Ah, late December. The time when the gaming press gets its members together and tries to convince each other that one awesome game is more awesome than other awesome games –also known as the Game of the Year Awards. When I worked as part of the creative team on GameSpy.com we would lock ourselves in…
As I mentioned a while back I wrote an article for GamePro magazine about the psychology of shooters and why interacting with game worlds through the barrel of a gun is often so appealing. I got some great input from people doing real research in this area and I like how the article turned out.…
I recently wrote about the endowed progress effect, which makes us more likely to complete progress towards a goal if we have the impression that we’ve already begun taking the necessary steps. For example, people who get 2 free stamps on a “buy 10 get 1 free” card are more likely to put in the…
Apparently the Xbox Kinect is a retail success despite the fact that I haven’t personally bought one. Enough people seem to enjoy flailing their extremities about and barking simple commands that Microsoft has sold 1.5 hoojillion of the devices and the holiday shopping season has only just begun. I’ve written before about how motion controls…