CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW
2.3 Game Design Factors
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play games on mobile devices. Also, Uzun et al. (2013) found that learners utilizing digital games for learning turned out to outperform other groups, generating positive perceptions toward vocabulary learning and further had great influence on future vocabulary retention.
2.3 Game Design Factors
Many previous studies (Choi & Kim, 2004; Dickey, 2005; Mulligan & Patrovsky, 2003) revealed that the design factors of the game are highly related to enjoyment, and enjoyment has a strong influence on players’ intention to play. Different levels of game design features might be able to provide users with different gaming experiences.
Choi et al. (2004) conducted a study which separated the game design factors of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs) into personal and social factors to examine users’ gaming experience. Eight game factors were identified in their study. Personal factors include challenge, fantasy, curiosity, control, and reward, whereas social factors include game participants, audiences, and communities. The following subsections show the detailed descriptions of them.
2.3.1 Personal factors
Malone and Lepper (Malone, 1980, 1981a; Malone & Lepper, 1987) proposed four game design factors that can be utilized to demonstrate users’ gaming
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experiences when interacting with game content: challenge, fantasy, curiosity, and control. These four game design factors have also been proven to have the ability to motivate people to play the game (Rieber, 1996). Table 2.1 shows the definitions of these personal factors.
Table 2.1 Definitions of five personal factors toward gaming experience
Personal Factors Definition
Challenge The achievement of goals to the difficulty level of the problem
Fantasy
A circumstance that one has never experienced in their reality life, which can trigger users’ imaginations and draw them into a world outside their own experience (Myers, 1990).
Curiosity
(a) Sensory curiosity: sound and light effects that trigger sensory experiences
(b) Cognitive curiosity: incompleteness in the game world that may surprise or interest users, and increase user motivation to explore the game in return.
Control Whether users can effectively conduct their tasks Factor that can satisfy users and facilitate their Reward motivation in their activity (Deci & Ryan, 1987;
Ducheneaut & Moore, 2004) can be classified into three social types as shown in Table 2.2: the game participant,
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the audience, and their community.
Table 2.2 Definitions of three social factors toward gaming experience
However, from a psychological point of view, the concepts of perceived enjoyment have been widely studied and used in games as well as perceived enjoyment of games has been considered to be the most important and necessary factor in game playing (Sweetser and Wyeth, 2005). Several previous studies illustrated the perceived enjoyment by using disposition theory, transportation theory, parasocial interaction, attitude, cognition theory, and flow theory (Oliver & Nabi, 2004). Among them, flow theory is the most influential and broadly used one.
Therefore, it is regarded as the foundational theory of this study.
Csikszentmihalyi (1975) introduced the flow, which is also called the optimal experience, or being in the “Zone.” Flow describes a state of mind with complete involvement or engagement in an activity and refers to the optimal experience (Csikszentmihalyi, 1991). During optimal experience, a person is in a psychological state where he/she is so absorbed in the goal driven activity that nothing else seems to
Social Factors Definition
Game Participants
Those players who are with the player throughout the game.
Audiences Game-watchers’ in the virtual world, who share no conflicts of interest with the user.
Communities
Groups of users who share the same goals and interests in virtual worlds (Ducheneaut, Yee, Nickell, & Moore, 2006)
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matter. While the flow experience appears, players lose track of time and worries. Past research confirmed that the flow state has positive effect on learning performance (Webster, Trevino, & Ryan, 1993) and recommended that it should be taken into account when designing games.
Moreover, Csikszentmihalyi (1990, 1996) presented nine major factors of flow:
challenge-skill balance, merging of action and awareness, clear goals, immediate feedback, concentration on the task at hand, a sense of control, loss of self-consciousness, time distortion, and autotelic experience. Flow theory has been widely applied in the studies related to game playing behavior and game design (Johnson & Wiles, 2001). Furthermore, to assess whether experiences of playing games for players were enjoyable or not, Sweetser and Wyeth (2005) demonstrated a model, which consists of eight dimensions: concentration, challenge, skills, control, clear goals, feedback, immersion, and social interaction. They are addressed as follows:
(1) Concentration: To get enjoyable feeling, concentration of the game is needed, the player must be able to concentrate on the game while playing (Sweetser
& Wyeth, 2005) Also, concentration is strongly connected to learning performance and directly affects the knowledge acquisition afterwards.
(Bruning, 2004).
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(2) Challenge: In order to increase the likelihood of flow experience, it is vital that the challenge and the skill level of the player should be matched as close as possible during the game play. If the challenge is beyond player’s skill level, the game users may feel anxious. On the contrary, if the challenge is less than player’s skill level, the player may feel bored instead (Kiili, 2005;
Johnson and Wiles, 2003).
(3) Skills: A successful game should keep the player in flow condition by gradually increasing the skill level of the game while the player’ skill increases simultaneously (Sweetser & Wyeth, 2005).
(4) Control: The player should be capable of moving objects easily and effectively through the game world. With the manipulation of the game, the goal of game can be accomplished (Gee, 2004). In addition, the interface of the game should be user-friendly, making players to play games as they like (Pagulayan et al., 2003), switch the game on and off (Desurvire et al., 2004), and further save the game. These features enable players to have a sense of control on their character so that they can explore the game freely in their own way (Federoff, 2002; Desurvire et al., 2004).
(5) Clear goals: A goal is needed in a game (Federoff, 2002). However, to experience flow, the goals must be clear as well (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990;
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Johnson & Wiles, 2003), and it should be clearly sent to the player in a straightforward way (Pagulayan et al., 2003).
(6) Feedback: During the flow, immediate feedback will be received by the player if they concentrate on the game (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). Games should provide players with feedback in their playing processes (Lazzaro, 2004). For instance, games should design a scoreboard in the screen so that the players are able to recognize their scores, which can provide positive feedback for game players (Federoff, 2002).
(7) Immersion: When experiencing flow, player may produce deep involvement toward the game, which contributes to the loss of the sense of time (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). Players are completely indulged in the game and become less self-aware about their surroundings than before (Brown &
Cairns, 2004).
(8) Social interaction: It is not a factor of game flow experience, but it may interrupt immersion during the play of the game. Game experiences should be designed to increase interpersonal interaction and to create enjoyment in playing with others inside and outside the game (Lazzaro, 2004).
Moreover, there are several studies related to similar factors of flow theory. Choi and Kim (2002, 2004) pointed out that people will go back to game play if they are
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content with their previous experience of the game. The optimal experience can be achieved if the player has had effective personal interaction with the game system or pleasant social interactions with other people connected to the Internet game.