A Cognitive and Affective Neuroergonomics Approach to Game Design

Abstract

While the usefulness of games extends beyond their entertainment value, the act of playing a game remains essentially tied to its positive experience. Techniques to assess the player’s experience have greatly improved in the past decade, yet several challenges remain such as identifying objective and dynamic measures that reflect the player’s emotions during the game. In this paper, we describe an innovative approach to capture the player’s experience that relies on cognitive sciences and affective neuroscience. Our research endeavor is to contribute to the development of systems capable of predicting the player’s fun based on psychophysiology and in-game behaviors, and adapting the game to maximize that value. We present a use case of our techniques to elicit the player’s affective and cognitive states using an online strategic card game. Preliminary results revealed that electrodermal and respiratory activities were positively associated to the casual gamers’ affective and cognitive states. Such findings suggest that psychophysiological metrics combined with behavioural measures offer a promising avenue to assess the player’s experience in a comprehensive and objective manner.