In my previous blog post, I talked about why I play games and briefly mentioned that challenges/difficulty can be a good incentive to playing them. To elaborate more on this idea,
Reality is Broken states that failure in games can lead to player happiness. This seems crazy, doesn't it? It actually isn't as far-fetched as it seems. An experiment done by the M.I.N.D. Lab, a psychophysiology research center, in 2005 found 32 test subjects playing
Super Monkey Ball 2, a frustrating game that tasks players to navigate gutter balls down crooked lanes without railings. (McGonigal 65) According to McGonigal, scientists expected that these test subjects would "exhibit the strongest positive emotion when they earned high scores or when they completed levels - in other words, during the triumphant fiero moments." (McGonigal 65) Their expectations, however, were false, and it turned out that the most positive emotions were attributed by the moments of failure. When applying this logic to real life, it seems quite odd, because in our modern society we are typically discouraged and disappointed by failure, which seems to be the opposite reaction than what is being presented with the test subjects. So what is the main difference between failure in a video game and failure in real life? In the case of
Super Monkey Ball 2, a lot of it has to do with the failing animation. "Whenever a player made a mistake in
Super Monkey Ball 2, something very interesting happened, and it happened immediately: the monkey went whirling and wailing over the edge and off into space." (McGonigal 66) This animation played a big part in this, and since the failure was more interesting, players seemed to be less discouraged by their mistakes, furthering their sense of enjoyment.
Recently, my friends and I have been revisiting the game
Halo: Reach, something that I have not picked up off my shelf in quite a while. One of the first things that we decided to do was to attempt the Campaign mode on Legendary difficulty with all 13 active modifiers, or skulls, which disable players in one way or another.
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| Me adding modifiers and preparing the game |
Going into it, none of us actually expected us to win, which made the event of failure a lot more enjoyable and entertaining, much like the test subjects with
Super Monkey Ball 2.
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| Our catastrophic attempt at completing the first mission actually made things more enjoyable and interesting |
My friends and I also found that failure made the entire experience much more enjoyable, despite the fact that with enough effort, just like
Super Monkey Ball 2, we would be able to succeed. Through our multiple failures, the game also gives us the optimism to continue on. McGonigal further states that "as long as our failure is interesting, we will keep trying - and remain hopeful that we will succeed eventually." (McGonigal 67) Games, in this way, have taught me that despite many failures that we should always keep pushing forward and not be discouraged by them. How do you approach failure in games? After reading this, has your view on failure in games or failure in general changed?
McGonigal, Jane.
Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can
Change the World. New York: Penguin Group, 2011. Print.
I find this interesting as many people tend to want to stop playing after they fail in a level or a mission of a game. Did the book happen to include what will happen after multiple fails?
ReplyDeleteThe players' failure helped to make things more interesting, and gave them the optimism to carry on playing until they succeed. Btw we should definitely keep this in mind next time we attempt King's Fall on Hard Mode.
DeleteAdding on to my original comment, I do tend to feel mad when I fail, but once I finish it I feel extremely happy about myself
DeleteI myself like to think I take failure in games quite calmly, compared to my brothers. But I'm slightly confused as to what constitutes a failure in life that the book mentioned, is it like a failed job interview; or like an unsuccessful relationship? Or does the book simply talk about the feeling of failure?
ReplyDeleteFailure in life could equate to failure in life, something that you're trying to achieve, etc. But what I'm trying to prove here is that failure in games can be much more rewarding and less discouraging than failure in real life, as you get instant feedback from the game.
DeletePersonally I take failure very easily. I always find a way to learn from a failed attempt. Whether it be something not to do or how there is a better way to do it. I keep this in mind when doing anything.
ReplyDeleteI see failure as a opportunity to improve. Failure in video games makes this especially easy to see, making a person change their strategy to try to beat the level. Things like memorizing the attack patterns, or formations the enemy shows up in allows us to improve our strategy. It sort of connects to effective planning in a way as well
ReplyDeleteI also find this curious. I never really thought about death being encouraging until I read that section of the book. When I play Guild Wars 2 it is very common to see death as a fun factor, an example being raids. In these raids you keep getting face-rolled by large bosses and yet somehow it is fun and makes you want to continue playing more. I guess it's the humiliation of your epic failure or because you were 2% away from killing the boss and 10 more seconds would have done it.
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ReplyDeleteI do think that failure can be used as a way to motivate the player and make the experience more enjoyable. Perhaps the most popular modern example is the Dark Souls franchise. The game is very hard, heavily punishing players for their mistakes and throwing very high damage opponents at you. It may take 5 tries to beat a boss. Everytime you die, you learn a little bit about the boss. Once you've learned how the boss works, you finally beat it, relieving you from the frustration from the previous deaths and making you feel accomplished.
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