Tag Archives: genres

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Articles for Edge Magazine Online

Last year I wrote several articles for Edge Magazine about the psychology of various video game topics. Somehow I missed that Edge put these online for viewing, so in case you didn’t catch the print editions I’ve helpfully aggregated them all here in one post. Wait …hang on, I’ve got to check something. Okay, yes. “Aggregated” is the right word here. Sorry.

Simply click with as much authority as you like on any of the images below to read the full article.

The Psychology of High Scores

The Psychology of High Scores

The Psychology of Nostalgia

The Psychology of Nostalgia

The Psychology of Genres

The Psychology of Genres

The Psychology of Avatars

The Psychology of Avatars

The Psychology of Free to Play Games

The Psychology of Free to Play Games

Enjoy!

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The Psychology of Genres in Edge Magazine #241


My latest article on the psychology of video games for Edge Magazine has been published in issue #241. It’s the one with the Crysis 3 cover. In it, I explore a bit about some theories of decision making and genre usage that may clue us in on why we like the genres we like. Why do we have genres, and are the ways that we think about game classifications doing us a disservice?

I sent Bobo The Quote Monkey out and he came back with this tidbit:

What factors make us more or less likely to depend on these mental shortcuts and compensatory strategies? It varies with expertise. Novices tend to substitute knowledge of a genre for knowledge about the specifics of a game. This is a widely studied phenomenon within the field of consumer psychology, especially in the context of brands. It’s been found to be especially true the less expertise we have with a product. In one study, C. Wahn Park and Parker Lessig found that people with limited experience buying microwave ovens tended to get overwhelmed with all the different options. Too many popcorn buttons and auto defrost settings were apparently too much for the novice buyer at the time to handle. What people who were unfamiliar with the product tended to do was collapse all the differences between options and consider them equivalent. So a microwave with seven power settings was lumped in with those only having five, because buyers were unable to put their fingers on why seven was that much better than five and how to weigh those factors when making a decision.

Instead, the subjects tended to look at things like brand and other aspects that the researchers termed “non functional dimensions” in order to make their price. Good experiences with a particular brand in another context was substituted for (or at least overshadowed) all the confusing technical differences, because that was easier and required less mental effort.

…It’s not difficult to see how this applies to video games and genres –or brands and series for that matter. Those who are less familiar with the huge variety of video games won’t understand all the technical aspects of the games. Asynchronous multiplayer? DirectX 11 support? Dedicated servers? Hours of gameplay? For inexperienced buyers who don’t make it a habit of reading magazines like the one you have in your hands right now, all those detailed, technical aspects of the game are going to get squished down to a few broad but shallow categories to make the mental strain of the decision easier.

The magazine is on store shelves now, if you’d like to pick it up. Up next month: The Psychology of Nostalgia explains (in part) why we have so many reboots, sequels, and retro games.

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Needs and Gratification Theory and Game Genres

Hey, do you guys watch Extra Credits? If not, you should. Each week the team there shares insightful, animated essays on topics related to video game design, culture, and business. They’re often pretty amusing, too. A few weeks ago they did a series on the difference between Western and Japanese RPGs that reminded me of a theory from the field of media psychology that aims to explain why we gravitate towards certain genres of entertainment.

In part 1 of the Extra Credits series the authors argue that the whole way we look at genres and sub-genres is inherantly flawed:

Most of the time when we talk about what makes a game belong to a certain genre we only talk about surface elements. The visible mechanics or dynamics of a game. This game is an RPG because it has a leveling system. That game is a first-person shooter because it has guns and a first-person camera. That other game is survival horror because there are zombies in it. But what we really outght to be looking for are the underlying reasons why we play a genre.

…Genres in all things are actually defined by what the audience desires to get out of interacting with them. We go to a romance for different reasons than we go to a comedy or a drama. We can identify a romance by the emotions it tries to invoke in us, not by its editing styles. And the same is true of games.

Let me ask you: Why is it we thnk of Mass Effect as an RPG even though its combat is built around third person shooting? Why are we so confident around labeling Call of Duty a first person shooter even though it has a leveling system? It’s because we’re assigning those labels not because of their surface mechanics or camera perspectives or techniques. But because of the fundamental human desires, emotions, and interests those genres deliver on; the underlying reasons we play which are radically different in these two cases.

…There are various different ways that games can engage us, which some designers refer to as “core play aesthetics.” Narrative, challenge, fellowship, discovery. And that’s just to name a few.

What James ((Mostly James Portinow, I think, who pens each episode’s script)), Daniel, and Alison are explaining here is called “needs and gratification theory” even though they don’t label it as such. It’s actually been kicking around the media psychology circles for decades, starting back in the 1940s when social scientists were interested in why men in fedoras chose to listen to radios dramas or read the newspaper over other activities. ((Ruggiero, T. (2000). Uses and Gratifications Theory in the 21st Century. Mass Communication & Society, 3(1), 3-37.)) Though the methodology and theory building improved, the core concept of needs and gratification theory has largely stayed consistent: We are attracted to media based on how well we expect it to satisfy internal needs.

In the case of television, consider Sally, who has a high need for intellectual stimulation and validation of her intelligence. Sally might prefer quiz shows like Jeopardy! because of how it meshes with these internal needs. Her friend Dick, on the other hand, is high in emotional intelligence and thus likes to ponder and understand interpersonal relationships. He would be more drawn to character driven dramas like Breaking Bad or even relationship driven reality television like Survivor.

The important point here to understand is that each person isn’t drawn to a show because the program guide labels it “Game Show” or “Drama.” Those are just convenient genre labels that Sally and Dick might use in the absence of other information. The point is that shows in each of those genres tend to satisfy different needs and we’re pretty good at noticing this kind of thing.

Mordin and Shepard have an existential crisis over whether they are in an RPG or third person shooter. Also genophage.


Due to the interactive nature of video games I think the needs and usage theory makes even more sense, though it hasn’t been empirically tested much. We are attracted to games because of the internal needs they help us fulfill. The Extra Credits examples of narrative, challenge, fellowship, and discovery make a pretty good list, though I would suggest additions like expression (for games that let you build, customize, and share), competition (for those games that facilitate comparing yourselves against others), and brain teasing (for puzzle games and word games).

For every one of those needs, you can probably think of a game that does an exceptional job of fulfilling it through its “core play aesthetics” to use the Extra Credits terminology. The main point of Skyrim, for example, is exploration. The main point of Minecraft is expression. The main point of SSX is challenge. Each of these games has a core play aesthetic that meets one basic psychological need that varies in intensity from person to person.

What’s interesting about this perspective is that it suggests that our current genre conventions are lackluster at best and flat our wrong at worst. Typical genre names like action, role-playing, adventure, and puzzle are widely used because games we’ve put in those genres tend to possess similar core play aesthetics –tend to but don’t always. Do you think if when you walked in to a big box retailer or browsed for games on Amazon you would have a better experience if the shelves and menus used words like Challenge and Narrative and Fellowship instead of “Action” and “Strategy” and “Role-Playing?” Do you think you’d be better able to find a game that you’d end up loving?

Needs and gratification theory suggests that you would.

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Why Do We Love Genres So Much?

The guys over at Penny Arcade had a great bit where they poked fun at gamers’ obsession with fitting everything into neatly defined genres. The stars of the strip are sitting at a tasting table with Gabe snootily remarking, “This is more of a late eighties platformer, with …Yes, I believe there’s a hint of sim.” To which Tycho replies, “Yes, sim. Quite right. Garcon! More genres!” ((Yeah, I know, I just quoted the Penny Arcade guys just last week, too. I’ll quit for a while.))

Why are we so obsessed with cramming games into genres and slapping labels on them? Most game reviews will remark on what genre a game fits in if not declare it outright, and if a game refuses to fit properly they’ll create a new genre just for it –witness the rise of the ridiculously named “third person, cover-based shooter” genre a la Gears of War. When I worked at GameSpy, we developed successful “genre sites” like 3DACtionPlanet.com ((Yeah, it’s an awkward name, but “ActionPlanet.com” was already taken and the guy wouldn’t sell)), StrategyPlanet.com, and SportPlanet.com that focused only on games in those genres. There was considerable internal debate over whether this made a lick of sense, but our ad sales guys loved it because it let them sell more targeted ads relative to a huge, monolithic site that covered everything.

genres

A typical genre breakdown.

Part of the reason for this genre love is that classifying things is human nature. It’s a habit instilled and rewarded early in life, as most toddlers love arranging objects according to shape, color, size, or function. And for good reason: assigning objects to sets builds the neural pathways necessary to develop basic skills in logic, counting, and mathematics. So when little Billy puts Doom and Modern Warfare 2 together, you reward him with a delicious frozen treat.

But there’s more to it than that: genres are useful for what Amos Tversky and other researchers call “elimination by alternatives” decision making ((Tversky, A. (1972) “Elimination by Aspects: A Theory of Choice.” Psychological Review, 76, 31-48.)) Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein elaborate on this concept in their excellent book, Nudge. ((Thaler, R. & Sunstein, C. (2008). Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness. New York, NY: Penguin Books.)) Imagine a simple decision, like say buying a new keyboard for your desktop computer. You’d probably be able to identify all the relevant factors, like your preference for ergonomic layouts, whether or not you want wireless, and price. You can look at the alternatives, take all that into consideration at once, and make your purchase. Fine. Bam. Done. This is called a “compensatory choice strategy” because for any one alternative a single factor (like low price) can compensate for a deficit in another (like lack of wireless support).

But think about something way more complex like renting an apartment. You’ve got a multitude of factors at play –distance from work, rent, lease terms, proximity to public transportation, safety of the neighborhood, square footage, and defensibility in the event of a zombie outbreak, just to name a few. AND you’ve got hundreds of potential apartments to choose from.

In situations like these, people tend to adopt that “eliminations by alternatives” approach I mentioned earlier. You’ll start picking out factors and setting thresholds for them. So you think “Anyplace with fewer than two bedrooms is out. And it has to be within 30 minutes of work. And it can’t currently be on fire.” And so on. This makes the decision manageable and prevents you from stroking out when you try to combine the weights of so many factors in a compensatory manner and simultaneously compare all the alternatives –of which there could be hundreds. And this usually works. The problem is that options that are outstanding on some important factors can get nuked just because they’re just barely on the wrong side of a cutoff for another. Alas, we are but puny humans.

This is a decision-making process that businesses and marketers are eager to hijack, sometimes in ingenious and even helpful ways. Thaler and Sunstein point to paint stores’ use of a color wheel to help you choose colors, as opposed to figuring out the difference between “Eggshell” and “Off White” based on names alone. Or think about going to a bar that boasts “100 beers on tap.” If you look at the menu, they probably don’t have your options listed in alphabetical order because how is the uninitiated supposed to know the difference between “Boddington’s Pub Ale” and “Dirty Dog Hefeweisen?” What any savvy owner of such a bar would do is facilitate elimination by alternative by grouping the beers by more meaningful factors, like taste, body, or color. That way people who dislike, for example, dark beers can automatically discard those options.

In other words, group them into genres.

This is why I think the habit of sorting genres in video games (and movies and music, for that matter) is so hard to shake. When faced with a huge number of possible games to buy, people use simplifying strategies to make that choice more manageable. One such rule may be “I only like role-playing games,” though I suspect less exclusive rules like “I’ll consider anything that’s not a sports game, a flight sim, or a survival horror game” are more common. It narrows the field and lets you focus on other things. Sure, maybe you’re missing out on some great games through this, but at least you don’t have an aneurysm every time you walk through a Best Buy.

Unfortunately I think this is part of the reason that Brutal Legend didn’t do as well at retail as it could: people couldn’t figure out what genre it belonged to. Action? Adventure? Driving? Real-time strategy? It was its own (totally awesome) creation, but because people couldn’t apply a certain decision simplification strategy on it, they missed out.