Hello  
I am currently doing a study into Persuasive Games and how the design of them could be improved to make them more efficient. 
While looking for places to post my survey I found this forum and hoped you guys could give me some thoughts and opinions  

If you are interested in participating in the survey you can find the link here:
https://goo.gl/forms/6LszmtYnPd3TjgpF2

Also please let me know what you think of the genre and how you think the design could be improved ? 

Thank you =) 

51 minutes ago, Dyla24 said:

Also please let me know what you think of the genre and how you think the design could be improved ?

By applying very basic gameplay design.

Persuasive Games are known for there bad design.

Like the one linked to the survey, the game wants the player to feel frustration, yet it forgets that a frustrated player won't stick with the game to the end.

The game criticizes governments that don't provide there people with free will, then removes the players will by forcing the player to make decisions that the developer says is right.

If you want to make a persuasive game, then persuade your players. Don't force them.

This War Of Mine and  Papers Please, are two persuasive games made using some good game design. Both allow players to explore situations instead of forcing a concept onto people.

Exact age rather than range, gender, ethnicity, national status, questions about known biases regarding immigrants and refugees ... Getting that far in the survey persuaded me.

3 hours ago, Scouting Ninja said:

[...]

Like the one linked to the survey, the game wants the player to feel frustration, yet it forgets that a frustrated player won't stick with the game to the end.

The game criticizes governments that don't provide there people with free will, then removes the players will by forcing the player to make decisions that the developer says is right.

[...]

This War Of Mine and  Papers Please, are two persuasive games made using some good game design. Both allow players to explore situations instead of forcing a concept onto people.

The reason I chose the game in the survey is that it has easy access, while This war of mine or papers please have to be purchased. 
And I do agree with you both of those two games are well done and great examples of how persuasive games should work more. 

I am also comparing this game to another game and a research that has been done last year, so I needed a similar game with some differences to compare and analyze why some mechanics just won't work with persuasive games. 
 

You say that the game takes away the players free will, don't you think that this was on purpose by the developer to make players understand how it feels like when the government takes away your free will? Not saying that it is the right way to do it but I could imagine that this is the reason why the developers decided to take away players free will. 

9 hours ago, Dyla24 said:

don't you think that this was on purpose by the developer to make players understand how it feels like when the government takes away your free will?

Yes I do and that is why I played it to the end to see the effect. All it did was ruin what could have been a good game.

The way to explain it: It is like telling someone that killing is wrong, then you go and kill one of there family members to make a point.

The game started so good. With the character selection and art style I was expecting a much better game.

The first scene could have been used to see what the player thinks is OK for a government to do. Then instead of linking to a web page it could have added events later to the game, that show the bad side of the sides the player doesn't agree with.

The packing scene could have been much better with more realistic designs. Clothes are heavy and so are most important items. limiting the player to weight and then later making them use the items they packed, would have made them consider things more. The 2 item limit was just dumb.

The escape scene that makes you choose between family, friend and neighbours was silly. The player was under the impression that they where escaping alone, now there is these people they don't know but should care for because of some kind of classification.

Studies show that when a person is forced to choose people to sacrifice, most people would select them self.

There is so much more in the game that just breaks the game play, but mostly it's the player choices not mattering.

I must have done something wrong that I didn't get past the questionnaires in that so-called game. I saw some blood drippings based on my answers, and the questions just looped back. So, meh, I did not get any game out of this "game". It felt like a questionnaire inside a questionnaire.

Edit: Here's my thought on the whole persuasive games. I think the questions in the game is too close to real life. When people play games, they do it for fun, not to think morally or ethically. So how do you persuade players with games? Create your own fictional universe of which a particular event is happening, and you make choices in that universe. You don't ask questions like "What do you think of refugees?". You put the players among the refugees, create missions around that situation, and let them write their own story.

It's like educational games cannot be about education, but it has to have its own world but adopting real-life knowledge/metrics/history to make it easier for people to remember. Games like AoE taught a lot of history to so many people, but it doesn't ask the players about "What year did Julius Caesar die? [multiple choice]".

You can't ask players what's "5+3=?" and put a timer with a pretty music and animation. That's not a game. That's a math software. You instead create a trading game in which players have to specify how much they are buying at what cost minus the discount. The act of trading in the game will teach them math.

On 11/21/2017 at 3:46 AM, Scouting Ninja said:

It is like telling someone that killing is wrong, then you go and kill one of there family members to make a point.

That point is brilliant. 

Your feedback is amazing and personally I do agree with a lot that you said. 
The whole point why I am doing my essay on this topic is to see/explain what not to do with persuasive games x) 

Thank you

 

If the goal is to persuade someone with a game then the optimal way to do that is to make a good game. Above and beyond all else that means making an experience that is engaging through fun, exciting, and/or interesting mechanics. It's also what makes games such effective teaching platforms: the lessons learned while playing are reinforced by the biochemistry and feelings resulting from enjoying one's self.

To persuade someone that is playing a game is just a matter of rewarding them for following a specific mode of thought. A bit like a Pavlovian experiment, rewarding a player with the best progression or outcome for choices that align with your chosen mode of thought will make them start to regard that way of thinking as the 'right' one. Note that it is not necessary to negatively impact a player's progression in the game from incorrect answers. Most gamers understand opportunity cost, at least intuitively, so simply making the best reward the outcome for desired choices can be sufficient while still making the game fun to play.

Also, I should point out that being deceptive or manipulative tends to backfire spectacularly, especially if your target audience is even a little bit clever, intelligent, or educated. To be truly persuasive it's best to let people come to their own conclusions in a believable setting (or one where they can successfully suspend their disbelief) by making their own choices with meaningful consequences. One of the most impressive examples I've seen of this is a game in development called ECO (http://www.strangeloopgames.com/eco/).