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html

I should think that since we're living in a capitalist society, anything that generates a profit (preferably at your personal address) is a good thing. Seriously - when it comes to selling (not stealing), especially within perfectly legal confines, all gloves are off. You don't have to buy my highly addictive, lethally repetitive and emotionally exploitative game if you don't want to. But... you know you're more than welcome to :P.

What happened to just making games fun?

5 things from the article, for the TL;DR crowd:

5. "They put you in a Skinner box". The next 3 are just aspects of the Skinner box, so they don't really count. If you know what a Skinner box is, skip to the bottom.

4. You do an action, and get a reward...

3. ...but only sometimes, so you'll keep doing that thing over and over again.

2. They make it take longer to get a reward each time.

1. They give you choice, just enough difficulty to be interesting, and tie it to the rewards.

The point that I found most interesting is that big companies are now hiring people who hold doctorates in behavioral and brain sciences to help with ideas to make their games more addictive. I would have never guessed.

Quote:
...according to everything expert Malcolm Gladwell, to be satisfied with your job you need three things...

Autonomy (that is, you have some say in what you do day to day);

Complexity (so it's not mind-numbing repetition);

Connection Between Effort and Reward (i.e. you actually see the awesome results of your hard work).

This is what my work day consists of
- pick from dozens of math skills practice questions to work on for the day, or look at my bugs queue, or improve our code infrastructure in some fundamental way

- the code is hard to write. every math skill is different and involves numerous random combinations.

- when a module is done, it generates its own questions web page, which students use to practice math sills.

anyway I look at it, my current job meets these three requirements pretty well. so what do I feel is missing? There must be a fourth, human element. I need to feel like I enjoy the people I work with...

I wouldn't call them creepy at all. If you look closely, it is really just a single thing.



In fact, I would call the whole article just a few observations from a Psychology 101 lecture on positive reinforcement.



The concept of random positive reinforcement is simple. You start by giving rewards immediately and frequently. You eventually turn down the frequency and immediacy of the rewards, until you reach a point that very infrequent rewards can be strong motivators.

Anybody who has trained an animal knows how this works. If you don't understand the concept, take a puppy to obedience school. The concepts taught there completely encompass the article's discussion points.

Quote: Original post by supamike
What happened to just making games fun?

In a sense, this is about making games fun, and that's why it's creepy. The creepiness comes from the clinical/scientific approach to making something fun. There shouldn't really be a difference between using psychology or intuition to create a skinner box for our enjoyment, but the more scientific/clinical approach is creepier because we picture ourselves as being experimented on. It also doesn't play well with the usual assumption that creating a work of art should be more "art" than "science".

woulnt be the world that actualy is a creepier place? :P

Quote: Original post by Way Walker

Quote: Original post by supamike
What happened to just making games fun?

In a sense, this is about making games fun, and that's why it's creepy. The creepiness comes from the clinical/scientific approach to making something fun. There shouldn't really be a difference between using psychology or intuition to create a skinner box for our enjoyment, but the more scientific/clinical approach is creepier because we picture ourselves as being experimented on. It also doesn't play well with the usual assumption that creating a work of art should be more "art" than "science".

That's what made it so creepy to me, definitely sums it up.