游戏邦注：本文作者是游戏设计师Chris Birke，他从条件反射行为入手，阐明了“乐趣”在神经学上的含义以及游戏如何利用条件反射产生的强制行为，呼吁广大开发者本着道德良心来设计游戏，为玩家的根本利益着想。

大约10多年以前，我读到John Hopson撰写的《Behavioral Game Design》一文。现在回想起来，那篇文章对我的之后的游戏设计观影响相当大。正是从那以后，我总是能发现把心理学和神经学原理整合进设计理念中的新方法，所以我一直追随这些原理。

技术进步日新月异，对网络而言更是如此。10年之期犹如百年，网络革命风起云涌。10年前，维基百科诞生了；不出四年，Facebook、《魔兽》和谷歌Gmail各领风骚；iPhone红遍整个2007年至今；《FarmVille》领衔农场经营游戏，这种游戏现在遍地开花。科学的前进步伐如此之快，神经科学联合高清实时的脑磁共振成像，正揭开行为学理论的神秘面纱。现在，基于分析和实时数据模拟玩家行为，我们的设计工作如有神助。我们不必为每天的设计苦恼了，如果有必要，我们还可以从理论运用中获利。

道德的含义是什么？《Behavioral Game Design》好像对这个古怪的命题也全然不知。现在，这种设计工具箱近乎一种心灵控制，只有提炼技术才有发展前途。在盲目地追逐“乐趣”的日子里，我们给玩家带来了什么？又遗忘了什么？

个人认为，既然我挣够了吃饭钱（可能再加一点点吧），我就有义务本着社会责任心来设计对玩家有好处的游戏，而不是拼命从玩家身上“榨钱”。我希望这些新技术的运用能呈现出积极的一面，同时鼓励与我志同道合的人。

首先，我将从神经科学的角度来阐述条件反射的运作原理，然后再深入解释游戏如何利用这个原理来最大化玩家的强制行为。之后，我还将进一步解释如何本着道德利用这些技术。我希望我的主张能在游戏行业里揭起一股讨论。首先，我们简要地了解一下条件反射行为。

大多数行为学家不说“斯金纳箱”这个词。斯金纳本人也不想被当成一种设备而名垂青史，所以这口箱子应该叫作“操作性条件作用室”（游戏邦注：操作性条件反射的概念是由美国心理学家斯金纳于1954年提出的）。这是一个用来隔绝研究对象（通常是鸽子或老鼠）的笼子，里面有一个可以操作的按钮和对象要学习的刺激（比如照射光）。对象按下按扭，就可以获得奖励（食物），但前提是对象对刺激做出反应后，能正确地按下按钮。

斯金纳就是靠这口笼子来探索学习的本能，后来又发现了如何最大化或破坏研究对象的强制行为。斯金纳的研究结论，简而言之，就是响应刺激而获得的奖励会极大地影响动物（包括人）对训练的反应方式。强制程度最高的行为不是由“固定率“的奖励（游戏邦注：在这种情况下的刺激是对正确行为进行固定的奖励）激发的，而是半随机的”变量”奖励——你可能成功，也可能不成功；但只要你不断地尝试，总是有那么个“万一”存在。

如果过去几年你已经在设计游戏了，那么你应该对此不陌生。综合利用这些研究结论已被证明确实有效。比如，当你听到熟悉的“叮”声，这是《黑暗破坏神》里的怪物掉落戒指时发出的声音，你能抗拒那种感觉吗？这种混合了珍贵的奖励和艰辛战斗的声音，并不是时时有，可以说是半随机出现。

你同样不能反驳前置内容映射到《Rift》（或其他MMO）学习曲线上有益处。在游戏的后期更缓慢地释放奖励内容，不仅能够最大化奖励的价值，而且正好符合最具强制性奖励时序安排的记录结果。只要添加一些强制随机战斗就可以保持游戏的新鲜度。评论称这是好设计，因为它更有趣了，是吧？

因为我就是个这么让人沮丧的还原论者，所以让我告诉你所谓“乐趣”的真相吧。它只是我们大脑中的一种电子和化学反应活动。乐趣就产生于此。你大概可以制作一个曲线图，上面添加销售额、焦点人群或Facebook游戏的DAU作为变量，“乐趣”的轮廓就出来了。即使你认为现在的Facebook游戏一点也不好玩，还是有人在玩（稍后你就知道为什么了）。

什么是“乐趣”？

在我看来，神经科学正在把行为理论当作操纵玩家的最有效手段进行快速拓展。到底是什么使大脑产生相同的东西呢？关于这个问题，目前存在若干不同的理论。在此，我只和读者们分享一下我最赞同的观点。

如果我所说的理论不是产生乐趣的真实机制，那么我至少要提醒你：很快就会发现真相的。早些时候，我看到一篇题为《Predictive Reward Signal of Dopamine Neurons》（多巴胺神经元的预见性奖励信号）的论文，看得我头晕眼花。这篇文章详细地描述了，大脑内存在一种特殊的神经元，专门负责释放一种叫作多巴胺的神经递质，多巴脑就是刺激学习和动机的“奖励系统”。其实，这是相当简单的理论，名为“刺激突起”，其关键在于保持新鲜感。

我们的大脑都是相似的，就好像每个正常人出生时，无名指的指甲盖上的角质细胞类型都是一样的。所以，我们的大脑上有相同的分区，每个人的大脑分区承担的任务（情绪、面部识别等）都是相同的。但每个区的活动都已专门化。

VTA，即腹侧背盖区，是大脑中的一个重要的中枢结构，是由专门释放神经递质多巴胺的神经元组成的。VTA延伸到其他脑区，伺机而动。通过释放多巴胺，这个结构充当了节流阀，可以强化各个区的大脑活动。那么，究竟是什么在操纵这个节流阀呢？奖励是也。

无论是斯金纳给研究对象的奖励，还是我们人人都渴望的社会地位、性、战利品等等，本质上都是一样诱人的。这些奖励激发了多巴胺神经元所管理的信号，并且每种信号都对应一定程度的奖励期望。

当意料之外的奖励出现时（或者说是“突出的奖励”），大脑中的多巴胺如泄洪般地增加了。大量释放的多巴胺就像火上浇油，沿着多巴胺能的神经通路，大脑的活动就增强了。

也就是在这个时候，新的记忆正在酝酿，原料就是作为刺激的当前感觉。当大脑体验过新奖励，无论当时大脑的感觉或想法是什么，这种记忆就成了一种模式。

现在，一种新联系建立了，一旦刺激出现，奖励的记忆就会被激活。并且，这个激活动作甚至比奖励本身更早出现。这就是行为学家所说的条件反射。

就以冰激淋为例子吧。现在你面前有一根像奶油一样甜（这作为奖励）的冰激淋，但你并不知道。假设你以前从来没有吃过冰激淋，现在舔一口吧。

冰激淋里的糖应该会触发大脑的自动奖励信号，然后多巴胺系统就会检测到，并且马上让你兴奋起来。（第一次尝试）

吃冰激淋越多，甜蜜的体验就越深刻，所以关于冰激淋的记忆也更加生动鲜明。单纯地看见冰激淋或闻到它的气味（不必尝），就足够让你联想起它的滋味。

冰激淋的奖励成了反射条件。这就是一种“愉悦”的体验，便我还不能称之为“乐趣”。离“乐趣”的形成尚有一步之遥。

因为你已经对冰激淋建立了条件反射，所以当你再次看到或闻到冰激淋时，甚至在你还没吃到之前，就会激活多巴胺反应（第二次尝试）——不是在最初的那片区域（那些最接近品偿体验的神经元已经开始期望冰激淋了，不像新区域那么兴奋）。相反地，还没尝过冰激淋奖励的新区域此时正在被激活。

记着，现在，在你吃到冰激淋以前，条件反射就已经发生了。当你站在等着买冰激淋的长队里，多巴胺的释放仿佛在大脑中放了一把火，对冰激淋的渴望熊熊燃烧起来。脑海中的记忆和刺激又被强化了（第三次尝试）。这是你的大脑正在记录奖励的期望。就算站在购买的队伍里和正在吃冰激淋完全是两回事，但你还是产生了得到奖励的反应，因为你的记忆强迫你这么做。这就是我们所说的“乐趣”。

“且慢，”你说，“站在队伍里不管用吧！”（你是对的。）对你我都不管用了，因为你已经做过太多次了，但是，试着想象一下你第一次站在买冰激淋的队伍里。我肯定你一定为期望兴奋到不可自制。这就是多巴胺的作用。多巴胺把冰激淋的记忆浸润得如此生动鲜活，以致于你几乎像尝到了冰激淋，所以在记忆的驱使之下，你走向冰激淇店，看着各种口味的冰激淋，琢磨着要购哪一款（巧克力还是奶油？）

所有这些经历和选择都是大脑的新记忆，并且都与冰激淋的奖励建立起坚实的联系。正是这些新记忆让多巴胺不断释放。只要新刺激可以预测到奖励，多巴胺系统就会不断引发记录体验的兴奋感，这整个体验都带着一种对奖励的不可抗拒的感觉和期望。所谓的体验不是指奖励本身，而是学习得到奖励的新记忆和渴望奖励的动机感。

这就是我想到的：当新的预测性刺激形成映射时，多巴胺就会强化奖励的经验。尽管每个人的大脑都是有差别的，有些人几乎免疫，有些人则非常容易受影响，但神经元和多巴胺总是存在的。再进一步推论，这就是游戏设计的工具。确保游戏给玩家带来明显的奖励，同时这种奖励要有足够的复杂度，但也不可过于复杂，否则就不能再刺激玩家。

为什么《魔兽》的服务器崩溃时，你仍然乐意不断地点击“重新链接”？为什么你总是重设旧机制，只要还能把它卖给推销给从来没有接触过的人（如儿童、新玩家）？奖励如何散布到多个大脑系统中（社交、听觉、机械、视觉）？条件反射正好解释了这些问题。有点令人意外的是，Vegas居然没有想出如何把赌博变成除了赌徒以外所有人都玩的社交游戏。

当所有可以联系到冰激淋的东西都联接完了，多巴胺系统就安定下来了。相关的神经元已经习惯了——感觉到刺激时也不再兴奋。这些神经元只是期望应该得到冰激淋奖励的时候就得到。因为没有学习新的东西，神经元不再引发兴奋。站在买冰激淋的队伍里失效了。

虽然冰激淋本身还是很美味可口，站在队伍里你仍然可以得到冰激淋，但“感觉就是不对了”。不仅如此，多巴胺神经元仍然能感觉到刺激，且如果当它期望时，奖励却没有出现，整条反应线就拉平了。当这条线彻底拉直了，就算冰激淋送到面前，你也不会再有什么冲动了，你还非常可能感到愤怒。这是厌恶理论，和乐趣理论类似。

冰激淋这个例子也暗示了成瘾原理，“致瘾“游戏和毒品有所不同——主要是多巴胺释放的强度和方式。几乎所有致瘾药品都会影响多巴胺，如去氧麻黄碱，会使多巴胺立即以十倍之于正常水平的量释放。你已经知道了奖励系统的运作，所以你可以想象得出这是多么强大的条件反射作用。游戏只不过以正常的感觉渠道刺激多巴胺的释放，释放的量也尚属于健康可接受的范围。

根据这个理论，头几次玩游戏释放的多巴胺是最多的。如果你有过恨不得冲回家玩一整天的游戏，那么你应该明白严重上瘾是什么感觉。另外适应性和压抑性会抑制多巴胺的进一步释放。

游戏有没有可能像毒品那样，形成足够强大的条件反射，从而立即刺激多巴胺释放？可能吧，从经济利益的角度上讲，我们很有动机确认这个可能性。我们有理由假定，有些人可能被训练至强制玩游戏。

根据反馈数据设计游戏

每个街机都有一个收集钱币的柜子。一到月底，街机老板就把柜子里的币统计一下，一部分付帐，其余的留作后期经营资金。老板就是凭这些钱决定要买哪款新街机。

你可以想象这种系统对游戏设计的影响，你可以认为它是分析的主要形式。当下的Facebook游戏的发布方式绝大多数在本质上是一致的，与计算利润仅有一步之遥。然而，因为数字营销和实时参数指标，这个世界一下子就改头换面了。

分析就是分析数据后再整成报告。由于早期的Facebook游戏不是由传统的游戏工作室制作的，所以数字分析最早是由网页开发者引进游戏领域。网页开发者知道分析的价值，而掌机游戏领域现在才开始意识到，并尝试着将其运用于游戏开发。

把网页中的“点击量”和“跳出率”概念换到Facebook游戏中，就成了“DAU（日平均用户）”、“MAU（月平均用户）”和组合参数“DAU/MAU”（用于衡量留存率）。

这些词除了给开发商带来声望，还设立了清楚明了、不容辩驳的成功指标：曲线图上的点。通过这些简单的指标，你可以即时地看到你的游戏如何快速积聚用户，留住用户和赢利。

然而，在DAU这种水平上分析，基本用途非常有限。这种分析只能反映现在，不能解释游戏为何、如何产生这些数字。正是通过设计理解、深入分析和经验的组合，才能进阶到下一级别。

现在游戏已经“云”化了。流媒体技术是早期的数字分布渠道之一，很快就深入到分析学和硬件调查的领域。Facebook拥有更高级的用户统计法，且已经嵌入分析功能（更别说它还重塑了我们的隐私概念）。

Android和iOS设备都通过“云技术”传输内容。Google拥有大量在线API用于分析，我只盼望某天像OkCupid这样的网站可以提供分析程序。（这是一个分析领域的金矿！）当代和次世代游戏机都有数字渠道，我认为这个趋势将继续发展。

我们在那个方向上走得越远，我们就越容易得到分析数额，此外，社交图谱也随之而来。所有玩家之间的关系，游戏内的互动和玩家的游戏史，都可以编成一份独有的文件夹。网页分析和游戏设计开始把这些海量的信息整合成新的东西。

因为游戏比网站提供的用户活动信息的层次更深，所以你也可以利用分析来更深入地观察玩家的行为。早在我们想到Facebook以前，Will Wright会不会是利用分析进行游戏设计的第一人呢？2001年，在电脑游戏期刊《Game Studies》对他的采访中，Wright说到数据如何揭开两大《虚拟人生》玩法：建房和建交。之后，这款游戏果然进一步为这两大玩家的目标而服务。

他继续谈到，有朝一日，分析可以用于为个体玩家打造游戏。现在这已经有可能了。不只是从参与的玩家身上收集信息，玩家行为的方方面面都可以收集起来用作分析。通过什么、何时、谁和为什么这些问题以及大量推测性信息现在都可以进一步研究了。

把玩家分成两个不同的类群，这样游戏开发者就可以根据玩家的类型来制作游戏。如果在动物园游戏中针对紫色企鹅收费10美元，无法填补你的月预算赤字，那么就把10美元的紫色加布迪（游戏邦注：意大利著名跑车品牌）引入差不多完全相同的汽车收集游戏中吧（迎合部分收入颇丰的中东受众）。

并非所有玩家群体的价值都是相等的。通过制作针对少数人的内容，你可以从主流受众中开发出“间隙市场”，或者把主流受众划分成更易管理的发展目标。并非所有玩家的价值都是一致的，这是同样的道理。

识别你的早期玩家和作为社交中心的意见领袖，对游戏公司大有益处。这些玩家是病毒传播的代理人，是成功的途径。识别他们并且让他们知道自己的奖励和特权地位。尽早告之下一款游戏，鼓励他们去尝试新游戏。剩下就好办了，其他玩家可能就会追随他们的步伐相继而至。

别忘了，这都可以自动化。服务器上的游戏一天可能更新两次，如果有必要，没理由让每个用户都看到相同版本的游戏。你不仅可以给最受欢迎的玩家“特别版”，你还可以发布“设计版A”给15%的用户，“设计版B”给剩下的用户。

观察分析看看哪个版本运作得更好，然后把整个游戏都变成那版设计。清洗、漂白、重复。这就是所谓的“A/B测试”，你可以用它来探索设计的方方面面。只是要注意不要测试相同数字内容的不同成本，因为人们会比较论坛上的交流意见，然后心生怀疑。

不过我认为没必要这么赤裸裸。我们不能消极被动，而要先发制人，通过前瞻性设计找到成功所在。因为提早列出概况，我们现在有了强大的理论框架，这个理论框架是关于与玩家联系、通过行为理论和神经学发展强制的游戏反应。A/B测试、统计、社交图谱和无数自愿参与的玩家都集中在这座旨在实现完美设计的实验室里。

我建议用小部分玩家做实验，看看他们对某种机制的条件反射情况如何，这样就可以优化时间和奖励分配。要雇用和培养统计员，这样我们可以根据他们的敏感性来追踪用户，定位用户、并最终留住用户。

不是一次又一次地修改相同的设计，而是推测特定市场范围内某种设计的有效性，然后把旧设计改成新的，更复杂的设计。通过MAU/DAU比值来增加留存率可以证实这一点。同时要记住，旧设计也许适用于新的受众群体。

游戏是否利用了玩家？

前面我们已经说到，我们有一套经过科学确证的奖励系统，又有大量社会学实验室每天开展的成千上万个实验的修正，真是太好了。这套系统总是能成功地牢住之前没有玩过游戏的人、网络环境下成长的孩子、失业的成年人和把时间消磨在工作上的人。游戏给他们什么回报呢？“乐趣”？

诚然，营利性实验室早在电子游戏分析学出现前就存在了。从一开始，我们就互相操纵，我们建立实验室来接收别人的想法（这叫作“交流”）。在游戏出现以前，广告就在改良操纵方法，而在广告出现以前，传道和修辞又差不多是这么做了。甚至我写下这些文字也是操纵你去思考我现在所讲的事实。

网络赌博、神经科学和分析学只是提供了控制行为和产生利润的强大利器。这种情况并不仅局限于游戏领域。

Jesse Schell在DICE大会的演讲《Design Outside the Box》中刻画了一个令人堪忧的未来版本：商业的动机就是披上跟踪销售的“游戏化”外衣，但现实已经是这样了。

让我担忧的不是买十送一的咖啡券，而是市场上的那一张张信用卡背后的“奖励计划”。为什么会有“奖励计划”这么个奇怪的概念存在？因为它管用啊。

游戏现在变成一种信用骗局？没有叙述、没有社交背景、没有政治立场、也没有表达创意的机会，我们只是把玩家划入小小养殖箱中吗？

作为设计师，我们只是一次又一次地点击相同的程序代码，等着财源滚滚而来，然后我们又可以继续点击代码了？你厌烦了吗？你还有多少空虚的时间要靠点击这些东西来打发？能提供更多价值的游戏才值得更多的付出，人们只是需要认识到这点而已。

让用户理解系统，向他们证明为什么你的游戏值得他们付出。让他们抛开其他游戏。支持能够传递价值的游戏，拒绝利用简单的奖励机制把游戏变成数字娱乐的麦当劳食品。用故事创造游戏，用艺术创造游戏。机制和对乐趣的理论性理解是表达信息的强大工具，这远比积分、音乐和电影更强大。那就是道德，你可以靠它获利。

媒体的未来会朝这个方向发展。尽管开发者总是嘲笑“将游戏视为艺术”的这种想法，但毫无疑问，这个想法在讨论中将越来越频繁地提起。史密森尼博物馆计划2012年办一个游戏展，全国艺术基金会（National Endowment for the Arts）现在也开始资助有艺术价值的游戏。

这意味着什么？我几乎没遇到过哪个谈到这个问题的设计师是人文学科背景出身的，所以我抓住机会，按设计方向把它转译成：艺术创造文明。从个体水平上交流和操纵精神不能产生文明，而是在大多数人中共享想法和道德才能产生文明。

艺术创造了忠诚的亚文化，在这个水平上的条件反射行为更高级、更广泛，远超过老虎机和Facebook游戏的简单设计。在独立游戏开发者的庆典、芯片音乐的小宇宙和人们对《最终幻想7》角色忠贞不渝的喜爱中，亚文化形成了。 Link的美德影响了整整一代人，而《CityVille》中的道德观也许永远也不可能达到这个境界。

我们让行为操纵产生积极的作用。耶鲁大学进行了一项名为“Play 2 Prevent”的项目，旨在探索如何将游戏作为提高青少年在性行为中预防HIV意识的工具。可能有些人会资助游戏来训练和改造犯人，因为比起无线电视，这些游戏应该更有教育和改良意义。

分析学也是你的朋友。你可以像大型游戏发行商那样在你的游戏上做实验、优化你的游戏——给予用户更多对他们生活有益的东西。用户们喜欢分析学，只要它对他们的还有益处。只要把数据整合成一份友好的程序包发给用户，然后再取回反馈。与其他设计师分享数据（也许我们需要一个玩家分析学网站？），共同对抗隐藏数据的公司。创意地设计，脱离社交图谱数据制作机制，以深化与真实玩家的互动。

大量服务已经在朝这一目标迈进（例如Xbox排行榜、OkTrends博客），且人们有意识地把它像病毒一样传播开来。用分析学进一步发展你的概念。如果数据表明，玩家数量在下午5点达到顶峰，那么就把游戏活动安排在那个时间。实时调整游戏的系统，像《Left 4 Dead》中的AI指导，可以由分析学数据来驱动。欣然接受“云”技术这个概念，运用这个数据保持游戏动态。

结语

玩游戏可以是一件很美好的事，甚至可能延展生命，但也可能导致人们上瘾般地沉迷其中，却不知自己在为素未谋面之人创造大量利润。因为我已经学过这些东西了，一天不见它们，我就过不下去了。当我因为不能完成逃不掉的专题报告而停止玩游戏时，我会想到它。当我读到某些我想学但不能学的论题，但文本写得很差时，我就会生气，因为我的意愿浪费在厌倦之中。

当我看到孩子们每天重复地做着枯燥无味的数学作业，我就心生同情，当我看到制作精美的广告却用来宣传不健康的东西，还被贴上艺术的标签，我就痛心疾首。我想到无数才能都浪费在做些事当中。一想到那些上瘾的人不断地玩维加斯的老虎机，所有的潮人不停地猛拍手机，希望Facebook快升级，满大街走着的都是一群不会思考的动物，我就不能再继续制作那种游戏了。但我现在还无法停止。

游戏与玩家之间如何互动？带着你的道德来设计吧。有时做点有趣又带强制性的东西也不错。但有时候，你也得被迫做出让步。在开发游戏的过程中，我已经做了不少令人羞耻的事——我妥协了用暴力对抗女人的原则，我模仿军用武器弹药，我还非常努力地研究如何让人们近乎强制地做事。

别放弃。如果你进入游戏行业是出于爱游戏，那么为它而战吧（你必须）。世道变化得快，游戏的未来就靠你了。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Ethos Before Analytics

by Chris Birke

[In this article, designer Chris Birke takes a look at research, examines what's going on in the social games space, and argues for an approach that puts creative ethos before data-driven design -- but without ignoring the power that game designers wield over players.]

A little over 10 years ago I read an article titled Behavioral Game Design written by John Hopson. Now, looking back, I see what a huge influence it’s been on my game design philosophies. I have been following psychology and neuroscience ever since, always uncovering new ways to incorporate them into an ever-growing design toolbox.

Technology is moving very fast, and 10 years is very long in internet time. Wikipedia was launched 10 years ago; Facebook, World of Warcraft, and Gmail have been around since 2004. The iPhone was born in 2007, and FarmVille recently turned two. Science is moving just as quickly, and behavioral theory is now being underwritten by neuroscience, and the revelations of high resolution, real-time brain mapping (fMRI). On top of this we now design with the aid of analytics, the real-time data-mining of player behavior. We can roll out a design tweak once a day, if necessary, to maximize profits.

What are the ethical implications? As a curious proposition, “Behavioral Game Design” seemed innocent enough. Now that design toolkit verges on a sort of mind control, and the future is promising only refinement of these techniques. What are we doing to players, and what have we left behind in those innocent days of chasing “the fun”?

Personally, so long as I can make enough money to eat (and maybe have a good time), I feel obligated to design socially responsible games that benefit the lives of players, not just exploit them. I want to explore ideas of how to use these new technologies in a positive way, and to encourage those who feel the same.

I would like to share some of the neuroscience that attempts to explain how conditioning behavioral conditioning works in games, and go into how this can be used in the context of analytical game design to maximize player compulsion. Then I will go into some ideas for how to use these tools ethically, and hopefully inspire discussion in our community. But first, a brief review of behavioral conditioning.

“They’re waiting for you, Gordon, in the test chamber…”

Most behaviorists don’t use the words “Skinner Box.” Skinner himself didn’t want to be remembered as a device, preferring to call it an “operant conditioning chamber.”

It is a cage used to isolate the subject (usually a pigeon, or a rat) with only a button to operate and a stimulus (a light, for example) to be learned. Pressing the operant (button) releases a reward (food), but that’s reliant on pressing it correctly in response to the stimulus.

It was with this that Skinner explored the nature of learning and, further, how to maximize or disrupt the compulsive behaviors of his subjects. The results, in short, showed that the schedule of rewards in response to stimulus greatly affected how animals (like you and me) responded to their training. The most compulsive behavior was not driven by “fixed ratio” rewards, where a stimulus meant a consistent prize for correct actions, but instead by a semi-random “variable ratio” schedule. Maybe you would win, or maybe not. Keep trying, just in case — you’ll figure it out eventually.

If you have been designing games at all in the past few years you ought to be familiar with this. Applying and combining the results of these studies have been proven to work. No one can deny the incredible feeling you get upon hearing the familiar “ting” (YouTube link) of a rare ring dropping off an enemy in Diablo. It’s the combined reward of the long term chase for better stats with the instant gratification of a high pitched chime over the clank and groans of battle. It’s rare and semi-random.

You can’t argue the benefit of front-loading content onto the learning curve like in Rift (or any other MMO) either. Dishing out rewarding content more slowly in the late game not only maximizes its use, it’s fitting nicely to the documented results of the most compelling reward scheduling. Just add some compelling random combat encounters to keep it fresh. Reviews (for example, Gamespot’s Review) call this out as good design, because it’s more fun that way, right?

Since I’m being such a depressing reductionist, let me tell you I believe there is such a thing as “fun.” It’s a specific brain activity within us, electric and chemical. It lives in there, and you can probably graph it with powerful magnets, sales, focus groups, or the staggering 275 million daily active users playing Zynga’s games on Facebook (AppData). Even if you don’t think current Facebook games are fun (and I’ll suggest how that might work), someone out there does.

What is fun, anyway?

In my opinion, neuroscience is quickly extending behavioral theory as the most effective means of manipulating people (players). There are a few different theories of what’s happening in the brain to create the consistent results found in behaviorism (and FarmVille), but I’ll only share my favorite for sake of brevity.

If this isn’t the true mechanism of fun, I’d at least like to warn you: it will be discovered soon. A early paper on the topic entitled “Predictive Reward Signal of Dopamine Neurons” is the sort of thing that makes me giddy. This research describes in detail how the behavior of a particular type of neuron in the brain specializing in the neurotransmitter dopamine works as the “reward system” to drive learning and motivation. It’s fairly simple theory called “incentive salience,” and the key is novelty.

All of our brains are similar. Just as the average person is born with the same sorts of cells in the fingernail cuticle on their ring finger, so, too, do we all share the same brain areas. They work to perform the same tasks in all of us (moods, facial recognition, Counter-Strike, etc.). They’ve specialized.

An important central structure, the ventral tegmental area (VTA), is made up of neurons that specialize in the release of the neurotransmitter dopamine. It stretches out into other brain areas, lining them and waiting for a queue to act. By releasing dopamine, this structure can intensify brain activity in those areas, acting as a sort of throttle. And what’s controlling the throttle? Reward.

(Fig. 1) The reward system.

These rewards are the same sorts of delicious rewards given in Skinner’s Behaviorist research, as well as other things we’re wired up to like. (Social status, pleasant noises, sex, explosions, epic loot, etc.) These things trigger the signals dopamine neurons are carefully monitoring, and each expects a precise level of expected reward.

When a surprising reward occurs (or, as they say in the literature, a “salient” one), a flood of dopamine is released. That flood is like adding fuel to a fire, and the brain activity is intensified along the dopaminergic pathways.

While that’s happening, new memories are being formed, too, encoding the current input from the senses as a stimulus. It’s the pattern of whatever the brain was sensing and thinking while that new reward was experienced.

From now on the link is made, and whenever this pattern (this stimulus) is present, the memory of the reward is activated. This happens even before the reward itself is consumed. It’s what behaviorists call conditioning.

I’ll use ice cream as an example of this process. It’s full of creamy sweetness (which qualifies as an excellent reward), but pretend you don’t know that. Imagine you’ve never before in your life so much as heard of ice cream. Then take a lick.

The sugar should trigger an automatic reward signal in your brain, and your dopamine system will detect it and light you up right afterwards (Trial 1, in the figure below).

The experience of the sweetness is intensified by the heightened activity, so the memory will be vivid. The sight and smell of ice cream alone will be enough to remind you of its taste, and how good it made you feel.

The reward of ice cream is now conditioned. This is the experience of “pleasure,” but I wouldn’t call it fun yet. There’s one last step in the process.

(Fig. 2) The dopamine release moving back in time over four trials until it reaches the furthest reliable signal of reward.

Because you’ve been conditioned, seeing or smelling ice cream (the stimulus) again will now activate a dopamine response even before you taste it (Trial 2). Not in the original area (those neurons closest to experiencing the taste have already begun to expect it, and aren’t as surprised). Instead, new areas that weren’t involved in the exact moment of the ice cream reward are being lit up.

Remember, this is now happening before you’ve actually gotten the ice cream. The dopamine driven brain fire is happening while you’re standing IN LINE for the ice cream. The memory and stimulus is being recorded progressively further out across time (Trial 3). It’s your brain encoding a prediction of the reward. Even though standing in line is not at all the same as eating ice cream, you’re doing it because you’re compelled by the memory. That’s what we call “fun.”

“But wait,” you say, “standing in line sucks!” (And you’re right.) It sucks for you and me because we’ve done it too many times, but try to imagine the first time you stood in line for ice cream. I’d bet you were giddy with expectation and could barely contain your excitement. That’s the dopamine system at work. It’s intensifying the experience by making the memory of the ice cream so vivid that you can almost taste it, while laying down a memory of walking up to the ice cream shop, looking over the flavor choices, and trying to decide which topping (chocolate fudge or whipped cream?)

All of these experiences and choices are new processes in your brain, and all of them are receiving an novel link to the reward of ice cream. That’s keeping the dopamine flowing, and making it all feel good. As long as a reward can be predicted by a new stimulus, the dopamine system will keep causing the excitation needed to record it, and the whole experience carries a compelling feeling and expectation of the reward. It is not the reward itself, but the fresh process of learning to get it and the motivational feeling of wanting the reward.

So that’s what I’ve come to think of: the dopamine-enhanced experience of reward while a new predictive stimulus is being mapped out. A human software interface.

Although every brain is born different, some nearly immune and others very susceptible, the neurons and dopamine are always there. With a little deduction it’s a tool of strong game design. Keep the dopamine flowing by making sure you provide salient rewards and just enough operant complexity to keep it all from ever being mapped out, but not too much or else you shut them down.

It explains why you’re willing to keep clicking “reconnect” when the WoW server goes down, and it explains why you can rehash old mechanics so long as you’re selling them to an audience who hasn’t already learned them (i.e. children, new gamers.) It also establishes how splitting your rewards across many brain systems (social, aural, mechanical, visual) is such a compelling combination. It’s a bit surprising that Vegas hasn’t figured out how to turn gambling into more of a social game for people besides the high rollers.

(Fig.3) A momentary depression occurs when an expected reward is absent.

Once everything that can be reliably linked to ice cream has been wired up, the dopamine system goes quiet. The neurons involved have become acclimated; they no longer get excited when they sense the stimulus (Trial 4). They simply expect their reward of the ice cream in due time. With nothing new to learn, they no longer trigger excitation. Standing in line for ice cream now sucks.

Even though ice cream itself is still delicious, the line is simply work you do to get it. Things “just don’t feel the same anymore.” Even more than that, those dopamine neurons are still watching, and if the predicted reward doesn’t show up when they expect it, the whole system flat-lines. When they fall on their face, you have no motivation to continue, and quite possibly feel pissed. It’s a theory of boredom, as well as fun.

It hints at addiction too, but in doing so it resolves the difference between an “addictive” game and a drug. It has to do with the strength and means of the dopamine release. Almost all addictive drugs like methamphetamine affect dopamine, and can trigger its immediate release at tenfold normal levels. Given how this reward system operates, you can imagine how strong this conditioning is. Games only trigger the release of dopamine through normal sensory channels, and at a more healthy and sustainable rate.

By this theory, the largest dopamine rush accompanies the first few times you play. If you’ve ever felt a compulsion to rush home and play a game all day, you are likely getting a hint of what a strong addiction feels like. Afterwards, the combined effects of acclimation and inhibition curb further dopamine release.

Can a game lay down enough conditioning over time that begin to match the levels of reinforcement seen in drugs that immediately release dopamine? Perhaps, and we have strong profit motivation to see if this is true. It’s reasonable to assume some people can be trained to compulsively play games.

Mario Collects Coins

Every arcade cabinet collected a certain number of quarters in a month. At month’s end, the arcade owners counted these up, paid their bills, and sunk the rest into their futures. These were the people who decided which new arcade machines to buy.

You can imagine the effect this system had on game design, and you can think of it as a primitive form of analytics. The majority of analytics in current games are essentially the same, only one step away from counting profit. However, with the realities of digital distribution and real time metrics, this world is quickly changing.

As a refresher, analytics is the process of crunching data to inform decisions. They came to games via web developers, as the early Facebook games were not created by the traditional console studios. Web developers knew the value of analytics in a way the console world is only beginning to appreciate, and built them into the game.

Webpage “hits” and “bounce rate” translate fairly well into the world of Facebook games as “Daily Average Users” and “Monthly Average Users,” and the combo stat “DAU/MAU.” (It’s used to measure retention.)

Beyond helping producers sound important, they provide a clear and inarguable metric of success: points on the graph! Through simple metrics like these you can see in real time how quickly your game is gaining users, keeping them, and turning a profit.

However, analytics used at the level of DAU are fundamentally limited. They show only the present, and say little or nothing as to why and how the game is creating these numbers. It’s through a combination of design insight, deeper analytics and experiment that takes it to the next level.

We’re putting games in the cloud now. Steam was one of the early digital distribution channels, and got into analytics right away with its hardware surveys. Facebook has more advanced demographics and built in analytic functionality (not to mention its pioneering work in redesigning our concept of privacy).

Android and iOS devices all deliver through the cloud. Google has numerous online APIs for crunching analytics, and I’m just waiting for the day websites like OkCupid start hosting apps. (It’s an analytics goldmine!) The current and next generation consoles all have digital channels, and I don’t see any indication of this letting up.

The more we continue to shift (or float) in that direction, so too will the analytics become easier and easier to access, and what’s more, with the social graph that accompanies it all. The relationships between all the players, their in-game interactions, and the histories of players over time and across games can now be tied to a unique profile for each user. This massive well of information is where web analytics and game design begin to synthesize into something new.

Because games offer a much deeper level of user activity than websites, you can use analytics to probe much deeper into player behavior, too. Will Wright was a pioneer in using analytics for game design long before we’d dreamed of Facebook. In a fantastic 2001 interview with Game Studies he spoke of how data revealed two main types of play in the Sims: House Building vs. Relationship Building. The game was then tailored to further support these two player goals.

He went on to speak of how analytics might one day be used to customize games on a per-user basis. It’s something now possible, and in real time. Rather than just gathering information on player attendance, every aspect of player behavior can now be collected as analytical data. Questions of what, when, who, and why can be asked, and a whole slew of predictive information can now be developed.

Dividing players into different demographic groups allows developers to tailor (both in content and mechanics) to particular types of players. If charging $10 for the rare Purple Penguin in Zoo Collector will not make up for your monthly budget deficit, then introduce the $10 Violet Bugatti in the nearly identical Car Collector (catering to a segment of the Middle Eastern audience with disposable income).

Not all demographics are of equal worth. By mastering specific content for a number of smaller demographics you can expand into niches beyond the mainstream, or divide the mainstream up into more manageable developmental targets. Not all players are of equal worth, either.

It’s very valuable to identify your early adopter players and the opinion-generating players who act as social hubs. These players are the agents of virality, and your means to success. Identify them and let them know how special they are with rewards and privilege. Tell them early about your next game, and encourage them to move on to it. The rest will follow.

Don’t forget this can all be automated, too. Games on a server can be patched twice a day, if needed, and there’s no reason every user will see the same version of your game. Not only can you give your most popular users the “Special Version,” you can also release “Design Version A” to fifty percent of your users and “Design Version B” to the rest.

Watch the analytics to see which version does better, then shift over the entire game to that design. Wash, rinse, repeat. This is known as “A/B testing,” and you can use it to explore almost every aspect of design. Just be careful not to test various costs on the same digital content, as people might compare notes on the forums and get suspicious.

I see no reason to be so blatant, though. Rather than being reactive — staring at your feet while trying to get ahead — find success through forward-looking design.

As outlined earlier, we now have a strong theoretical framework for interfacing with players and developing a compulsive play response through behavioral theory and neurology. A/B testing, demographics, social graphs, and an endless stream of willing players is the perfect laboratory setup for perfecting such designs.

I would recommend experimenting on subsets of users to see how well they condition to certain mechanics such that the timing and distribution of rewards can be optimized. Hire or train statisticians. Users should be tracked according to their sensitivity, and targeted to maintain engagement.

Rather than rehashing the same designs over and over, predict the effectiveness of certain designs on specific market segments and transition them from an old design to a new, more complex one the moment they are ready. This can be verified as increased retention via the MAU/DAU ratio. Meanwhile, the old design can be reapplied to a fresher audience segment.

I’d recommend that if I was a tool, that is, and unfortunately it’s already happening.

Who wants to be a thief?

At some point we’re getting carried away. To review, we have a system funded by the success of a theory for conditioning behavior with the neurological science and imaging to refine it, and a massive social laboratory performing millions of experiments daily to get it right. That’s quite a beast to be reckoned with. It most effectively targets players who’ve never seen a game before, children growing up online, unemployed people, and people wasting time at work. What do the games provide in return? “Fun”?

To be sure, this for-profit laboratory existed long before video game analytics. We’ve been manipulating each other since the beginning of time, and we are built to accept the thoughts of others (it’s called communication.) Advertising long precedes gaming in refining these methods, and before that propaganda and rhetoric did nearly as well. Even writing these words is in a way of manipulating you into thinking them.

Internet gaming, neurobiology, and analytics just provide great new ways to control behavior and generate profit. It’s hardly limited to games, either.

Jesse Schell projected an alarming version of the future in his “Design Outside the Box” talk at DICE, where all commerce was motivated with a point-tracking “gamification” layer, but that’s now well underway too.

It’s not the Buy-Ten-Get-One-Free coffee cards that worry me, but the “Rewards Program” available for every single credit card on the market. Curious name, “Rewards Program.” It exists because it works.

Is that what games are now becoming, a sort of credit scam? Without narrative, without social context, without political stance, and without an opportunity for creative expression, are we just dividing our players into little boxes to be farmed?

Are we, as designers, just clicking the same square tiles over and over waiting for the coins to pop out, so we can click them too? Are you bored, or do you still have a few more years of empty clicking in you? Games that provide more value are worth more; people just need to know.

Educate consumers about the system, and show them why your games are worth paying for. Get them to shun other games. Turn games exploiting simple reward mechanics into the McDonald’s food of digital entertainment, while standing up for games that deliver something worthwhile. Create games with story and create games with art.

Mechanics and a theoretical understanding of fun are wonderful tools for expressing a message in a way more powerful than print, music, and film. That’s ethos, and you can generate profit with it.

The future of the medium is growing this alternative. Though developers often scoff at the idea of “games as art,” it is unquestionably coming up more frequently in discussions. The Smithsonian plans an exhibition of games in 2012, and the National Endowment for the Arts is now funding games that have artistic merit.

What does it mean? I rarely encounter a developer with the humanities background to engage the question, so I’ll take a chance at translating it to something engineering-oriented: art creates culture. It is not the communication and manipulation of minds on the individual level (as described in this article), but a formation of shared opinions and ethics across masses of people.

Often, art creates whole subcultures of devotion, and in doing so it engages people at a level of behavioral conditioning far more advanced and comprehensive than the simple designs of slot machines and Facebook games. It’s already begun with the celebration of indie game developers, the microcosm of chiptunes, and people’s unwaveringly fond devotion to Final Fantasy VI and VII characters. The virtues of Link are present in a generation, whereas the ethics of CityVille will never be.

Behavioral manipulation can be used positively. A program at Yale university called Play 2 Prevent is exploring the use of games as a tool for increasing awareness of HIV in teen sexual activity. Perhaps someone will fund games for the training and rehabilitation of prisoners, as they ought to be more educational and passively reformative than cable TV. With each day passing methods such as these are becoming accessible to all developers. Articles by researchers (like this recent one by Ben Lewis Evans) are now routinely appearing on Gamasutra.

Analytics are your friend, too. You can do experiments and optimize your games in the same way as mega-publishers; just do it in a way that gives your users something that actually benefits their life. Consumers love analytics, so long as it’s for their benefit. Just put the data together in a friendly package and give it back.

Share out this data with other developers (maybe we need a PlayerAnalytics.org?), and collectively out compete the companies who hoard data. Design creatively, and build mechanics off social graph data to deepen interactions with real people.

Numerous services are already doing this (from Xbox Leaderboards to the OkTrends blog) and people consciously make it viral. Push your existing concepts forward with analytics, too. If data reveals a peak number of players at five pm, schedule in game events for that time. Systems that adjust the game in real-time, like the AI Director from Left 4 Dead, can be driven with analytic data too. Embrace the concept of the cloud and use this data to keep your game from becoming static.

Love before profit.

Play

The zen and flow of play can be beautiful and life-expanding, or it can drive people into the rut of a junkie for the profit of someone they will never know. As I’ve learned these things, I can’t go a day without seeing them in my life. I feel it when I stop playing games because I just can’t finish the unskippable tutorials. I get angry when I read poorly written textbooks on topics I want to learn, but can’t, as my will is needlessly sapped with boredom.

My heart goes out to the pain of kids trying to finish the dry repetition of their math work, and it goes black when I see the finely crafted advertisements for unhealthy things tagged onto the finer moments in art. I think of the millions in talent spent to make it happen. With all the zombies pulling slots in Vegas, all the hipsters swiping down on their mobiles in hopes of a new Facebook update, and all the worn paths paced by desperate animals in the zoo, I don’t want to make another game like that. But I probably will.

Design your ethics into how games will interact with players. Sometimes it’s okay to make something fun and compelling. Other times you’ll be forced to make concessions. I’ve done some pretty shameful things in development. I’ve compromised on principles of violence against women, I’ve modeled munitions for the army, and I’ve studied very hard at how to make people keep doing things compulsively when they otherwise wouldn’t.

Don’t give up. If you got into game design because you love games, then fight to show it (and you will have to fight). Things are changing very quickly, and the purpose of games is created through you.（source:gamasutra）