Why do people play games? A lot of scholars and market researchers have looked at game motivations and have pretty much come up with similar results. People play for several reasons, some of which include to be social, to engage in competition, to immerse in fantasy, etc. etc.

But why do people play games on Facebook? We would expect that a lot of motivations that apply to regular games would also apply to Facebook games. However, maybe Facebook games are different. Compared to MMOs, they are most definitely smaller in scale. Also, with Facebook games you are more likely to play with your existing friends (yes, you could play with your existing friends on MMOs and Xbox Live, but with those games you don’t necessarily need that friendship tie in order to play). The games are also mostly asynchronous, browser-based, and easier to learn/play.

So we set out to see why people were playing Facebook games– and especially, in the context of social network sites– if people were playing for social reasons.

A few colleagues and I did some empirical tests and turns out, yes and no. We focused on non-game-specific motivations (we didn’t look at competition or fantasy elements) and found four distinct motivations. People said they played games on Facebook because they:

-Wanted to achieve common ground (get topic of conversation to talk with other people)
-Wanted to engage in reciprocity (give gifts, get gifts, etc.)
-As a coping strategy (relieving stress, getting enjoyment, etc.)
-To relieve boredom

Because people could answer these from a 5-point scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree, although we found these four factors, we saw that the first two reasons had pretty low means. Which means that more people DON’T play social network games to achieve common ground or engage in reciprocity.

So that is the bad news. People aren’t playing because they expect to get social outcomes. A isn’t playing Farmville with B in order to improve social relationships with B. A just wants to relieve boredom or play for his or her own enjoyment.

BUT that isn’t the end of the story. Just because you don’t expect something doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t get it. Our next step is to see if playing social network games actually generates some positive (or negative) social outcome. And we strongly believe that it does, because gift-giving and reciprocity are very strong elements of the game play. Even if people are only giving gifts because the game forces them to, they may get some unexpected social outcome. We have anecdotal cases that support this– in the coming months we will be trying to get some empirical evidence of whether or not this is true.

I will be presenting our preiminary findings of social network game motivation and uses at CHI next week. Stay tuned for more interesting research on social network games!

-yvette wohn

Digital halo n. A geometric shape hovering over the head of a character in a game. Traditionally emits light

I’m coining a new word– digital halo. What is a digital halo? The “thing” that is on top of the heads of game characters. There is no religious connotation to this term. If you look into the definition of halos, they don’t necessarily have to be a ring-shape, although traditionally halos been portrayed mostly in the form of an oval or circle. The key part of a halo is that there is a nucleus and something revolving around or radiating from that nucleus. So if the thing on top of characters’ head is glowing, I think I can claim that it is somewhat of a halo.

The halo has become an icon in gaming  (or at least a staple in game design) to the extent that we don’t even think it’s weird that an object is floating above the head of a character. Halos also make game-playing easy because they represent the status of a game character.

There are many different types of halos. There are halos like the rings above NPCs in Lord of the Rings Online or the exclamation marks above the heads of NPCs in World of Warcraft, that indicate that the character has a quest or some kind of task to offer. With these halos, the light coming from them is important; if the light is extinguished, that game character becomes almost worthless in terms of game play. Along those lines, other types of halos indicate readiness:  halos on top of animals in simulation games like Harvest moon (green hearts) or Farmville (pink guitar picks)  indicate that the animal is “ready” to be harvested.

Then there are the halos that indicate mood,  like the green diamonds above the heads of character in some of The Sims games that change color. In some of the more casual time-management games, halos will indicate patience or satisfaction level. When a character runs out of patience, they will stomp off and leave.

There are also halos that are like a divining rod– a tracker. They will glow stronger if you are close to a target or wanted item, like the “ball” on top of characters in Neverwinter Nights (only a feature of certain quests), which blinks faster when you get close to the assassins’ lair.

Can you think of any examples of digital halos?

ps. (On an completely unrelated note, this term is dedicated to Trent Reznor, whose halos have always been inspiring.)

I feel the need to address this blog post which criticizes Farmville as being different from reality; the post claims that we need to do farming in real life instead of  in games. I don’t know where to begin, wondering if this is worth refuting at all, because a response would indicate that this is worthy of response. But then, the world is made up of people with diverse ideas and I could do my part in relaying mine, so let me continue.

First of all, yes, games don’t mirror reality. Some do to a certain extent, but a lot don’t. Is that a surprise? You can’t suggest that games should mirror reality– it’s like saying that movies should reflect reality or novels should reflect reality. It becomes a problem when an entertainment media claims to be replicating reality, but otherwise, entertainment media should not be required to be “real.” Even so-called reality shows aren’t about reality, but seeing how hypothetical situations (that would otherwise not happen in reality) play out in reality. And unlike television or novels, which can portray a situation to be hyper-realistic, video games cannot do that because any situation created by the game (even if it is one based on a historical event) is a recreation, and thus, is at its essence, hypothetical.

In Farmville, my turkeys sit down to Thanksgiving dinner, not the other way around. NOT REAL.

I realize that this person is concerned that people playing Farmville will have a skewed idea of what farming is really like, but I don’t think people will think it’s the same. For instance, I’ve already pointed out that Farmville does not reflect butchering, but I still know about it. I don’t think Farmville players think that crops can actually be harvested in a matter of hours or that it is possible to maintain animals without feeding them. The list can go on and on… for instance, Farmville doesn’t have pests (maybe that’s something they could add in the future) nor does it ever rain. You can’t help other farmers harvest their crops, and you can give presents to your friends for free. Plants die, but trees don’t. Yup, not very realistic.

Also, even though elements in Farmville are not equivalent to those of real life, I think that people still learn something about farms. For instance, I thought pineapples grew on trees and when I saw them growing on the ground in Farmville, I was confused and did some research on pineapples. Also, you can’t slaughter animals, but the game makes you very aware of the fact that there are alternative “benefits” that you can harvest from animals, like truffles and pigs. Also, using the machines makes farming easy in the game; I think it has made me more appreciative of food that is grown by hand. And playing Farmville puts a face behind the food. You know that with everything you eat, there’s someone who was responsible for producing it. I’m not saying that’s not something I didn’t know before- but Farmville made me more cognizant of it.

But lets say that you’re not the type that takes away latent morals from games. You’re not a person who sees good in everything. That still is not a good reason to say that the games should mirror reality. Yes, it’s important to make people aware of farming, but games shouldn’t be responsible for not taking on that responsibility. Why should games be blamed for lack of education or activism on part of the actual parties who failed to deliver their message or cause to the right people?

This post also a distorted sense of causality. Just because Farmville taps into the hearts of people who have a desire for a more simple, pastoral life doesn’t mean that Farmville is making people yearn for farm life. And even if that were true, what is the harm in that? Anyone who starts farming after being inspired by Farmville will find on day one that reality is different.

It’s true that entertainment media of any kind influences how people think or feel– there are decades of studies on this. But before blaming games for not being realistic, we should think of more fundamental problems: if people are so gullible as to believe everything in games is true, it reflects a lack of ability to separate fiction from non-fiction to begin with. This inability to distinguish reality is a mental disorder, more influenced by environmental functions, a long laundry list that includes demographics, household environment, personality traits, genes, and so on and so forth

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