I was reading Swen's blog and he mentioned wanting to give player the experience he had when playing Ultima VII. He's probably referring to a state called flow.

What is flow?

Flow = "the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people do it even at great cost, for the sheer state of doing it."

So...the ideal (on some level) in gameplay experience is often to create a state of flow and maximize the length of time a player spends in this state.

"To achieve flow in a task (or in-game), the following should exist:

- The task/game must have clear goals/quests and actions needed to overcome obstacles

- Immediate feedback is needed to see whether actions work or do not work in relation to achieving the goal/quest

- The challenge and skills required to reach the goal/quest must be aligned but it has to stretch the person. It has to be hard enough to keep the person in a state of complete attention but not too difficult to the point where a person is discouraged and gives up."

If a task in-game or in life is too much of a challenge, flow is broken and attention breaks away. If a task in-game or in life is too easy, the person might not be too interested with what's happening and focus on something else. Theoretically, the task needs to be somewhere in the middle in terms of difficulty. This is the "sweet spot" which is most likely to create the experience of flow.

Riding this fine line in a game is often subjective. What's difficult for one person is easy for another. What's easy for one person is difficult for another.

So, how might this apply to gameplay experience? There should be something to encourage the player if he/she finds something too difficult. If he/she finds a certain part of the game too easy, something's gotta be there to snap him/her out of complacency.

Of course, he/she can also be given the freedom to adjust difficulty level with great precision. It's gotta fit the individual player. In many games, however, this adjustment only applies to combat. It doesn't spread to other parts of the game.

The player can have no problem with combat but might experience excess ease/difficulty in solving quests, finding items, or relating to other characters. This also potentially breaks up the flow experience. And, the situation here is more difficult to moderate because it's also subjective. The issue lies around modifying difficulty or letting the player do so in order to facilitate the flow experience.

Opposing questions to consider...How can potentially frustrating moments in-game experienced by excess difficulty be minimized to keep flow in place? At the same time, how can a developer minimize moments in the game where things are too easy? Too much ease can also break up the flow experience. If this issue is resolved skillfully, the player feels a greater sense of flow throughout the game.

Okay...I hope maybe some of this information will benefit game developers. Perhaps it'll provoke or spark more ideas to help improve gameplay experience. Or maybe, it spurs further research. Please see reference below and related resources on "flow" for more information...

Reference

Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience

Author: Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Last edited by Rocky; 05/10/12 06:59 PM.