adaptation in applied video games: from player modelling to dynamic game adjustment and enhanced...

Adaptation in Applied Video Games: from Player Modelling

to Dynamic Game Adjustment and Enhanced Playability

Boyan Bontchev

Prof. at Dep. of Software Technologies,

Fac. of Mathematics and Informatics, Sofia Univ., Bulgaria

Marie Curie Fellow at Brainstorm Multimedia, Spain

Adaptation in Applied Video Games e-Society’2016

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9/04/2016

Faculty of Mathematics and Informatics

BSc, MSc, PhD programs in:

Mathematics

Applied Mathematics

Mathematics and Informatics

Statistics

Informatics

Computer Science

Software Engineering

Information Systems

AI

…

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9/04/2016Adaptation in Applied Video Games e-Society’2016

Technology enhanced learning: models, adaptability, authoring/instructional/delivery platforms and interoperability

Content collaboration and access to cultural heritage - MECITV: Media Collaboration for Interactive TV; semantic technologies for cultural heritage

Software services and quality - software service design and discovery; cloud; methods

Digital games:

MMORPG (SHIVER project of MyAlert S.L., Spain, and Rila Solutions, Bulgaria);

Creating virtual business models, tools and environments (FP6 PRIME: Providing Real Integration in Multi-disciplinary Environments);

Models of board games for education for ADOPTA: ADaptive technOlogy-enhanced eduTainment platform for building edutainment

H2020 RAGE (Realising an Applied Gaming Eco-system)

ADAPTIMES (ADAPTIve player-centric serious video gaMES) - with Brainstorm Multimedia, Spain

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Agenda

Introduction

Types of computer games

Features of computer games

Applied games

Player modelling

Dynamic game adjustment

Game adaptation for an enhanced playability

The ADAPTIMES project(ADAPTIve player-centric serious video gaMES)

Challenges to adaptive applied games

Conclusions

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Introduction First Alfred Russel Wallace has explained in 19th century

how varieties and species are forced to adapt to changesin their local environment (evolution through natural selection).

Principles of adaptivity and adaptability - not only for floral & animalspecies but also to the human beings, social life, business, etc.

Adaptive software platforms dedicated to domains such as real timeapplications, parallel computations, technology enhanced learningand many more.

Adaptive computer games for education retain interest of players (learners) by attracting their attention better than traditional approaches, by tailoring the game to the player character.

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Digital video games today

An ubiquitous visual media

able to recreate both tangible & intangible artifacts

in a highly interactive and dynamic way

Provide a powerful and increasing appeal and engagement for all user ages by possessing an integrated form of fun and play

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The average game player is 31 years old

Source: The Entertainment

Software Assoc., 2014


Modern video games types 1/2

Competitive versus noncompetitive games

Interactive versus non-interactive games

Physical versus non-physical games

(Vosen, 2004)

Platforms – personal computers or tablets; game consoles like Microsoft Xbox, Nintendo Wii U, or Sony PlayStation; mobile phones

Playing mode - multi- or single-player;

Milieu (social environment) - describes the visual type of a video game - science fiction, fantasy, horror, etc…

(Apperley, 2006)

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Modern video games types 2/2

Distribution – paid or free

Openness – games with open code or not

Mod’s – modified games with altered content

Linear vs non-linear gameplay – while linear gameplay provides fixed sequence of challenges, non-linear gameplay poses challenges that can be completed in different sequences

Progressive vs emergent gameplay – some games (like ‘The Sims’) do not have story structure planned in advance and, thus, offer emergent gameplay

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Entertainment video games11

(Entertainment Software Association, 2014)


Applied (serious) video games

“have an explicit and carefully thought-out educational purpose and are not intended to be played primarily for amusement “

(Abt, 1970)

“produced, marketed, or used for purposes other than pure entertainment; these include, but are not limited to, educational computer games, edutainment and advertainment” + “health games and political games”

(Nielsen, Smith, Tosca, 2008)

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12 structural game elements (Prensky, 2001)

1. form of fun - provides enjoyment and pleasure;

2. form of play - gives intense and passionate involvement;

3. rules – determine structure of the play;

4. goals - provides motivation;

5. interactivity – leads to learning by doing;

6. adaptivity - provides flow

7. outcomes and feedback – serve as a basis for learning

8. win states – provides ego gratification

9. conflicts, competition, challenges and opposition – give more adrenaline

10. problem solving - sparks player’s creativity

11. interaction - gives social groups

12. narrative (story) and its representation – both they serve as a source of emotional experience before, during and after gameplay

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Player-centric adaptation

Player-centric adaptation in video games needs to answer some important questions:

Who – player character structural and behavioral changes => requires player modelling


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Player modelling

Player modelling is crucial for realization of an effective player-centric adaptation in both applied and entertainment video games. It implies:

Observation of individual player’s behavior “from a contextually omniscient view”

Construction and updates of a model of that player based on observation, and

Intelligent game adaptation for tailoring the gameplay to the individual player.


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Source: Magerko, B. Adaptation in Digital Games, COMPUTER, July 2008, pp.87-89.

Behaviour models: flow

Flow is a process of optimal human experience (based on: Csikszentmihalyi, M. Finding flow: The psychology of engagement with everyday life. New York: Basic Books, 1997)


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Lo

wC

hallen

ge/C

om

ple

xit

yH

igh

Individual

average

Anxiety Arousal Flow

Worry

Apathy Boredom Relaxation

Low Skills High

Control

The flow concept

based on: Kiili, K. Evaluations of an experiential gaming model. Human Technology: An Interdisciplinary Journal on Humans in ICT Environments, 2006, 2(2), pp.187-201.


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Flow

experience

• Concentration

• Loss of self-

consciousness

• Transformation

of time

• Autotelic

experience

(intrinsic

motivation)

Flow

consequences

• Increased

learning

• Positive

attitude

• Exploratory

behavior

• Perceived

behavioral

control

Flow antecedents

• Challenge–skill

balance

• Action–awareness

merging

• Goals of an activity

• Unambiguous

feedback

• Sense of control

Task

Artifact

Behavioural models: Motivations


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pleased

Valence

Aro

us

al

PleasantUnpleasant

Activated

Deactivated

Approach

motivation

(reward)

glad

Avoidance

motivation

(punishment)

happy

alert

excited

astonished

aroused

alarmed

afraid

tense

annoyed

frustrated

miserable

depressed

sad

gloomy

bored

tired

contented

satisfied

serene

calm

relaxed

sleepy

The core emotional space with motivations to approach or avoid a stimulus

(based on Russell, J.A. A circumplex model of affect, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1980, Vol. 39, No. 6, pp.1161–1178)

Motivational intensity (Fairclough & Gilleade, 2012)


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Effort

Dem

an

dBoredom Engagement Zone Overload

Behavioral model of motivational intensity for game adaptation (adapted from Fairclough, S., & Gilleade, K. Construction of the biocybernetic loop: a case study. Proc. of the 14th

ACM Int. Conf. on Multimodal interaction, ACM, 2012, October, pp. 571-578)

GameFlow model for assessing player enjoyment (Sweetser and Wyeth, 2005)


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Element Criteria

Concentration A game should require concentration and the player should beable to concentrate on it.

Challenge Games should be sufficiently challenging and match the player’s

skill level

Player skills Games must support player skill development and mastery.

Control Players should feel a sense of control over their actions in the

game.

Clear Goals Games should provide the player with clear goals at appropriate

times.

Feedback Players must receive appropriate feedback at appropriate times.

Immersion Players should experience deep but effortless involvement in the

game.

SocialInteraction

Games should support and create opportunities for social

interaction.

Adaptivity in serious games for education and training

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(ENTRExprorer project, 2011)9/04/2016Adaptation in Applied Video Games e-Society’2016

Concentration

Challenge

Player skillsControlClear GoalsFeedbackImmersionSocialInteraction

Player competence model (Silva and Behar, 2015)


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Competences

Skills

Abilities

Know-

ledge

Attitudes

12 player competences:

digital fluency

autonomy

organization

planning

time management

communication

reflection

virtual presence

self-evaluation

self-motivation

flexibility

teamwork

Playing style models 1/2


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Bartle,

1996

Characteristics Keirsey,

1998

Killer Acting (on) Players = External

Change / Tactics

Artisan

Achiever Acting (on) World = External

Structure / Logistics

Guardian

Explorer Interacting (with) World =

Internal Structure / Strategy

Rational

Socializer Interacting (with) Players =

Internal Change / Diplomacy

Idealist

(Stewart, 2014) proposed a unified model of personality and play styles, based on both Bartle styles & Keirsey temperaments

Playing style models 2/2


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Relationships between Honey and Mumford learning styles and playing styles of ADOPTA (Bontchev, 2011) and Bartle

Honey and

Mumford

Learns by: ADOPTA Bartle

Activist hand–eye coordination, planning andstrategizing, problem-solving, teamworkand the ability to think quickly

Competitor Killer

Theorist logically entering problems step-by-step,

with spatial awareness and verbal &

numeracy skills

Logician Achiever

Pragmatist planning, decision-making, testing

hypotheses, strategic thinking,

management skills

Strategist Explorer

Reflector Observing and watching reflectively Dreamer Socializer


Player-centric adaptation in video games needs to answer some questions:


How – how adaptation will be realized => requires adaptation loop design


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Adaptation loop in applied games

The game adaptation control is supposed to be run time and implicit for the player;

The adaptation control should make the video game aligned to specific response patterns of individual players and to bring positive effect on playability and learning outcomes;

The adaptation process runs in the context of the game and aligns adaptable game features to player-centric metrics showing:

Player’s progress and performance

Player’s behavior and emotions

Any individual subjective input expressed by the player


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Affective feedback loop - “Relax-to-Win” racing game (Bersak et al, 2001)


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2) the system replies

to the users by

appropriate affective

response

3) the users feel

greater involvement

and reinforced

emotions

1) users’ emotions

are expressed and

communicated to

the system

Measuring player’s affect

Relax-to-Win (Bersak et al, 2001) used player's galvanic skin response (GSR) for measuring current level of relaxation and, next, controlled the speed of a dragon according to this relaxation’s level

Recognition of emotions by measurement of:

behavioral indicators - facial and voice expressions, gesture, eye/head tracking, mouse pressure, ...

physiological signals of autonomic nervios system – GSR or electro-dermal activity (EDA), heart rate variability (HRV), electromyography (EMG), temperature, ...

physiological signals of central nervios system –electroencephalography (EEG), magnetoencephalography (MEG), functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), Positron Emission Tomography (PET), …


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How – how adaptation will be realized => requires adaptive loop design

What – which game features can be adapted => requires adaptive gameplay design


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Adaptable game features 1/3

1. Adaptive automation of game tasks and feedback:

explicit tasks - such as objectives, goals and missions posed to the player as part of the gameplay;

implicit tasks - not explicitly stated by the game interface but expected to be fulfilled; such as “stay alive”, “maximize your skills”, or “collect as many items as possible”;

player-driven tasks - created by the player thanks to his/her creativity within existing limitations of given game mechanics and leading to so called emergent gameplay, with no predefined narratives.


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Source: Murphy, C., Chertoff, D., Guerrero, M., Moffitt, K. Design Better Games: Flow, Motivation, and Fun. Design and Development of Training Games: Practical Guidelines from a Multidisciplinary Perspective, 2014, p.1773.

Adaptable game features 2/3

2. Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment (DDA):

DDA by means of automatic level generation - uses methods for procedural content generation. Textual and multimedia game content such as narrative, dialogues, quests, camera profiles, levels, textures, etc. is created automatically.

DDA by means of modification of artificial intelligence – dynamic adaptation of difficulty of an intelligent agent by picking out AI behaviour most relevant to current player’s abilities and emotions – dynamic scripting generation; machine learning; adaptive agents.

DDA by means of adjusting level content, i.e. game items for player interactions – means dynamic adaptation of level of inventory interacted by the player for specific game context, according to player’s skill acquisition – e.g. game speed adjusted to player´s boredom, frustration and enjoyment (Tijs et al, 2008).


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Adaptable game features 3/33. Adaptation of audio-visual effects: reflecting user’s emotional state has initially been exploited

within multimedia applications like affective music players, recommendation systems and online chat applications

Dekker and Champion (2007) first tried enhancing the gameplay and display of a horror game mapping directly physiological player’s responses to audiovisual game properties

Grigore et al (2008) used stochastic algorithms for adapting ambient light in rooms within a video game by using psychophysiological features, namely player’s heart rate and skin conductance

Garner (2013) explored various psychophysiological approaches and sound design practices for creating greater emotional experiences in adaptive audio-centric gameplay, with a special focus on correlations between fear and game sound


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How – how adaptation will be realized => requires adaptive loop design

What – which game features can be adapted => requires adaptive gameplay design

Why – advantages of game adaptation => requires analysis of outcomes in playability and learning results


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Playability model for player experience in applied games (Sánchez et al, 2009)


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Playability

attribute

Attribute’s properties

Satisfaction Fun, disappointment and attractiveness

Learnability Game knowledge, skill, difficulty, frustration, speed,

discovery

Effectiveness Completion, structuring

Immersion Conscious awareness, absorption, realism, dexterity, socio-

cultural proximity

Motivation Encouragement, curiosity, self-improvement, and diversity

Emotion Reaction, conduct, and sensory appeal

Socialization Social perception, group awareness, personal implication,

sharing, communication, and interaction (competitive,

collaborative or cooperative)

The ADAPTIMES FP7 project ADAPTIve player-centric serious video gaMES

ADAPTIMES aims at investigating how

cognitive abilities,

psycho-emotional processes and

playing style

can be used as a basis for efficient and effective player-centric adaptivity


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Co

native

psych

olo

gy

Adaptation in


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Game dynamics

Ga

me

ae

sth

etic

s

Player

Player style

metrics

Playing styles

Performance

and efficiency(abilities, skills

and knowledge)

Emotions(flow, immersion &

intrinsic

motivation)

Principal workflow of game adaptation control


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Dynamic adaptation control

Player model

monitoring

Dynamic

game

adaptations

Player model

updates

Player dynamics

(performance, emotions,

style)

Player statics

(goals and

preferences)

Adaptive video game

Measurement of

adaptation

effect

Real time

player feedback

on adaptations

Player style measurement

Implicitly during play time of specific mini-game

Based on player’s metrics for specific game tasks:

Performance (result)

Efficiency (result/effort)

Task difficulty

Play time


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Rush For Gold, part 2 -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJe61bUDE40

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Maze Editor

Transitions table

Property Editor

Titles …

Texts …

Graphics …

PythonScripts

Brainstorm API

3D Maze Game Engine

BrainstormRun Time

Environment

Mini-Games

GUIFront-

End

Property Metadata

9/04/2016

Software platform for generation of maze games


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Rush For Gold (playing style)

9/04/2016

Generated labyrinth (maze game)

3D quiz game (assessment)

3D puzzle


Problems with applied games 1/2

Higher development cost

Lower attractiveness compared to entertainment games

Transition between instructional design and actual game design implementation - how Game Mechanics impact and interact with the Learning Mechanics

Insufficient personalization and adaptation:

Emotional state

Physiological/neurophysiological signals

In-game performance & game progression metrics

D1.6 GALA Roadmap 2, Nov. 2011


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Problems with applied games 2/2

Harmonization of distributed SG Environments supporting reusability, interoperability and standardization

Human-Computer-Interaction & neuroscience - non-intrusive and natural interaction in SG by 2020

Assessment - effectively tracking and analysing of the right parameters related to learners’ progress (knowledge gain, reflection and application)

How psychological theories should be used in the design of realistic and convincing NPCs?

How different pedagogical paradigms relate to SG and SG mechanics - reference framework needed!

D1.6 GALA Roadmap 2, Nov. 2011


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Conclusions 1/2

The market space of both entertainment and applied video games will continue to grow in next years, together with that of gamification applications.

The same is valid for the impact of video games thanks to their synergy of story, art and technological achievements including affective and adaptive gameplay.

Applied games with non-linear and interactive storytelling will be used more and more for immersive cultural presentation, teaching, assessment and training.

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Conclusions 2/2

Both applied and commercial entertainment games will include dynamic and implicit player-centric adaptation.

New player-centric adaptive methods, technologies, frameworks and applications will be created and applied in video games

More analysis of adaptation benefits is needed in regard of playability and learning outcomes

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Thank you for your attention!

Discussion

More info at: http://adaptimes.eu/

[email protected]

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http://adaptimes.eu/

mailto:[email protected]