Moves in Mind: The Psychology of Board Games

Linearity in a modern game seems to have become as unpopular as a mime artist in a …well, as unpopular as a mime artist. The days of simply routed games, where all you needed to think about was collecting giant golden keys and making your way towards a fight with the big red dragon are long gone. Free roaming, unrestricted exploration is the norm nowadays, with complex environments that allow the player to wander for hours, marvel at the scenery, and cavort across hilltops with a Julie Andrews-like abandon. But freedom comes at a price.

Dropping a player into a strange new environment can be confusing. The amount of information presented can mean that a player becomes unsure about which direction to take and unless some kind of help is available. The appeal of free exploration can be crushed under the tedium of random wandering. Solving this problem relies on good design and well-executed construction, but there is one additional area that plays a part: memory.

At the Copa… Copacabana…

Remembering where we've been, what we're doing and where we are going, can, for some of us, be a difficult feat in our everyday lives. I for one often find myself starring blankly into the fridge, having no recollection of even entering the kitchen, let alone what I am looking for. Add into the equation, a story line, several characters, a world full of caves and a sacred quest of some description, and suddenly, keeping track of what's going on becomes quite an issue. There are a couple of memory related problems that often crop up in games, which can in my opinion, reduce a players enjoyment considerably:

FIGURE 7. Remembering where we've been, what we're doing and where we are going, can, for some of us, be a difficult feat in our everyday lives.

OK, I have been a little facetious with all of the "th" sounds, but this scenario is one that pops up constantly. Without mentioning any of the worst culprits (you know who you are), the verbal ping-pong that can take place, firing out character and location names which obviously mean nothing to the player, whilst he slowly begins to bleed from his ears under the strain of trying to take it all in, is not entirely uncommon. True enough, many games that do this do not expect you to remember everything, and much of the information is meant as nothing more than supportive detail to the central plot. The problem however, is that the player doesn't know this. The player has no idea if the names of Emperor Xioachin's four trusted Generals: Chai-Sin-Wa, Sai-Chin-Ho, So-Ha-Xiao and Se-Chaio-Hin are important, or if they just add color to the story. When unfamiliar information is presented, there is usually little a player can do to discern what is relevant, and what isn't, and this problem is made worse as more information is given.

The second memory related problem is Exploration Anxiety. As mentioned previously, the trend away from linearity- towards free exploration exacts its own peculiar price on the player. This anxiety comes in two basic forms, the first of which, as mentioned before, has the player wandering aimlessly around a world, searching for something specific (or unspecified- in the worst cases), unable to remember whether or not they have been along this particular path before. Unproductive rambling can drive any player towards the escape button, but coupled with the common game-world problem that trees, corridors, paths and caves can often look the same (regularly using the same geometry), exploration can sometimes be its own worst enemy. The other form of Exploration Anxiety that most of us will be familiar with, is the nagging feeling that sometimes appears during a game, niggling at the back of your mind saying "I bet you missed one of the rooms back there", and "I bet there was a huge magic sword in it". Progressing from level to level is generally the driving force behind the gameplay, but the thought of having missed something vital, or of significant value along the way, can sometimes be detrimental.

So, what has psychology got to offer, to help game designers cope with memory issues and their associated problems? I would suggest a look at the following three rules.

Funnily enough, this number is seven (Miller 1967). Or more precisely: seven plus or minus two. In psychology, things are only talked of in terms of theory, the Law of Penile Envy for example doesn't exist in the same way as the Law of Gravity. Even though certain elements of thought and behavior seem to be well established, psychologists are happy to regard them as theoretical and not proven. The concept of a magic number is however, one of the most robust of these phenomenon, demonstrable across many cultures and age ranges.

Try it out for yourself:

All things being equal, your recall should have fallen between 5 and 9 letters: the magic number. There are a range of interesting modifiers to this phenomenon that allow recall to extend beyond the magic number. Chunking for example, suggests that we place the information into lumps (or chunks even) and thus the overall amount that we remember, is increased. As an example, it would be relatively simple to remember the sentence: aliens ate my best-friend's underwear, which in actual fact gives us a total letter recall of 30. This chunking process allows letters to be made into words. The same trick is used with phone numbers -- businesses want us to remember 0800 60 40 2200, for example.

This principle is probably most applicable in a game, to puzzles. Using too many elements at any one time will most often result in the player loosing track of what they're doing, or will force them to begin writing things down.

Primacy and Regency

This is best illustrated by the following exercise:

FIGURE 8. The items at the beginning or end of a series are generally recalled more accurately than those in the middle.

How does this help game design? It can be established that once the amount of information presented spills over the normal limits of short-term memory (seven items, plus or minus two), the middle ground becomes fuzzy. In terms of cut-scenes and long-winded intros: if they serve to build atmosphere and establish character, fair enough, but place any important information in the beginning or the end.

However unreliable my memory is, the two things for which my recall is perfect are the words to Fiddler on the Roof, and the monument to modern song-writing that is Barry Manilow's Copacabana. This is not due to either an obsession with musicals from the '70s nor too many nights spent at karaoke, but rather my parents' unfortunate taste in music as I was growing up. Whether we like it or not, repetition is a reliable method for reinforcing memory, and is an effect that can be used in games.

On the most basic of levels, repetition of important story elements helps the player remember details that could at first be difficult to retain. In terms of familiarizing a player with a control system, or having them learn certain procedures within a game, repetition is both a way to help the player remember what to do, and provides the opportunity to practice these actions. As long as the repetition is skillfully paced and well integrated into the overall flow of the game, it should do its job without becoming tedious.

Resistance is Futile

While game players are unlikely to submit to having large metal probes inserted into the back of their heads (I'd like to see Sony try and sell that to the gaming public), they may well end up being more like The Matrix than Tron. As the power of the games machine begins to free designers to explore new areas of gaming potential, playing will evolve into participation, and that will evoke stronger emotions and reactions.

Examining what psychology can bring to the table as part of the game creation process, could be seen as an overindulgence that even the Marquis de Sade would categorize as excessive. However, treated as a practical means by which the game playing experience can be enhanced, a greater understanding of the inner workings of a player's mind will ultimately give the designer more power to create the emotions and experiences that are needed to make the games of the future.

References

Coon, D. 1983, Introduction to Psychology 3rd edition. St. Paul, Minnesota, West Publishing Co.

Gregory, R. L. 1966, Eye and Brain. London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson.

Helmholtz, H. 1909, Wissenschaftliche Abhandlungen, II, pp 764-843.

Hochberg, J. 1978, Art and Perception. In E.C. Carterette and H. Friedman (Eds.), Handbook of Perception, Vol. 10. London: Academic Press.

Koffka, K. 1935, Principles of Gestalt Psychology. New York: Harcourt Brace.

Marr, D. 1982, Vision. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman.

Miller, G. A. 1956, The Magical Number 7 Plus or Minus 2: Some Limits in Our Capacity For Processing Information. Psycological Review 63: 81-97.

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