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Videogames Fill Psychological Needs for Players
Posted by
Zonk
on Thu Dec 28, 2006 03:21 PM
from the all-about-the-deepseated-pinata-wants dept.
from the all-about-the-deepseated-pinata-wants dept.
codegen writes "The CBC (among others) is reporting that researchers at the University of Rochester and Immersyve Inc. have released a study indicating that people enjoy video games because they satisfy a psychological need. The study showed that the interrelations between players in MMOGs were particularly important. From the article: 'Gamers said they felt the best about their experience when the games they played produced positive outcomes in scenarios related to the real world ... The researchers evaluated players' motivations in virtual worlds by asking four groups of people to play different games, including a genre known as massively multiplayer online (MMO) games, which some industry watchers regard as the future of video games.'"
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So wait, are all videogames MMOGs now? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So wait, are all videogames MMOGs now? (Score:4, Insightful)
Video games are more fulfilling than the hole. Better games are more fulfilling than not so good games, although we are seeing some MMOGs that are achieving a low-level, lizard-brain kind of fulfillment that is more adicting than good-for-you.
Parent
Re:So wait, are all videogames MMOGs now? (Score:4, Funny)
You never played DaiKatana, did you?
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Here's the abstract [metapress.com] It's kinda saying. Folks feel good when they play video games, rather, when they feel good, while a player's needs are met while they play a game, they are likely to enjoy it more, and play more. MMO games seem to fulfill more needs and that is why they are so addictive.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Not just MMOGs (Score:2)
Every gamer I know becomes obsessed with at least one of mechanics, primarily for the genre they prefer. Just beating the game often isn't enough anymore.
Re:So wait, are all videogames MMOGs now? (Score:4, Funny)
"Not a substitute for human interaction."
Parent
Duh (Score:2, Troll)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Duh (Score:5, Informative)
I don't eat for "sustenance" as much as I am sustained by what food offers.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Doesn't it seems obvious to you? (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Doesn't it seems obvious to you? (Score:4, Insightful)
Gamers are looking for a sense of achievement meaning they don't actually have to achieve anthing to feel fulfilled with a game. I have noticed (personally) that when I am playing a MMORPG the game is a lot of fun until I get to the point where I see no worthwhile accomplishment left to complete; essentially, where the game has become mostly about grinding and nothing else.
Parent
Damn it... (Score:5, Funny)
This just in (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This just in (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Loving Choice Adoption in Second Life [somethingawful.com] -- A virtual adoption agency where people wishing to sexually roleplay as children are able to meet pedophile partners.
I play videogames because... (Score:5, Insightful)
1. They can be damned fun.
2. They continually make my brain keep working, continually trying out new tactics.
3. Many a LAN party are included in my top 10 favorite memories of my entire life.
4. There are parts of the gaming community that are fantastic and allow for great friendships to come about.
5. They provide a fun alternative to the daily grind (much like drugs)
6. They have the ABILITY to be educational
7. They provide a safe place for the dark desires that dwell within all of us to be satiated. Afterall, would you rather someone be killing people on screen, or people on the street?
As far as fulfilling some psychological need, I wouldn't put myself in that group...however, I don't dispute it either; I know many people who are anti-social, have anxiety, are overly shy, have aspergers, or various other things that prevent them from interacting properly face to face. Put them behind a WoW toon though, and suddenly they become open and talkative and friendly.
Video games to me are a fantastic form of entertainment. They are similar to reading, the difference being instead of working your imagination, they work your reasoning and reaction. They require you to part with "daily reality", however, and embrace a different world. This is most definately not a bad thing when used in moderation.
Last but not least, it serves for a way for me and my fiance to bond...granted, there are many lonely gamers out there, but for geeks and nerds who are lucky enough to have a spouse who is just as geeky and nerdy...well, playing video games with a spouse who not only wants to but EXPECTS to brings about some amazingly fun times.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It's the same reason I'm involved with geocaching [mngca.org] and post "articles" and photos to my website...
Slow news day.
The reason is obvious (Score:5, Insightful)
Just take this simple test: would the last 24 hours of your life make for a good season of "24"? Would anyone watch it?
Re:The reason is obvious (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:The reason is obvious (Score:5, Funny)
As the posters name is 'Rob T Firefly', I suspect that even if he did have big boobs not many would watch.
man boobs
(shudder)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
But you've got to admit that a phone that never needs charging would be handy...
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Speak for yourself.... life would probably be less boring if you'd go out and do something instead of sitting playing a video game in the first place!
Anyway, I'd suggest that they serve as not merely a passtime, but rather an outlet, or a release for things we can't do in waking life, because we are limited by physics, law, morals, etc. Hmmm... sound familiar? Freud believe that our dreams serve this purpose of "wish fulfillment" while we sleep. To me gami
The Opposite (Score:5, Funny)
It's about the timescale (Score:3, Interesting)
It's
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, don't sound so pessimistic!
Those players just chose to hit the "reset" button to try again with a new character, rather than trying to salvage their current one with a large time penalty.
Leveling (Score:5, Insightful)
If I got a pay raise after a week of grinding, I'd sure enjoy work a lot more.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, come now. Work's not so far from your average D&D RPG. Most of your work colleagues will already have been slowed, with a duration of several days, and some may have been blinded or deafened as well. Your office will be under the effects of an ice storm for the first morning back. Your boss will still be an ogre several levels higher than you. But on the bright side, launching a fireball into his office will still be fun!
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Work is just work - it's *you*, sat at *your* desk, in *your* office, in *your* world, doing *your* job.
WoW (and any other game) is different - it's *you*, being *someone/thing else*, doing *something else*, in a *different* world.
It's an escape. Me, I'd love to be living in an Elite/Freelancer/Eve/X kind of universe, travelling through space, seeing the universe, trading, fighting, having adventures. Of course if I
Re:The Grind (Score:2)
Some players tell me that the real content is in t
Different games... (Score:5, Interesting)
Reasoning? Pacman and space invaders are immersive escapes from reality. When you're sitting there controlling some pixels (or vectors if you're really old school) on a screen without interacting with anyone else around you, you have escaped our reality to enter another one for a time.
But in Counter-Strike, you can fulfill your basic psychological need to shoot annoying teenagers in the face. When the game is multi-player, it's just a disguise, an extension of the reality we live in. You interact with other real people, and kill them, or sell them blue items for gold, or zerg their base and capture their flags. It's still reality, but minus the consequences one usually faces for equivalent actions.
That's my take on it, at least.
Of all the things I *COULD* be... (Score:4, Insightful)
I could be an alcoholic. I could be abusive. I could be a prick. I could be an asshole. I could be any combination of the aforementioned, or even more that I haven't mentioned.
All that said, I come home after work, turn in Counterstrike: Source (don't give me shit about 1.6!), and play for about an hour. After this my mind is at ease. I'm relaxed. I make dinner, clean the house, and a lot of the crap that I deal with during the day disappears.
There is an obvious escape from reality, and the bonus is that when you are done playing, the reality you HAD is put in the back of your mind. You're fresh off a high from 20 kills straight, or you got the high score. Your mind is happy, and happy thoughts ensue.
And the only thing I did was burn a little electricity and time. And I'm still not an asshole. Yet.
Re: (Score:2)
Synthetic Achievement (Score:2, Interesting)
I'll go back to the genuinely fun game once I am no longer deficient in REAL accomplishments.
I think it's definately safe to say that while there would be a market for MMORPGS if they didn't tap into people's psychological deficiencies for
Re:Synthetic Achievement (Score:4, Interesting)
That being said, do with your lives whatever you see fit. It's none of my buisiness. I just personally have given up RPG's because of this realization.
Adarn
Parent
I think it might be true... (Score:2, Interesting)
Significant real world benefits of Mmorgs. (Score:5, Interesting)
2) greatly improved ability to flirt casually.
3) managing a guild of 90 members made managing a team of 22 people at work easy.
4) managing the logistics of a large guild's advancement made managing the logistics of large projects easier.
5) greatly increased confidence
6) greatly increased ability to let everyone bitch and stay above it (a "rare" quality commented on by senior management to me recently).
7) greatly increased skill with alcohol that has lead to being able to hold interesting conversations about Port and other fine drinks with afficianados. (it was a drinking guild and we get together for annual boozy fun parties and that lead to my fall from near teetotaler status).
8) led to RL buds that has led to two extra RL skiing trips (one in whistler) which lead to two 22 year old pretty blond australian girls dancing and flirting with me because I was a texan cowboy. which is funny since I'm in my 40's.
There may be more.
There were downsides.
At the height of my addiction, I let my real personal life go to hell for about 24 months. It was pretty much - work 8 hours, play 8 hours, sleep/bathe/eat in the other 8 hours. It was a magical world that did fill all my needs and then one day in 2002ish I finally got full and got back on with life. I still play 7 to 15 hours a week.
It definitely contributed to carpal tunnel (tho my job does that anyway).
It lead me to be much less idealistic and much more realistic about how many people (80%) out there are users (some purposely- more subconciously).\
It lead me to appreciate those people who are real (i'd say about 20%?).
Guess I'm just odd like that... (Score:2)
In other words, RTS (CoH is my current favorite) and tactical FPS.
Re: (Score:2)
DUH! (Score:2)
MMOGS are the future? (Score:2)
If that's the case, the industry will lose this gamer. I don't have the time, energy or interest to even look at a MMOG. I played several MUDS while attending highschool and college, but they simply do note appeal to me any more. I think there will always be a place for MMOGs, but I doubt that they are the future. Maybe that's my inner geezer speaking.
Do you mean...... (Score:2)
Amazing but true! (Score:2)
Certainly this is news for nerds! Had it been the players' needs being filled with video games, well, that wouldn't be very interesting would it?
Possibly, yes: (Score:2, Insightful)
Games like Tetris, Civilization, Monkey Island, exercise your desire to construct / create. In those games, creating things or solutions means you are good.
Which type of games is more popular, and why? Read the newspapers, watch the evening news, and think about it.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
You obviously haven't listened to dr dre's account of his LA riots experience. It begins;
Sittin in my livin room calm and collected
Feelin mad, gotta get mine respected
You can't change anything. The best you can hopefore is some sort of revolution to swallow you up and spit you out a hero in your idealized world. This has a very slim possibilty of happening.
So I'll be headshotting 14 year olds in the mean time mmmkay?