Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts & Design

Ben Ledoux

College of Computing & Informatics

Computer Science

Faculty Mentor: Dr. Frank Lee

Digital Media

Corey Arnold Co-Mentor

Intrinsically Motivated Play: How Game Design Can Inform Player Engagement

Unlike typical video games made primarily for entertainment, Drexel’s Entrepreneurial Game Studio (EGS) researches and designs “serious games” with goals ranging from education to the promotion of civic art. My research for the EGS revolves around the concept of player engagement - how video games encourage players to continue interacting with a game.

While player engagement is generally considered difficult to predict before playtesting, I set out to find the underlying commonalities across engaging games, connect them to concrete design principles, and determine their roots in psychology. I found that one can implement established psychological theories (specifically cognitive load theory, self-determination theory, and flow theory) within specific aspects of a game’s design to better engage and retain players. Using my research as a guide during the design phase, future games created in the EGS will be able to utilize my findings to help foster an intrinsic motivation within players to keep playing within players. With the knowledge of how to promote player engagement, we hope serious games developed by the EGS will be able to better fulfill their intended goals and purposes.