applied game thinking

Professor Kevin Werbach Dept. of Legal Studies & Business Ethics

Wharton School, Univ. of Pennsylvania

werbach@wharton.upenn.edu

Twitter: @kwerb

Knowledgestream Lecture April 9, 2013

https://www.coursera.org/ course/gamification

Gamification is…

The use of game elements and game design techniques in non-game contexts.

Levels

Points

Resource Collection

Progression

Quests Avatars

Social Graph

Levels

Points

Progression

Badges

Social Graph

Quests

Avatars

Rewards

Everyone’s Gamifying

“Suddenly, gamification is the hot new business concept, with many of the world’s most admired companies signing on.”

– Fortune, Oct. 17, 2011

“Striving to make everyday business tasks more engaging, a growing number of firms... are incorporating elements of videogames into the workplace.” – Wall Street Journal, Oct. 10, 2011

“Many businesses are using these game tricks to try to get people hooked on their products and services—and it is working, thanks to smartphones and the Internet.” – New York Times, Dec. 23, 2012

Everyone’s Gamifying

•  Microsoft

•  Nike

•  SAP

•  American Express

•  Major League Baseball

•  Salesforce.com

•  AXA Equitable

•  CodeAcademy

•  Deloitte

•  Samsung

•  EMC

•  Mint.com

•  Stack Overflow

•  USA Networks

•  LiveOps

•  Dell

•  Kaiser Permanente

•  Foot Locker

•  Opower

•  eBay

•  Cisco

•  Recyclebank

•  Universal Music

•  Siemens

•  Yelp

•  Nissan

•  Playboy

•  Verizon

8

Not Just in Business!

Beyond PBL Reward Structures

Beyond PBL Reward Structures

•  Users get tired of gimmicks

•  “Extrinsic” rewards can actually de-motivate

What makes games

FUN?

1.7 billion downloads

Rovio’s 52nd Attempt!

1.7 billion downloads

Two Sides to Gamification

Business Games

Game Techniques

1.  Player Journey

2.  Motivation Types

3.  Balance

4.  Social Dynamics

5.  Puzzles

6.  Surprise

7.  Feedback

8.  Playtesting

Dynamics Big-picture

aspects; “grammar”

Mechanics Processes that drive

action forward; “verbs”

Components Specific instantiations of mechanics

and dynamics; “nouns”

Game Elements

(focus of book and course)

Onboarding

Climbing

Rest

Rest

Boss Fight

Climbing

Climbing

1. The Player Journey

Scaffolding

Level Up

Traditional Course Design

1   2   3   4   5   6   7  

Units

Midterm Final

Gamification Course Design

Onboard   Climb   Climb   Climb   Rest   Boss  Fight   Rest  

Quiz  

Quiz  

Final  

Major  Project  

Quiz+  Project  

Quiz+  Project  

%  of  Registra?on  %  of  Starters  %  of  SubmiCers  %  of  Writers  0%  

10%  

20%  

30%  

40%  

50%  

60%  

70%  

80%  

90%  

100%  

61%

31%

23%  19%  

16%   15%  13%  

11%   13%

52%

38%

32%

26% 25%

22% 18% 21%

74%

61%

50%

48%

42%

35% 40%

84%

70% 80%

%  of  Registra?on  

%  of  Starters  

%  of  SubmiCers  

%  of  Writers  

≈81,600 registered

8,280 received certificate

2x-4x Typical Completion Rate

2. Motivation Types

Source: Richard Bartle

3. Balance

(Related to Player Journey) (Related to Types)

4. Social Dynamics

•  Competition

•  Cooperation

•  Support

•  Showing off

•  Peer pressure

•  Competition

5. Puzzles

Notice any differences?

6. Surprise (Contrived Uncertainty)

CAPRI (Balaji Prabhakar)

27

7. Feedback

28

29

“We’re running several hundred tests at any given time for every one of our games.”

http://grattisfaction.com/2010/01/ how-zynga-does-customer-development-minimum-viable-product/ Mark Pincus

Founder & CEO, Zynga

8. Test, Test, Test… with Real Humans!

Two Sides to Gamification

Business Games

Business Games

Marketing & economics Game design

Incentives Experiences

Satisfying needs Fun

Status Meaning

PBLs Challenges

Rewards Progression

Getting users to do things Making players awesome

Business Games

Common Ground

FUN

Prof. Kevin Werbach

werbach@wharton.upenn.edu

Twitter: @kwerb

thank you!

http://wdp.wharton.upenn.edu/books/for-the-win/