5 Ways Video Games are Turning You Into an Addict

[Sforza]

1. Virtual Skinner Box theory (Conditioned Stimulus)

This is a big source of controversy in the world of game design right now. Braid creator Jonathan Blow said Skinnerian game mechanics are a form of "exploitation." It's not that these games can't be fun. But they're designed to keep gamers subscribing during the periods when it's not fun, locking them into a repetitive slog using Skinner's manipulative system of carefully scheduled rewards.

2. Creating virtual pellets for you to eat

Of course, virtually every game of the last 25 years has included items you can collect in the course of defeating the game--there's nothing new or evil about that. But because gamers regard in-game items as real and valuable on their own, addiction-based games send you running around endlessly collecting them even if they have nothing to do with the game's objective.

It is very much intentional on the developers' part, an appeal to our natural hoarding and gathering instincts, collecting for the sake of collecting

3. Making You Press the Lever

Basically, conditioning the gamer to get rewards by doing certain actions, but making rewards drop randomly

...The list goes on. Check it out here:

http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-c...ed_p1.html

Thoughts?

Edit: Favorite quote from the article.

Why do so many of us have that void? Because according to everything expert Malcolm Gladwell,
to be satisfied with your job you need three things, and I bet most of you don't even have two of them:

Autonomy (that is, you have some say in what you do day to day);

Complexity (so it's not mind-numbing repetition);

Connection Between Effort and Reward (i.e. you actually see the awesome results of your hard work

[Shintetsu]

These rules are very evident in ORPGs.

It took me over a year to stop playing Grand Chase, for example. btw GC is a fine example of all five rules, I think. I think HayWire should agree.

[clonezero]

creepy but way to true the best way to go about is be aware about this and simply set limits. The problem lies in the awareness bit XP.

[Sforza]

The weird thing is that a lot of people are very happily addicted, so they have no reason to stop o.o

[Serene]

The weird thing is that a lot of people are very happily addicted, so they have no reason to stop o.o

They have a reason to stop, but they overlook it because they're happy.
If the stop, they gain more time doing whats more worth than just time eating games.

[clonezero]

in other words oblivious bliss XD