Theory

Motivation is one of the main pillars of video game user experience. Competence, autonomy, and relatedness are the three basic psychological needs that people aim to satisfy according to the self-determination theory (SDT). When playing games, players need to feel adept (competence), have meaningful choices when deciding how to play (autonomy), and feel a sense of connection (relatedness).

SDT is one of the most well-known and widely-used psychological theories in games user experience research, primarily because of its influence on building the framework for player motivation. Free-to-play monetization models are a modern norm in the gaming industry and designers are always seeking ways to keep players motivated and coming back to their games for more. This post will discuss SDT through a series of popular mobile free-to-play hero-collecting games.

Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes 

Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes focuses on collecting the many characters in the Star Wars universe and is a great demonstration of the competence motivator of SDT. For this motivator to have the desired effect, players need to feel like they are progressing and getting better at the game. Early on, Star Wars: GOH offers positive feedback on progress the player has achieved. Building this competence from the start and letting players know they are succeeding can help motivate them to continue.

The main progression is focused on players leveling up their character collection, which makes them more powerful and able to unlock new and upgraded skills in order to tackle increasingly-difficult content. Feedback is also presented during defeat, which reminds the player of items in his/her inventory to make characters more powerful in order to help overcome any current obstacles (see screenshot below). Even in defeat, player competence can be strengthened.

Additionally, the player has a level, which increases the energy used to play different modes and unlocks different game modes as well. Star Wars: GOH makes this information very clear to the player and notifies them of their progress with each level, presenting them with yet another goal to work towards. This feedback enables players to monitor their advancement and effort regulation towards a distant goal. Having an achievable distant goal also allows players to decide their playing pace/strategy and enhances autonomy.

Fire Emblem: Heroes

An important factor when playing a game is that the player has meaningful choices when deciding how to play (autonomy). In mobile games and, more specifically, RPG mobile games such as hero-collectors, choosing which quests to pursue or how to pursue them is a choice players have to make. For example, in Fire Emblem: Heroes, players can choose from story missions, training missions, special (limited-time) missions, and arena duels (PvP). To give more meaning to player choice, Fire Emblem: Heroes includes secondary check-list-type objectives that include things such as clearing specific missions, completing a certain number of specific mission types, and in-mission objectives, such as beating certain types of enemies.

         

Quest/objective lists are common in many games for a reason. At our most basic level, humans do not like it when they begin something and do not finish; such conditions create an internal tension and preoccupation with the incomplete task (Madigan, 2017). This basic desire is a major underlying reason for daily quests and similar types of limited-time events/missions; players feel the need to log in daily to games that offer such quests in order to simply “check things off their list.” Not only does such action typically provide players with a reward, but completing a task also provides closure. Additionally, although these types of quests are entirely optional, humans also hate losing options once having them; a sense of loss, or losing out on an opportunity, can overcome players if they decide to (or inadvertently) skip limited-time quests.

Furthermore, players can utilize different combinations of any four heroes to strategically tackle whichever quest they choose. In Fire Emblem: Heroes, players can level up their heroes with XP gained by defeating enemies in combat or spending in-game gold to level them up. Defeating enemies and leveling heroes also results in Skill Points (SP), which allows players to customize their heroes by unlocking different skills and subsequently leveling those skills. This further enhances the meaning of player choice, especially if players are attempting to combine certain hero synergies and tactics.

         

Together, the examples discussed here for competence and autonomy (i.e., feedback in Star Wars: GOH and quest lists in Fire Emblem: Heroes, respectively) can invoke the endowed-progress effect. When players are given the feeling of advancement toward a distant goal, they’re more likely to try harder and longer to reach that goal, even relative to players who have an equally easy goal but received no sense of momentum right from the start. For example, in Star Wars: GOH, players begin receiving shards to unlock Darth Vader within the first few quests they complete, not only making them aware of this distant goal, but also providing them with a sense of advancement toward unlocking this character. It takes 80 shards in total to unlock Darth Vader and players are continuously unlocking nominal amounts of shards through daily quests, etc. The game reminds the player of his/her progress with each shard obtained in a check-list format (e.g., 48/80 shards) via pop ups and UI panes, which provides recognition to players and their progress toward this goal.

Walking Dead: Road to Survival

It is important for games to convey a sense of relatedness, or a sense of connection to others. These connections can be with other real players through social aspects of the game or through in-game characters. Walking Dead: RTS allows players to build both types of connections. Connections are made with other players through Factions and events such as All-Out-War, where players and their faction members take on other factions in asynchronous PvP. These Faction events give players team-oriented goals, tournaments (and placement-specific rewards when they’re over), leaderboards, and emphasis on achievements attainable only through team play, such as leveling up characters with certain traits within a specific time frame. Since players are working toward a team goal, they feel important to others and know that their play/participation affects not only themselves, but other players as well.

Players can also build a connection with in-game characters through the main story mode and various limited-time events. Walking Dead: RTS is based on the comics, not the TV show, and anyone who has read and enjoyed the comics will likely feel a sense of camaraderie with some of the fictional characters and stories. Players go through a lot of effort to feel these connections and progress-related missions help with that.

Summary

Self-determination theory and its three underlying motivators (competence, autonomy, and relatedness) are, in some form, present in most games. They are especially prevalent in mobile games and games seeking to keep a high level of player motivation and retention. This will lead to higher retention rates and likely more money spent in free-to-play games. SDT and its motivators have developed a framework for designers to achieve this, not only in free-to-play games but, in more traditionally-monetized games as well through some of the design techniques discussed here. These techniques elicit responses from player’s basic psychological needs and desires. This will lead, along with good, clear, meaningful feedback (and rewards) to highly-motivated players.

References:

Madigan, J. (2017, January 2). Zeignarik Effect and Quest Logs. [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://www.psychologyofgames.com/2017/01/3613/

Signal Detection Theory (SDT) is a way to quantify decision-making in the presence of uncertainty, which is also referred to as internal and external “noise.” The basic premise of this theory is that both signal and noise are represented in calculated probabilities within the individual making the decision, and the extent to which those representations overlap can be quantified based on the individual’s response and whether the signal is present or absent (Anderson, 2015; although the specific mechanics and statistics underlying this quantification are beyond the scope of this post, there are a multitude of resources available for those interested in further pursuing that information). Therefore, there are four possible outcomes to the SDT (matrix from Anderson, 2015):

1. Hits: correctly reporting the presence of the stimulus/cue
2. Correct rejections: correctly reporting the absence of the stimulus/cue
3. Misses: failing to report the presence of the stimulus/cue when it occurred
4. False alarms: incorrectly reporting the presence of the stimulus/cue when it did not occur

Furthermore, the detection of a stimulus depends on both the intensity of the stimulus and the physical and psychological state of the individual. Recognition accuracy depends on whether a stimulus was actually presented, as well as the individual’s response.

In relation to games user research, the SDT can be used to measure and design many different aspects of games. Any instance in a game where a player has to make a decision under some uncertainty is when this theory can be best applied. Since SDT has been applied extensively in perception and decision-making research, let’s first discuss how some of this work is relevant to the player experience in video games.

Perception research commonly utilizes a behavioral task called the oculomotor delayed-response task, which requires an individual to make an eye movement to a cued location following a specific delay. The schematic of the oculomotor delayed-response task (from Goldman-Rakic, 1996) below should help demonstrate the connection between this task and video games.

For the oculomotor delayed-response task, during signal-absent trials, the individual has to hold off judgment until the whole observation period is finished whereas, during signal-present trials, the individual can judge the signal presence immediately after the signal is presented. Ultimately, researchers are typically interested in the number of trials an individual responded correctly and incorrectly (i.e., recognition accuracy). While the oculomotor delayed-response task has been manipulated in many ways (e.g., varying inter-trial intervals, cue/delay periods) to answer specific questions, perhaps its most relevant connection to video games is when players learn the meaning of a stimulus/cue presented in a game and then, at a later time point, need to respond appropriately about whether that stimulus/cue is present or not, as well as how to apply the information conveyed by that stimulus/cue in the current situation. Although players’ recognition accuracy of specific game elements is not being tested or predicted when they play games (unless, perhaps, they are playtesting), the relevance to the oculomotor delayed-response task and how it tests decision-making and working memory is evident.

Let’s look at some examples in games that might fit the four possible outcomes of the SDT:

Hit

In Prototype 2, a third-person action game, instructional text is introduced to the player about the effect of their actions on specific UI elements. This appears near the relevant UI, which allows the player to easily associate this with the specific UI, and flashes briefly to attract the player’s attention. Additionally, there is time manipulation, which minimizes in-game distractions and allows the player to focus on the conveyance. Ultimately, this type of UI introduction is likely to result in a hit, according to the SDT, because it is a very attention-seeking design that minimizes extraneous distractions, or external noise.

Miss

In Battleborn, the tutorial starts once the player takes control of the character. White text is presented in the top-center of the screen, which explains features of the UI (e.g., minimap) as well as basic movement (i.e., sprint). However, since this text is small and cycles quickly, there is a high chance the player will miss this information. In addition, there is new objective text, character/story narrative, subtitles, and upgrade available notification. All of this presented simultaneously is cognitive overload for the player, who is also trying to experience the world and art style of the game at the same time. Ultimately, the low salience of the white text, in combination with higher-salient cues, is likely to cause the player to miss some, if not all, of what the white text is trying to convey.

Correct rejection

While correct rejections and false alarms can seemingly be more difficult to design around than hits and misses, a correct rejection would simply be the player correctly identifying the absence of a UI element. Designing for a correct rejection would likely be successful when implementing common UI industry-best practices, such as Neilsen Norman Group’s 10 Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design.

Infamous: Second Son introduces instructional text to the player describing one of the game’s main UI elements, the smoke meter, which is accompanied by a bright arrow that points to it. Also, in the GIF above, you can see the “Drain Shard” UI that appears when the player is in the appropriate position to complete such an action. Being that video games are only becoming increasingly more complex, with many things typically appearing on-screen simultaneously, it is important to note how the “Drain Shard” UI is noticeably different from other UI elements and notifications. It differs in size, color, and iconography. This and similar designs would likely result in correct rejections, according to the SDT, because the player would be able to easily notice the difference in the UI, not mistaking the “Drain Shard”, which is an in-game action, with another UI tutorial/notification.

False alarm

Continuing with the theme of video games becoming increasingly complex and containing numerous on-screen cues to attend to simultaneously, a busy screen is likely to result in some false alarms. Overall, The Division is an example of a game that handles the busy-UI screen relatively well by relying, primarily, on pop-up text boxes and a lot of flashing orange to convey information to the player. However, one example that might produce a false alarm can be seen below.

During the tutorial, there is almost continuous tutorial text appearing on the left-side of the screen. Specifically, the constant orange blinking and similar text-box pop ups could result in the player attending to a certain cue expecting one thing and it is actually an entirely different message. Although consistency in game elements is typically praised, when all UI elements are of similar design, this might result in the player thinking a certain UI element represents one thing when it actually represents something else entirely.

Conclusion

Although this post focused primarily on the external noise component of the SDT, it is important to note that the internal noise component (i.e., how external aspects of the SDT affect players cognitively) is an integral part of the theory. The internal response is an internal state that produces an individual’s impression about whether a stimulus/cue is present, has shifted, or is absent. Also, these components of the SDT typically fluctuate from individual to individual and situation to situation (Imai & Tsuji, 2004; Kubovy, Epstein, & Gepshtein, 2013); numerous variables can factor into this fluctuation, such as current psychological state, cognitive (e.g., attentional) resources, and prior experience with the type of game, to name a few.

How a player perceives game elements, as well as how he/she converts this information into an in-game action, is a complex process and, consequently, game design can affect a lot about the player experience from both psychological and physiological perspectives.  As games user research grows as a field and begins implementing additional biometric methods, such as electroencephalography (EEG) to measure local brain activity, we will be able to correlate external and internal components of the SDT during gaming experiences. Although this will likely not be implemented for quite some time, and it will take time for basic research to accumulate enough evidence to convince companies to invest in such methods, understanding the intersection of these components could help inform game design. More specifically, this could help deliver designers’ precise intentions and, ultimately, an optimal player experience.

References:

Anderson, N. D. (2015). Teaching signal detection theory with pseudoscience. Front. Psychol. 6:762. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00762

Goldman-Rakic, P. S. (1996). “The prefrontal landscape: implications of functional architecture for understanding human mentation and the central executive,” in The Prefrontal Cortex: Executive and Cognitive Functions, eds A. C. Roberts, T. W. Robbins and L. Weiskrantz (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 87–102.

Imai, A. & Tsuji, K. (2004). Event-related potential correlates of judgment categories and detection sensitivity in a visual detection task. Vision Research, 44, 763-773.

Kubovy, M., Epstein, W., & Gepshtein, S. (2013). Foundations of visual perception. In A. F. Healy & R. W. Proctor (Eds.), Experimental Psychology. Volume 4 in I. B. Weiner (Editor-in-Chief) Handbook of psychology (87-119). New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.