Forecasting Online Game Addictiveness

Transcription

1 Forecasting Online Game Addictiveness Jing-Kae Lou Kuan-Ta Chen Hwai-Jung Hsu Chin-Laung Lei National Taiwan University Academia Sinica Academia Sinica National Taiwan University NetGames 2012

2 World of Warcraft by Blizzard

3 World of Warcraft by Blizzard 4.5 years and $63M USD for development before release on 2004 * > $37M USD for upkeep and expansions during 2004 to 2010 ** * **

4 Online Game Industry is Competitive $1M to $200M USD dev cost per game * > 200 game titles each year ** * * **

5 The Terrifying Truth Most of them survived only 4--9 months. Usually long before a game s investment could ever be paid off

6 The Question Is a game s lifetime predictable? Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 6

7 In other words Is a game s addictiveness predictable? addictiveness [noun]: the ability to retain players active in the game for a long time. Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 7

8 The Significance STOP developing hopeless games SUGGEST better design decisions during development CHOOSE better games to publish (for game publishers) Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 8

9 State-of-the-Practice Intuition of game designers Feedbacks from focus groups Psychologically inspired methods E.g., the think aloud method Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 9

10 Our rationale Why a player addicts to an online game? - Being entertained - Having various emotions arisen, e.g., joy, excitement, tension Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 10

11 Our Approach Lab emotion studies An unpublished game X Prediction Model Lab emotion studies Published games Performance on market Performance on market An unpublished game X Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 11

12 GROUNDTRUTH DATASET DESCRIPTION Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 12

13 Our Collaborator Gamania, the no. 1 game company in Taiwan Gamania released player session information (every player s login and logout events) of 11 games to us Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 13

14 Overview of Games 4 ACT 2 FPS 5 RPG Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 14

15 Account Activity Records (AAR) AAR Format Dataset Overview Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 15

16 QUANTIFYING GAME ADDICTIVENESS Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 16

17 Attempt #1: Subscription period Subscription period The time span (in days) of a player s first and last game sessions. Issues INTUITION A game is more addictive if its gamers tend to play it as much as they can. The actual time players spent in game is not considered. Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 17

18 Attempt #2: Ratio of Presence Ratio of presence (RoP) The total number of days that the gamer entering the game at least once during the subscription period. E.g., Entering the game on 20 days with 100 subscription period RoP = 20/100 = 0.2 Issues Bias toward games with short subscription periods E.g., average 4 online days over 5 subscribed days = RoP 0.8 Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 18

19 Subscription period and RoP Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 19

20 RoP(OP) RoP Generalization RoP with a certain observation period RoP curve The curve formed by RoPs over a range of OP Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 20

21 The RoP curve of FPS2 RoP curves follow a power-law relationship with OP. Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 21

22 Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 22

23 Defining Addictiveness Index β The decline rate of RoP over time genre-independent Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 23

24 Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 24

25 MEASURING PLAYER EMOTION Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 25

26 Corugattor supercilli muscle groups Negative Emotion Frowning Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 26

27 Zygomaticus major muscle groups Positive Smiling Emotion Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 27

28 Facial EMG approach (EMG: Electromyography) 1. Continuous emotion measures (can be at a rate of 1000 Hz or even higher) 2. Does not disturb game play 3. Objective since the emotional indicators are directly measured rather than told by subjects Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 28

29 Facical EMG Measurement Setup Corrugator Supercilii muscle Negative emotions Zygomaticus Major muscle Positive emotions Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 29

30 Measurement Devices Electrodes Wires PowerLab 16/30 Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 30

31 Measuring Facial EMG during game play Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 31

32 Experiment Design 84 subjects are asked to play the 11 games A subject must be new to the games he played Each game session lasts >= 45 minutes continuously Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 32

33 Quantifying the Measurement EMG samples are taken at 1,000 Hz, so a 45-minute trace comprises , 000 = 2, 700, 000 samples The average absolute differences between adjacent samples is taken as the representative index Given a time series of electrical potential samples P = {p 1, p 2,, p n } CS: corugattor supercilii muscles negative emotion ZM: zygomaticus major muscles positive emotion Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 33

34 Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 34

35 FORECASTING GAME ADDICTIVENESS Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 35

36 Emotion vs. Addictiveness Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 36

37 Modeling Game Addictiveness ES: the emotional strength ES = CS + ZM The combined emotional strength arisen β = ω 0 + ω 1 CS + ω 2 ZM + ω 3 CS:ZM + ω 4 CS:ES +ω 5 ZM:ES Adj. R 2 = 0.94 Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 37

38 Leave-One-Out Validation Pearson cor: 0.86 Kendal cor: 0.78 Avg. error rate: 11% Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 38

39 Applications of the model Early evaluation of game design Market value assessment before publishing 1. Optimize the odds of successful investments 2. Target more accurately the provision of better entertaining experience. Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 39

40 Ongoing Work & Future Plan More sophisticated modelings and more validations Game addictiveness may change over a game s lifetime Develop models that can explain WHY a game s lifetime is longer than another? Due to particular game designs? Due to commercial promotions or others? Are All Games Equally Cloud-Gaming-Friendly? / Kuan-Ta Chen 40

41 Thank You! Kuan-Ta Chen Academia Sinica