My thought is that a game's success is wholely predicated upon is addictiveness---if you choose to make your game less addicting, you're making a worse game. You're shooting yourself in the foot. That's my view.

Quote:Original post by Trapper Zoid
While a journal does help, I'd really like to see some sort of auto flashback system in these story based games ("Previously in Fantasy Quest XVIII, our hero has ventured into the Fire Temple to rescue the Princess of Fate! Can he rescue her before she is sacrificed to the Demon Goddess? Play on to find out!")

That's a great idea! I might have to nick that :-)

Quote:Original post by caffiene

Quote:Original post by makeshiftwings
Addictive generally means something that generates an actual physical biochemical addiction.

Im going to be pedantic about that... I think there is a fine difference, but one thats relative to the discussion.
Addiction certainly can involve chemical dependancy. But more important to understanding addiction in general is the way in which the chemical dependancy -leads- to a reward and punishment cycle which reinforces the behaviours involved, and creates a potentially damaging pattern.

Well, I'll be pedantic right back at you ;). I agree that the word "addiction" can be used to describe either a chemical dependancy OR a psychological addiction, but the adjective "addictive" is usually only applied to things that cause a chemical dependancy. Because ANYTHING can be "addicitve" to someone with an addictive personality disorder, and therefore, if the word "addictive" were to mean "something that could become addicitive to someone with an addictive personality disorder", then it would apply to every single thing in existence. People are addicted to eating, dieting, exercising, being lazy, washing their hands, shopping, stealing, playing video games, playing sports, driving, spending money, hoarding money, sleeping, not sleeping, etc. I'm sure somewhere out there in the world of neuroses, there is someone addicted to eating 60 watt light bulbs and someone else addicted to covering their face with canned peas. You can't apply the term "addictive" to all of these things.

Quote:A bigger problem lies in that some companies may deliberately try to make games (namely MMORPGs) to be as addictive as possible. The reason behind that, logic dictates, is that their income is mostly based on the number of concurrent subscriptions, rather than the initial price of creating a new account. They will do everything in their power to make it hard for the player to stop playing at any given time (be it a temporary break, or a full-time account cancellation), but instead persuade him into staying online longer, even when it becomes boring, not fun and unnecessary

What purpose would an MMORPG developer have in keeping as many players online all the time as possible, when their income is based on concurrent subscriptions? Why have the option to allow players to crunch so much content into a consecutive time span instead of forcing them to spread it out? They could easily force your online character to require rest. As the developer you have then extended the amount of time it requires for someone to complete tasks without having them logged in and using your bandwidth and resources. Of course you could also create an algorithm similar to double or rested XP which would allow a character to have built up rest to do "all-nighters".

From a dev/marketing standpoint - say it takes 1 month of constant grinding to obtain a reputable status in-game, forcing a rest option you have extended it to nearly 2 months (1 more month of subscription fees). As the developer you have now put a system in place to not make the game less addictive, but force the player to take a break.

Is it ethical now to say you tried? Any addict is just going to find a way around it – say starting up a second account and have their characters rest time offset.

Quote:Original post by benco
What purpose would an MMORPG developer have in keeping as many players online all the time as possible, when their income is based on concurrent subscriptions?

You want to have a lot of players online so that other players have more people to meet and play with. If the MMO were mostly based around solo play, then sure, you'd be better off financially trying to get them to stay subscribed but not actually play much. But if the success of your game requires lots of players interacting with eachother, you want to try to keep them all online all the time. Is this unethical? No, I don't think so. If a player doesn't like that your game forces long play times, he can quit. It's not an actual drug, like cigarettes, where it is designed specifically to chemically overcome that person's resistance and force them to continue buying your product even when they don't want to. Also, MMO's have a much, much, much smaller chance of killing you or damaging you at all. Seriously, there is no way to separate "addictive" from merely "fun" when you try to argue about everyone in the world. If you make anything fun at all, video game or not, someone somewhere will become "addicted" to it. If you make more of the "fun" item, they'll buy more of it, because they're "addicted". If this is unethical, then all business and all entertainment is unethical.

This wouldnt be a problem if 'real-life' was more entertaining ;)

So what is the real problem here:

Addictive games take away time from the real world
|
V
Social norms dictate that a person be successful in the real world
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V
Success in the real world is defined by material and/or social gains/contributions
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V
Material and social gains are ultimately trivial

Solution:
Make the virtual world more important. That is, get video game junkies addicted to something relevant.

Go-go-gadget logic.

I agree that it's impossible to aim to make a game both good and totally non-addictive - that's the reason I titled this thread "How to make a game less addictive" rather than non-addictive. However I argue that some games can be more accurately described as addictive than others. There's a reason Everquest was nicknamed "Evercrack" and Tetris was not nicknamed "Tet-roin" or "Te-ctasy".

Judging from the responses, I think part of my problem with the use of the word "addiction" stems that many designers seem to equate rather than correlate an addictive game with a good game. There's a bunch of replies that are along the gist of "if a game isn't addictive, then it isn't going to be fun". I guess it's understandable; I know most designers would be thrilled if their players were saying "Wow, your game is so fantastic I just can't put it down!". However I am not convinced that that is the case that addictive equals fun. I reckon a game that you can pick up and be entertained with for half an hour and easily put back down is much, much better than a game that frustrates you for eight hours but you want to keep playing the damn thing to get past that damn point that's still blocking you.

As for the issue of ethics, it does come down to personal option here, but I do feel uneasy about delibrately trying to hook players into playing a game as much as possible, especially if there's a financial incentive as with MMORPGs. Again it's a grey area where I can't deliminate the fine line from what I'd consider fair game from what I'd feel was unethical.

But to give you an example that I would regard something beyond what I'd want to do that's related to gaming - I'll take the example of designing slot machines. A well-designed slot machine is one that nets the most profit. Is it unethical to design such a machine in the first place? What about if you make it give a big flashy display when the punter wins, but losses are done silently so to lesson their impact? Or if you don't make it easy to see how much money you have lost in a play time? What if you make it able to read credit cards for easy cash access? Is it unethical to place them all in a big darkened room with no windows and no easy to see clocks so the players lose track of time? Or if you place your slot machine casino in an area with a high rate of unemployment and offer free daycare services for people who gamble more than a certain amount?

I might have gone a bit overboard on my example, but I do take issue with this desire to make games addictive (heck, there's a thread on making MMORPGs more addictve on the front page of the design forum right now! [smile]). I suppose it is just down to terminology. I have absolutely no problem with designing a game to be a fun as possible, or even as seamlessly flowing as you can make it. But I do have a problem with designers aiming to make their game as addictive as possible, as I feel that's more of an unfornuate side-effect of a compelling game rather than a positive quality that you should aim for as a primary objective

Ahh, I love these discussions.

There are many different views on games being addictive. Some people honestly believe that they're incredibly addictive and a threat to society. Some people think that they're absolutely fine and do no harm whatsoever. Still others believe that games can be addicting, but generally it's not something worth worrying about. There are lawyers, parents, gamers, game designers, and they all have different opinions.

All of them are right, all of them are wrong, and most all of them are missing the point entirely.

Our focus shouldn't be if games are addictive or not. Our focus should be why games are addictive. And this depends greatly on the person, and the game itself.

With single player games, it seems easier. Ultimately, if a person is playing a game instead of "getting out into the real world", it's for a reason. That reason is usually because there's something they don't like about the world. When your choices are "do something potentially really unpleasant, boring, and painful", and "play computer games", the latter usually wins out. Some people hide from the world by drinking alcohol. Some people hide from the world by burrying themselves in their work. And some people hide from the world by playing computer games. It's not about addictiveness. It's about the people. And the more we focus on the symptoms instead of the cause, the more people are going to be hurt. Saying "games are addictive" or "games aren't addictive" helps precisely nobody.

Then there's the MMORPG case. This one is much more interesting; Here, the lure is social gratification. I know a friend who played an online game non-stop. He absolutely hated the game, but he was a member of a guild. Now the people in this guild weren't just a bunch of random people to go dungeon crawling with; they were his friends. If he never mentioned anything in context with computers or the game in question, you'd think that these people were close friends he knew in real life. There, it wasn't the game that kept him there, but the people who he cared about. Social gratification is one of the most powerful aspects in our world. If that social gratification is coming through the game or through real life is completely irrelevant.

As for the particular question at hand.. you can't make a game "less addictive" and still keep it good. It's addictive because it's good. Putting health care warnings on games that tell your players how long they've been playing may be in good faith, but in the end, it'll cost the game something. At the very least, a sense of immersion.

I'm going to go back to my point again; It's not about the games. It's about the players. If you've got a bunch of avid gamers, it's not about keeping them from their "vice". It's a symptom-cause scenario. The symptom is playing the game too much. The cause.. well, if you want to know the cause, start studying psychology with a passion.

My advice.. if any of you have friends, close friends, who are addicted to the game.. stop thinking about the game. It's not about the game. It's about your friend, and it's either some hardships they're going through, or they're getting something from the game that the real world just isn't giving them. If you want a "cure", you're going to have to go well beyond the symptoms, and start looking at the actual cause. You might be shocked to find out what's depressing the hell out of the people you care about.

If you're a game maker, and you're just worried about being a worker of evil making addictive games and consuming the lives and souls of innocent people, don't be. You make computer games. Go out and make them. Make them good. Don't worry about the people who play them too much. If people play your games too much, it means you've made a really good game. Nothing else. It's your job to make games, and make them good, so go out and do it!

And if you're still worried.. well, for what it's worth, most people couldn't make an addictive game if they tried. If you don't believe me, check out the bargain bin at your local game store. But please, everybody, when you think about people being addicted to computer games.. stop thinking about the games.

The people in question will probably thank you for it.

That's a really good reply, VPellen. I can't say I disagree with that side of the argument. From my understanding of the nature of game addiction I'd say you're pretty dead on in that view.

Quote:As for the particular question at hand.. you can't make a game "less addictive" and still keep it good. It's addictive because it's good. Putting health care warnings on games that tell your players how long they've been playing may be in good faith, but in the end, it'll cost the game something. At the very least, a sense of immersion.

I'm still not 100% certain of this though. Are good games necessarily addictive? That's an assertion I keep seeing but I just don't know if it's true. Is there any way we can prove it's true, or is it all just based on a gut feeling? I may have to hunt down someone with a better understanding of psychology and see if they can help me out on what case studies have been done.

The other question from that is - how important is a sense of immersion? Does a good game need a high sense of immersion?

Good points to consider, thanks!