Here are 4 very helpful videos to watch if you are interested in designing a game or social experience. The speakers here talk about how the social aspect of games affects our behavior and by extension the world. There is no particular order to the videos. I’ve included the notes that I took from the video – basically just copying some of the material on their slides – so that you can quickly see if the material might be something you are interested in hearing more about.
While each of these four presentations are all about game mechanics each presenter has their own unique POV on the matter. I’m currently working on something that has both game and social media aspects to it. Each of these videos inspired new ideas or fresh looks on the things I’m thinking about.
TED.com > Seth Priebatsch: The game layer on top of the world
Notes from the presentation
The Last decade was all about >
- All about connections
- Facebook’s open graph
- Construction is over ( but more to explore )
The Next decade will all be about >
- All about influencing behavior
- No set foundations
- Construction has just begun
4 ( of the 7 ) aspects of Game Dynamics
- appointment dynamic: a dynamic in which to succeed, one must return at a predefined time to take a predetermined action.
- Happy hour
- Farmville – must water the crops
- influence and status: the ability of one player to modify the behavior of another’s actions through social pressure.
- The “Black” American Express card
- Badges in Modern Warfare ( or any other game )
- School – it’s a game just not a well defined game.
- Progression dynamic: a dynamic in which success is granularly displayed and measured through the process of completing itemized tasks.
- Linkedin – complete your progress bar
- World of WarCraft – level up
- communal discovery: a dynamic wherein an entire community is rallied to work together to solve a challenge.
- Digg – find the best news
- McDonalds Monopoly – community crops up to find “Boardwalk”
- DARPA find balloon project solved by MIT students
Thoughts
Seth has done a great job of looking at games and figuring out what are the essential components that make them compelling. It’s a good list to refer back to occasionally when brain storming for features of a game you might be working on. On the other hand it should be remembered that not every game needs to cover every single item here. Sometimes less is more.
Google Talks > Putting the Fun in Functional: Applying Game Mechanics to Functional Software
The entire video is almost an hour long however it isn’t necessary to watch the entire thing. Her presentation runs for the first 22 minutes and is, I think, very informative. Amy is a good speaker. She gets to the point and has lots of informative things to say. After her presentation she does two case studies on YouTube and Twitter to see how they measure up against the criteria that she outlined in her presentation. That lasts for about 16 minutes to the 38 minute mark of the video. Then she goes into Q&A which is worth watching but isn’t exactly the highlight of the video.
Speaker: Amy Jo Kim ( @amyjokim )
Amy Jo Kim, CEO of Shufflebrain, is an internationally known expert in online community architecture. She has helped design social games and social architecture for such companies as Electronic Arts, Digital Chocolate, Viacom, eBay and Yahoo! Her book Community Building on the Web was published in 2000, and has been translated into 7 languages.
Notes from the presentation
What is Social Media?
1) player-created content
2) social infrastructure:
3) tools for sharing
What is a game? ( informal definition ) A structured experience with rules and goals that’s fun.
Why are games so popular? Because they are incredibly good at modifying behavior.
Most compelling aspect of games: Schedules of reinforcement. Very primal
Covers 5 Game Mechanics (not a be-all, end-all list)
- collecting – the power of completing a set.
- points – game points or more interestingly there are points given by other players. A social points metric. Earning points to redeme for something.
- Leaderboards – expresses what is valued in your system.
- Levels – punctuate the game experience
- Feedback – accelerates mastery. Social feedback drives engagement
- Exchanges – structured social interactions. Basic and primal.
- Taking turns, trading. < explicit exchange. I go then you go.
- or implicit ( emergent ) exchanges: feedback can be given but not necessarily returned (eBay) Gifting – you don’t have to give a gift if they give you one.
- There are two types:
- Customization – character, profile. Helps you express yourself. You become invested.
How is Social Media influencing Games?
- Makes the UI more accessible. Devices – reaching out to more devices. Open APIs
- Recombinant – mashing up.
- Syndicated – content that lives outside where it’s source is.
Thoughts
This was probably the most academic of the four presentations listed here. Amy packed a lot of material – a books worth – into just a few minutes. Her list of the 5 aspects of game mechanics gave me lots to think about. My game is very location based. It occurred to me while Amy was answering one of the questions at the end that I can base my leader board on each local instead of just having one giant leaderboard for the whole planet. If there is just one then a few people will be so far ahead that it will seem impossible to new people to ever attain their level. However if people only have to compare themselves to others in their community then there is a since of accomplishment and attainability.
TED.com > Tom Chatfield: 7 ways games reward the brain
Notes from the presentation
Wanting + Liking = Engagement
The reward schedule: measuring the things that people do so that it can be calculated how much reward is needed to keep someone engaged, without over doing it.
A game can adjust the probabilities of success along the way to keep the person engaged.
- Experience bars measuring progress
- Multiple long and short term aims
- Rewards and effort
- Rapid, frequent, clear feedback
- An element of uncertainty
- Windows of enhanced attention
- Other people!
Thoughs
I like Tom’s hypothetical analysis of opening boxes. That is essentially what many of our online gaming experiences are like. If you are developing a game then try and do what Tom did and take the interactions of your game and strip away all the pretty pixels and cool sounds away to discover what is the essential experience(s).
TED.com > Jane McGonigal: Gaming can make a better world
This video is more about inspiration than education. As the title indicates: Jane discusses how gaming can be used to not only entertain but also to help change the world.
Notes from the presentation
Her goal: Make it as easy to save the world in real life as it is in games.
Gaming makes us virtuosos at 4 things:
- Urgent Optimism
- Weaving a tight Social Fabric
- Blissful Productivity
- Epic Meaning
That all adds up to gamers are Super-Empowered-Hopeful-Individuals.
Thoughts
First, Jane is a great speaker. She was funny and engaging. Her talk isn’t nearly as useful from the perspective of the developer/designer who might be making a game. But it’s valuable information nonetheless. If nothing else it should serve to inspire people to work harder because games can not only offer a financial benefit to the developer but also provide personal satisfaction for making people happier and smarter – sometimes.
Someday I want to see you at TED…in 5 year maybe.
@Antipirina Thanks! That would be way cool. If my next project goes where I think it will that won’t be such a long shot.
You already have a project in mind? Sooo….I'll see you at TED 2011, don't disappoint us! And give us some advances when you have something worked out..if is not a secret…