future

Perfection in Simplicity – 10 Rules I Try to Live By

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1000020676 Perfection in Simplicity 8211 10 Rules I Try to Live By

Recently, I decided to put down in words a simple set of rules I try to live by. Think Gibbs in NCIS – be fewer rules! I wanted to be able to give them to my kids, something they can refer back to in their mind when they are making decisions or looking to the the future. These are not grand declarations or world-changing insights, just small truths that I’ve learned (and often relearned) over time.

Here they are:

  1. Be yourself, accept others.
  2. Be kind, starting with you.
  3. Be honest, take responsibility.
  4. Be curious, seek truth.
  5. Fear ignorance, not failure.
  6. Be brave, never reckless.
  7. Be strong, but don’t harden.
  8. Be confident, but humble.
  9. Be playful, never foolish.
  10. Seek joy, live with purpose.

That’s it. Ten rules. But as I looked at them written down, I realised something else—they form the bones of how I approach gamification too. These personal rules could just as easily be a quiet manifesto for ethical, human-focused design. So here’s the deeper dive: what each rule means to me, and how it maps to designing meaningful gamified experiences. Read More ...

The Future of Gamification

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Augmented reality 1476093062 The Future of Gamification

Recently I was honoured to be asked to be part of a documentary about games, their history, and evolution. One of the questions that I was asked that really got me thinking was “What is the future of gamification?”

I am asked this quite often and tend to go with a safe answer. In my view, we will not speak about gamification within the next few years. It will be spoken about in the same way social media or digital is, just  another part of various strategies. In the case of gamification, it will become part of a standard set of tools for experience design.

VR and AR

However, for the purposes of this interview, I needed to dig a little deeper than that. So I got thinking about what is current in the games world and of course, I hit up against virtual reality and augmented reality (VR and AR). Now, I have never been the biggest fan of virtual reality especially. The reason for this is that all of my experiences have been very lonely. I put the headset on to deliberately drown out the human beings around me and sit in a solo world – alone. Augmented reality has always had more allure to me, the idea that I could put on a set of glasses and play that chess game they have on the millennium falcon in 3D with my kids excites me hugely.

Whilst talking about this, the producer raised a really interesting point – one I had never consciously noticed. Games technology goes through a similar cycle everytime something new is released. It starts off as a solo experience and then it evolves into multiplayer. IF you think about the arcades. The games were originally solitary affairs, pitting you against the computer. But, with the introduction of scoreboards, suddenly there was a challenge for others. People would crowd around a player to see what they would score and try to beat it. Then forward thinking types started to put more than one game into a building and video game arcades started to take over. Solo games became spectator sports and multiplayer games started to arrive to allow people to compete directly. “But pong was multiplayer and that was the first video game” I hear you cry. Of course, you are right, but there are exceptions to every rule!

Consoles were similar. Single, maybe two player games in your bedroom. Then multitap came along and allowed 4 players. Eventually, you could get online and play against hundreds of people all over the world. The same for PC and so it will be for VR. In fact, the recent unveiling of Oculus 3 with Mark Zuckerberg proves exactly that!

With the more social aspects of VR becoming a reality, I feel that is certainly one future for gamification. That said, I still would prefer to see more hardware focusing on augmented reality – I would like to see the people around me with my own eyes!

Intelligence

My second future involves intelligence. The first is intelligent systems, ones that adapt to the preferences of the user. As I keep saying, no two people are likely to be the same and motivating or engaging them can be complicated. We currently do our best by creating systems that either appeals to the majority or that appeal and encourage the sorts of behaviours we are looking to foster in a system.

Would it not be great if systems could adapt their delivery based on a set of preferences created by the user. This way each person would experience the system in a way that was uniquely matched to them. This would need to be a continuous evolution, with users rating their experiences so that the system could adapt to their changing wants and needs.

The second type of intelligence is artificial intelligence. I recently experienced an advert for the new series of Humans. I got a pop up on Facebook about my simulated human needing servicing and asking me to chat with an operator. On clicking on the advert, Facebook messenger was opened and I started a conversation with the operator. Through the course of the conversation, various events took place and I was asked by the operator how I wanted to proceed. Each decision seemed to alter the operator’s next questions and a story began to unfold. It was a short, but fantastic experience that showed me the power of Intelligent Interactive Narrative or Intelligent Interactive Fiction (IIN or IIF, I think I may have just coined that…)

 

I see a lot of potential in chat bots and story telling. We have seen similar in games for some time now, with the likes of The Martian or Lifeline on mobile platforms. These games act like a conversation with another person, often in real time, that allows you to control the outcome of the story to some extent. However, those are just modern twists on traditional interactive fiction. My future involves intelligent chat bots that have no set narrative, just an understanding of what is going on in the story or the experience. They will have an agenda, but their responses will be totally dependent on the input from the player. So if they are being used to teach a concept like division, they will chat to the player, trying to explain things in a conversational way, but always trying to get to the end point – learning about division. This way the player feels they are involved in the process, rather than being just told what to do. The conversation could analyse the players abilities and tailor the outcomes for them, or explain different methods for division based on the bots understanding of the player’s abilities.

I know that sounds a bit far fetched, but really I don’t feel that it is at all.

The future is bright for gamification I feel because the future for games is also bright! Where they go, we are sure to head to eventually!

Remember you heard it here first IIN and IIF 😉

3 C’s to reduce negative uncertainty

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Uncertain 1418824595 3 C 8217 s to reduce negative uncertainty

I have spoken about mystery and the like in the past and you would be forgiven for thinking that uncertainty sits in a similar space. The difference is that mystery or surprise are designed and deliberate.

TL:TR?

Defining Uncertainty

In this instance I am defining uncertainty as “The lack of certainty. A state of having limited knowledge where it is impossible to exactly describe the existing state, a future outcome, or more than one possible outcome.” 1

Uncertainty can be both negative and positive. As with mystery, sometime snot knowing all the details leads to a healthy curiosity and motivates you into “opening the box” (though that didn’t work out so well for Pandora…). There has be research done on how uncertainty can actually boost motivation as well. A paper called “The Motivating Uncertainty Effect” 2 This study showed that if people were given a limited amount of information about the reward they would receive, it could actually boost motivation.

People invest more effort, time, and money to qualify for an uncertain reward (e.g., a 50% chance at $2 and a 50% chance at $1) than a certain reward of a higher expected value (e.g., a 100% chance at $2). This effect arises only when people focus on the process of pursuing a reward, not when they focus on the outcome (the reward itself ).

There is a nice caveat there though, that it is only effective when people are focusing on the process not the reward.

Here I am focussing a little more on the negative effects of uncertainty and how you as a system designer can reduce them.

To give this a little context, consider an employee in a large company. There are redundancies happening in the company for various reasons. They are uncertain about how this will affect them. This could be because they have not been communicated with properly (or at all), it could be because they did not understand the communications – it could even be that whilst they have had clear communication, they don’t trust the source of the information or the information itself.

Stress

Studies have been done on how this kind of uncertainty can increase stress levels in people 3 and stress can have extremely negative effects on people’s motivation 4. When people feel that they don’t have control of their future they begin to experience an increase in psychological strain – stress. In the above example, the employee does not have enough information to be able to predict the future outcome and has no control over it. This leads to negative uncertainty and thus stress.

For some, knowing if the outcome is negative can help just as much as knowing of the outcome is positive. For others, knowing that the outcome will be negative is just as stressful. Again, this will be because they don’t have enough information to predict the future after the negative outcome.

It is useful at this point to get a better understanding of stress. Things that cause stress can be called “Stressors”. Stressors are broken down into two main types; Challenge Stressors and Hindrance Stressors. Challenge Stressors are associated with with a more positive aspect of stress, providing more focus on the task at hand. Hindrance Stressors are associated with negative stress, reducing productivity in individuals as well as motivation. Both can be broken down into work related and non work related 5. The above example demonstrates work related hindrance stressors. The employee is uncertain of their future as a result could become demotivated 6.

Put simply, some stress can be good for development, the wrong type or too much can lead to reduced motivation and satisfaction (and other stress related issues).

Reducing Uncertainty

The upshot of all of this; negative uncertainty -> negative stress -> reduced motivation, productivity, frustration etc. Whilst the effects can vary from person to person, it makes sense that whatever you are designing, be it a gamified system or an enterprise transformation programme, you should have some tactics to reduce uncertainty!

  1. Communication
    • Communicating with the target audience is essential. To reduce the chances of uncertainty, you need to give them as much unambiguous information as possible. This may mean not telling them things that are not set in stone. The aim is to give them the right amount of knowledge to understand and predict what the future may hold. In gamification, think about how you would onboard people into a system. You would give them just enough to understand what is happening then and what will happen next, without giving them too much and potentially confusing things. In our example of uncertainty around employment, keep the employee informed and make access to the information they need simple.
  2. Control
    • One major issue that causes stress in uncertainty is a feeling that the person affected has no control of the situation. In gamification, this will be about choices as they onboard and as they move through the system. It will also be about knowledge again,. if they have a good understanding of what they are doing, they have a level of control. In our employment example, give them a chance to have their voice heard. If they feel they are being listened too, they will feel they have some control. If outcomes are negative, make sure they know there is support for them to help take control of their future.
  3. Care
    • If someone does not trust you, they will not believe or trust what you are telling them. If you have shown a history of caring and consideration towards them, they are more likely to trust you. With gamification, this is all about looking after them in the early stages and then giving enough support over time that they feel safe. For the employee this boils down to consistency of message and honesty. If they feel you are telling them the truth and that you are at least consistent with what you are saying and how you are saying it, they won’t be taken by surprise when things happen. Better still, whatever is happening try to make people feel that you have their best interest at heart beyond the immediate decisions. If there is something negative about to happen, they need to know that you care enough to help them face the future after.

 References Read More ...