Ok, so that may have just been one of those attention-seeking headlines. However, what I want to explore briefly is what will kill gamification if people keep heading the route they are now.
The short answer to this is, misguided over complication. As more people jump on the gamification bandwagon, people’s definitions and ideas seem to be getting ever more complex. They seem to miss the core point about gamification.
Recently at gSummitX, Gabe Zichermann was discussing the key reason games work. Just as I have described games simply as Task and Reward, he added a key final stage. Ahhhhh. Task, Reward, Ahhhhh. As he explained, that Ahhhh is the release of Dopamine – a feel good drug the body creates when you achieve something. In video games this is happening constantly. Within your workday, under normal circumstances, it probably never happens.
