User Experience In Games Research Articles

Influence of head-up displays’ characteristics on user experience in video games

Head-up displays (HUD) are important parts of visual interfaces of virtual environments such as video games. However, few studies have investigated their role in player–video game interactions. Two experiments were designed to investigate the influence of HUDs on player experience according to player expertise and game genre. Experiment 1 used eye-tracking and interviews to understand how and to what extent players use and experience HUDs in two types of commercial games: first-person shooter and real-time strategy games. Results showed that displaying a permanent HUD within the visual interface may improve the understanding of this environment by players. They also revealed that two HUD characteristics, namely composition and spatial organization, have particular influence on player experience. These critical characteristics were manipulated in experiment 2 to study more precisely the influence of HUD design choices on player experience. Results showed that manipulation of design of these HUD characteristics influences player experience in different ways according to player expertise and game genre. For games with HUDs that are perceived as very useful, the higher player expertise is, the more player experience is influenced. Recommendations for video game design based on these results are proposed.

Rhythm and Cues

This essay situates game design and development within the domain of sociotechnical research and reviews the results of a case focusing on the design and development of an original video game level with platformer mechanics. Using a case history methodology with autoethnographic methods, the work studies the context in which small game components are authored and methods by which knowledge is exchanged and applied within rapidly developed software systems. It argues that the designer experience is a critical phenomenon to understand within the study of user experience in video games given the iterative nature of development and the necessity of frequent, in-house playtesting. The video game was designed by the authors and developed using preexisting assets from prior projects. Results suggest ideas for incorporating UX strategies into micro-project management techniques that are useful for small and large projects alike. The work closes by calling for future areas of research in related areas.

Cloud Mobile 3D Display Gaming User Experience Modeling and Optimization by Asymmetric Graphics Rendering

With the arrival of auto-stereoscopic 3D displays for mobile devices, and emergence of more 3D content, there is much anticipation for 3D mobile multimedia experiences, including 3D display gaming. Simultaneously, with the emergence of cloud computing, more mobile applications are being developed to take advantage of the elastic cloud resources. In this paper, we explore the possibility of developing Cloud Mobile 3D Display Gaming, where the 3D video rendering and encoding is performed on cloud servers, with the resulting 3D video streamed over wireless networks to mobile devices with 3D displays for a true 3D mobile gaming experience. However, with the significantly higher bitrate requirement for 3D video, ensuring user experience may be a challenge, both in terms of 3D video quality and network delay (response time), considering the bandwidth constraints and fluctuations of wireless networks. In this paper, we propose a new asymmetric graphics rendering approach which can significantly reduce the video encoding bitrate needed for a certain video quality, thereby making it easier to transmit the video over wireless network. However, since asymmetric graphics rendering may also impair the graphics quality, we need to be able to understand and measure its impact. We conduct subjective tests to study and model the impairments due to asymmetric graphics rendering and network delay, thereby developing a user experience model for cloud based mobile 3D display gaming. By conducting subsequent subjective tests, we prove the correctness of the impairment functions and the resulting user experience model. Furthermore, given any network condition, we propose to solve the problem of selecting the optimal graphics rendering factors for the left and right views so as to maximize user experience of cloud mobile 3D display gaming. In order to solve this problem, we first develop a model to estimate the resulting video bitrate of the rendered 3D video when certain graphics rendering factors are used. Next, we derive a model to predict the delay given the available network bandwidth and the video bitrate of the rendered 3D video. We use the above two models together with a branch and bound algorithm to solve the optimization problem and determine the optimal values for the left and right view rendering factors. Experiments conducted using real 4G-LTE network profiles on commercial cloud service demonstrate the feasibility of significant improvement in user experience when the proposed optimization algorithm is used to dynamically select optimal rendering factors according to changing network conditions.

User Experience of Educational Games: A Review of the Elements

Abstract Over the recent years, the study on User Experience (UX) have been an area of discussion among Human Computer Interaction (HCI) researchers. User Experience is a branch of HCI which focus on interaction between products and users thus in the era of growing digital games, UX plays an important part in identifying the appropriate or suitable variable in order to evaluate the UX design. This study explore about the UX elements for the purpose of evaluation and design of educational games (EG). EG have captivated most students with the idea of mixing fun with learning. A good framework of UX for educational game will help EG designer to evaluate the UX of their games in order to ensure that they have produced the effective game. Therefore, it is essential to identify the suitable elements in order to model the right UX framework for educational games.

Measuring User Experience in Board Games

Measuring user experience in board games is broadly unexplored with research mainly focused on digital games. This paper assesses the suitability of using a questionnaire, developed for digital games, for use on board games - thus providing a common measure of user experience between board and digital games. The study involved play testing a themed board game with undergraduate computing students and alumni, measuring user experience via the Games Experience Questionnaire whilst testing for reliability and validity. Findings obtained high scores in both criteria, suggesting that the GEQ is a suitable tool to measure user experience in board games and thus a valid candidate for comparing game design across varied game media such as digital and board games.

Fusing Visual and Behavioral Cues for Modeling User Experience in Games

Estimating affective and cognitive states in conditions of rich human-computer interaction, such as in games, is a field of growing academic and commercial interest. Entertainment and serious games can benefit from recent advances in the field as, having access to predictors of the current state of the player (or learner) can provide useful information for feeding adaptation mechanisms that aim to maximize engagement or learning effects. In this paper, we introduce a large data corpus derived from 58 participants that play the popular Super Mario Bros platform game and attempt to create accurate models of player experience for this game genre. Within the view of the current research, features extracted both from player gameplay behavior and game levels, and player visual characteristics have been used as potential indicators of reported affect expressed as pairwise preferences between different game sessions. Using neuroevolutionary preference learning and automatic feature selection, highly accurate models of reported engagement, frustration, and challenge are constructed (model accuracies reach 91%, 92%, and 88% for engagement, frustration, and challenge, respectively). As a step further, the derived player experience models can be used to personalize the game level to desired levels of engagement, frustration, and challenge as game content is mapped to player experience through the behavioral and expressivity patterns of each player.

A Case Study on User Experience of Social Network Game

The user experience of the game contents refers to the overall experience which players feel in the game play. As this experience increases, the immersion and satisfaction level extend. Therefore, the user experience is an important factor in determining success of the game. This study has the purpose for presenting importance of user experience about SNG (Social Network Game), which is the focal point recently. For this purpose, this study analyzes features of successful SNG game by comparing essential elements of user experience, such as user interface, usability, and interaction design elements. And then, this study discusses the user experience elements for enhancing the possibility of success of SNG game. This study can provide the information which is beneficial to the game immersion of SNG game players and user experience.

Playability: analysing user experience in video games

Currently, few studies focus on analysing the degree of the Player eXperience (PX) in video games. Video games have now become interactive entertainment systems with a high economic impact on society; these are interactive systems characterised by their subjectivity, which differ from other systems in that their main objective is to entertain and amuse the user (player). This work discusses the analysis and evaluation of the User eXperience (UX) in interactive entertainment systems, exploring how usability, given its definition, objectives and the fact it is one of the main dimensions of UX, is not sufficient to characterise the PX, giving rise to a new concept: Playability. In this paper, we present a framework for the analysis and evaluation of the UX in video games. The results show the need and importance of a framework to help us understand and measure the experience that players feel using these types of interactive systems, in order to improve the experience during play time. The proposed framework characterises the experience using attributes to identify and properties to measure UX. It thus provides a multifaceted analysis mechanism to assess the impact of the gaming experience and its relationship with the elements of a video game. We therefore present a system to represent UX based on this framework, with the aim of ensuring and measuring a satisfactory experience of the entertainment system. Finally, we discuss a practical experiment in which an evaluation of the playability of a commercial video game was carried out using the methods proposed in this work.

Evaluating user experiences in rehabilitation games

PurposeComputer‐based systems for motor function rehabilitation have been around for more than a decade, with work done to help recovery of function in the lower limb (ankle, leg) as well as upper limb (hand and arm).Design/methodology/approachMore recently there has been a trend towards the use of game‐based systems to deliver rehabilitation goals. The authors' interdisciplinary group has been working in the area of motor function recovery of the hand and arm (following stroke) for a number of years, using both high‐end virtual reality (VR) technology as well as low‐cost video capture technology.FindingsOver this time it has become clear that there are many challenges in designing usable, effective game‐based systems for motor function rehabilitation.Originality/valueThis paper reflects on user experiences across the range of technologies developed by the group. It presents a summary review of the authors' systems and details the protocols and user evaluation instruments used. It then critically reflects on this work and reviews other recent advances in game usability and playability, leading to suggestions for how the user experience of games for rehabilitation may be improved in future work.

Cloud mobile gaming

With the evolution of mobile devices and networks, and the growing trend of mobile Internet access, rich multi-player gaming using mobile devices, similar to PC-based Internet games, has tremendous potential and interest. However, the current client-server architecture for PC-based Internet games, where most of the storage and computational burden of the game lies with the client device, does not work with mobile devices, constraining mobile gaming to either downloadable, single player games, or very light non-interactive versions of the rich multi-player Internet games. In this article, we study a cloud server based mobile gaming approach, termed Cloud Mobile Gaming (CMG), where the burden of executing the gaming engine is put on cloud servers, and the mobile devices just communicate the users' gaming commands to the servers. We analyze the factors affecting the Quality of user Experience (QoE) using the CMG approach, including the game genres, video settings, the conditions of server and client, and the conditions of the wireless network. A Mobile Gaming User Experience (MGUE) model is developed and validated through controlled subjective testing. We also develop a prototype for in-service measuring MGUE, and then use it to characterize user experience achievable using the CMG approach in a mobile cellular network. The MGUE model developed and validated in this article will be helpful for researchers and service providers to develop and assess the performance of future cloud mobile gaming techniques and services.

Contextual influences on mobile player experience – A game user experience model

In this paper we are discussing a new model of mobile gameplay experience with a special focus on contextual influences of play in ubiquitous environments. The model was developed based on prior general gameplay models which were extended and refined based on the results and personal experiences taken from several evaluative user field studies with mobile games. The experimental results point to two different playing contexts: home and mobile, which were evaluated with a gameplay experience questionnaire (GEQ). The GEQ showed significant difference in negative affect and immersion between mobile and home setting, which are moderated by several influencing contextual factors. This leads us to propose a contextual gameplay experience model that accounts for spatial, temporal, social, cultural, and psychological influences in an external context. The implications of the contextual gameplay model are discussed in light of future research.

Evaluating user experience of adaptive digital educational games with Activity Theory

Adaptive digital educational games (DEGs) providing players with relevant interventions can enhance gameplay experience. This advance in game design, however, renders the user experience (UX) evaluation of DEGs even more challenging. To tackle this challenge, we developed a four-dimension evaluation framework (i.e., gaming experience, learning experience, adaptivity, and usability) and applied it to an empirical study with a DEG on teaching geography. Mixed-method approaches were adopted to collect data with 16 boys aged 10–11. Specifically, a so-called Dyadic User Experience Tests (DUxT) was employed; participants were paired up to assume different roles during gameplay. Learning efficacy was evaluated with a pre-post intervention measurement using a domain-specific questionnaire. Learning experience, gaming experiences and usability were evaluated with intensive in situ observations and interviews guided by a multidimensional scheme; content analysis of these transcribed audio data was supplemented by video analysis. Effectiveness of adaptivity algorithms was planned to be evaluated with automatic logfiles, which, unfortunately, could not be realised due to some technical problem. Nonetheless, the user-based data could offer some insights into this issue. Furthermore, we attempted to bridge the existing gap in UX research – the lack of theoretical frameworks in understanding user experience – by adopting Engeström's (1987) extended framework of Activity Theory (AT) that provides contextual information essential for understanding contradictions and breakdowns observed in the interactions between the game players. The dyadic gameplay setting allows us to explore the issue of group UX. Implications for further applications of the AT framework in the UX research, especially the interplay between evaluation and redesign (i.e., downstream utility of UX evaluation methods), are discussed.

User Experience in 3D Stereoscopic Games

New display technologies, such as 3D stereoscopic displays, provide opportunities to enhance the user experience (UX) in digital games. A widely-held belief is “the more stereo, the better experience.” The purpose of this study is to examine this belief and evaluate the added value of 3D stereo to the UX in games. Stereo separation in a display was varied, and a multidimensional UX was measured using a psychological Presence-Involvement-Flow Framework2 (PIFF2) in a between-subjects design. The PIFF2 findings were further supported by both qualitative and objective measures. Users' descriptions of the game were included as well as adverse symptoms, open-ended negative aspects of 3D stereo, basic eye physiology, objective performance metrics, and fundamental background variables. This hybrid qualitative-quantitative methodology shows that more stereo does not lead to better UX. It was shown that a moderate level of stereo separation affected the UX most by increasing the sense of presence among the users. These results deepen the previous findings in investigating the stereo effect in different media. The advantage of using multidimensional measures to evaluate UX, the added value of 3D stereo, and the practical implications of the results are further discussed.

User Experience in Digital Games

Playing entertainment computer, video, and portable games, namely, digital games, is receiving more and more attention in academic research. Games are studied in different situations with numerous methods, but little is known about if and how the playing situation affects the user experience (UX) in games. In addition, it is hard to understand and study the psychology of UX in games. The objective of this study is to show how UX differs when the first-person shooter HALO is played in a laboratory and at home. To disclose this difference, a psychologically valid and multidimensional measurement framework is introduced. UX is profiled according to the level of the sense of presence, involvement, and flow in a between-subjects design. Statistically, the structure of the framework is grounded on a large and heterogeneous gamer data set ( N = 2,182). The results showed that the profile of the sense of presence in the laboratory included higher levels of attention and arousal as compared with that of the natural environment. This finding was independent of any of the measured background variables. Other differences between the two situations were more related to the participants’ background. For example, gamers at home were more involved in the game and they felt a higher level of competence. No strong emotional differences between the two situations were found. The authors discuss the complex UX terminology and implications of the framework for implementation of learning games.

A Study of Game User Experience and Physical User Interfaces through Location-based Service

A Study of Game User Experience and Physical User Interfaces through Location-based Service

Evaluating System Usability, Workload Suitability, and User Experience of Game-Based Virtual Reality in Spaceflight Education and Training

Game-based instruction and immersive virtual reality are enhanced pedagogical methods beneficial in training environments involving complex disciplines, ranging from medical applications to construction engineering technology. This study investigated the use of game-based virtual reality (GBVR) when applied to the complex field of spaceflight education and training. As modern society places increasing demand on space-based amenities, the need for proficient satellite operators will also increase, requiring more accessible and advanced training options. Satellite ground control training scenarios, immersed in the GBVR environment, were developed and deployed to university student participants. Multiple validated scales were employed to measure the GBVR system regarding three main attributes: system usability, workload suitability, and user experience. Results revealed that the GBVR system usability scores ranked above average on the System Usability Scale (SUS). Secondly, the workload suitability ranked within the accepted mean value range of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Task Load Index (TLX). And lastly, the user experience scores were similar to popular video game scores on the Game User Experience Satisfaction Scale (GUESS-18). Even with a small sample size (n = 10), the findings indicate that GBVR is a feasible tool when applied to a complex discipline such as spaceflight education and training.