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Research on gameful design

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Gamification: Toward a Definition Ref: Gamification: Toward a Definition ; Sebastian Deterding, Rilla Khaled, Lennart E. Nacke, Dan Dixon. Photo by Samuel Zeller on Unsplash I was reading the above mentioned paper regarding the term of gamification and its definition. I found some really interesting lines that I would like to share as notes. "A working definition of the term gamification is the use of game design elements in non-game contexts." I find this sentence pretty laconic, with a clear meaning and really interesting the fact that there is not any clue or reference to the the term of play, which unfortunately is often misinterpreted! Actually, the writers mention it nicely and clearly while analyzing the definition few paragraphs below, that "…we are talking about elements of games, not of play." Moreover, I found also interesting the approach of the terms play and use in the following quote regarding the term of element within t

Gameful but not necessarily playful User Experience

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Photo by Esteban Lopez on Unsplash Gameful and playful What is actually the definition for gameful? Given by Sebastian Deterding, Dan Dixon, Staffan Björk, Elizabeth Lawley and Lennart Nacke in their paper with title Designing Gamification: Creating Gameful and Playful Experiences : "Gameful design … refers to the design of hardware and software in non-game contexts using design elements from games." And what is the definition for playful? Again given by Sebastian Deterding, Dan Dixon, Rilla Khaled and Lennart Nacke in their paper with title From Game Design Elements to Gamefulness: Defining “Gamification” : "… no consensual theory or terminology of playfulness has emerged so far." So, what could possibly define the term of playful? Given by Hannu Korhonen, Markus Montola and Juha Arrasvuori in their paper with the title Understanding Playful User Experience through Digital Games , playful is: "… to design something that is pleasurable to use

Gameful but not gamified User Experience

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Photo by Chris Liverani on Unsplash Gamification The definition for gamification has been properly given by Sebastian Deterding, Dan Dixon, Rilla Khaled and Lennart Nacke in their paper with title From Game Design Elements to Gamefulness: Defining “Gamification” . That is: "… use of game design elements in non-game contexts." The term of gamification has been a bit of a buzz-word for the last few, maybe, years in the field of enterprise and consumer software. Apart from being used, it has been also clearly misused, bringing in mind mostly points, badges, top lists and attempts to motivation. Until someday, while searching for the term gameful, I came up to this really interesting quote by Jane McGonigal from her session with title We don’t need no stinkin’ badges: How to re-invent reality without gamification : "Within the video game and digital media industry, discontent with some interpretations have already led designers to coin different ter

Games and User Experience

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Photo by Nikita Kachanovsky on Unsplash Why games? Let’s begin with this abstract question… why should we bring games into a discussion about User Experience in the enterprise software? Games deserve a huge respect! Games address the masses, and they do it successfully, if you consider the fact that each one of us has a game of any kind of her or his preference. Games, in the sense of a designated system constituted of rules and a purpose, exist already for a long time; they date actually back to the first traces of human civilization. In parallel, game research evolves all these years either through a trial-and-error practice or consciously as a theoretical term. Since the last four decades, games have also reached their digital era; images from video games deluge our visual culture, as well as our senses. Consequently, a new term has been established, the game experience. Game experience and numbers Let’s roughly check game experience interpreted in numbers. Analytic

Nutzer sollen Kontrollgefühl behalten

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Wie gute Gamification funktioniert Photo by Ugur Akdemir on Unsplash Interview beim  meinungsbarometer.info

Gefahren von Gamification hinsichtlich des Themas Spielsucht

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Welche Gefahren können von Gamification hinsichtlich des Themas Spielsucht ausgehen? Photo by Hello I'm Nik on Unsplash Im Falle eines Systems, in dem die Gamifizierung so aufgesetzt ist, daß diese selbst zum eigenen Spiel wird, könnte es diese Gefahr geben. In diesem Fall, könnten Nutzer diese Teile so nutzen, daß diese nicht mehr zur Aufgabenerfüllung dient, sondern zur Ablenkung wird. Dies bedeutet aber auch im besten Fall den Fehlschlag des Designs, und im schlimmsten die dunkle Seite des Designs. Die Mechaniken per se haben keine Bedeutung für sich alleine, sondern können im Zusammenhang mit dem Nutzer-Szenario entweder unterstützen oder manipulieren.

Welche Anforderung stellt Gamification an den Nutzer

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Photo by Filios Sazeides on Unsplash Ich sehe das weniger als Anforderung, sondern eher als eingrenzende Leitung. Der Nutzer muss nur mit den von dem gamifizierten System gegebenen Werkzeugen und Funktionalitäten sein oder ihre Arbeit machen. Hier genau kommt aber die User Experience und das Design ins Spiel, bzw. wie erfolgreich die Mechaniken basierend auf das Nutzer-Szenario verwendet worden sind, so daß der Nutzer nicht von den Möglichkeiten des Systems ausgebremst wird. Ziel ist, daß die Nutzer nicht das Gefühl verlieren, daß sie den Überblick und die Kontrolle über den gesamten Ablauf haben. Pragmatisch gesehen, müssen sie ständig und transparent die Kontrolle über den Prozess der gesamten Tätigkeit haben. Daher sollte User Experience diese spielerischen Elemente nicht als unvermeidliche Hindernisse diesbezüglich hinzufügen, sondern diese als Realisierung der Offenheit bereitstellen.