In this article, the authors engineered an experiment to see how a storyline in a first-person shooter video affected the players’ experiences in comparison to players’ experiences when there is no storyline involved. During the experiment, participants played 4 total games, two that included a storyline (Outlaws and Half-Life) and then two that did not include or have minimal storylines (Doom 2 and Quake 2). After finishing eight minutes of each game, the participants answered specific questions and completed a nonverbal assessment related to the completed game before continuing to the next specified game. This experiment was conducted through observations and participant responses to test the author's’ theory that players experiences while
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Although not much research has been done while searching for a relationship between identification and video game characters, the authors state that previous research has been done towards the topic of child development and identification with heroes in books. This research has concluded that when children connect themselves with the protagonist of a story, they mentally feel the hero’s success and discovered how behaving in a positive manner is rewarded. One of the goals that game designers have and the authors test through the experiment is emotional response from video games. The authors articulate that emotion consists of two components: hedonic valence, including a spectrum of very positive to very negative, and arousal, including calm, relaxed, excited and more. According to previous research on emotion, it is more of a collection of personal feedback rather than just one response. This allows researchers to observe and record emotional responses in different …show more content…
As predicted by the authors, participants confirmed higher identification as well as presence with the characters and goals when a storyline had been evident in a game. Also, the authors observed higher subconscious responses and pleasure when the participants played games with a storyline . However, when measuring whether participants emotional response changed between the games, the participants reported no significant difference in emotional arousal from the storyline games, although emotional valence showed a significant increase during storyline based video games. When this is compared to the subconscious responses, the authors conclude that even though participants did not verbally report more emotional arousal during storyline games, their body gestures showed enjoyment and emotional arousal. These results can allude to the original theory of a storyline in a video game will cause greater consequences towards a person’s experience while playing video games. Also, the results allow the authors to conclude that in storyline based violent video games, the violence may be perceived as justified, which could be a potential reason for adolescents to become
Although not much research has been done while searching for a relationship between identification and video game characters, the authors state that previous research has been done towards the topic of child development and identification with heroes in books. This research has concluded that when children connect themselves with the protagonist of a story, they mentally feel the hero’s success and discovered how behaving in a positive manner is rewarded. One of the goals that game designers have and the authors test through the experiment is emotional response from video games. The authors articulate that emotion consists of two components: hedonic valence, including a spectrum of very positive to very negative, and arousal, including calm, relaxed, excited and more. According to previous research on emotion, it is more of a collection of personal feedback rather than just one response. This allows researchers to observe and record emotional responses in different …show more content…
As predicted by the authors, participants confirmed higher identification as well as presence with the characters and goals when a storyline had been evident in a game. Also, the authors observed higher subconscious responses and pleasure when the participants played games with a storyline . However, when measuring whether participants emotional response changed between the games, the participants reported no significant difference in emotional arousal from the storyline games, although emotional valence showed a significant increase during storyline based video games. When this is compared to the subconscious responses, the authors conclude that even though participants did not verbally report more emotional arousal during storyline games, their body gestures showed enjoyment and emotional arousal. These results can allude to the original theory of a storyline in a video game will cause greater consequences towards a person’s experience while playing video games. Also, the results allow the authors to conclude that in storyline based violent video games, the violence may be perceived as justified, which could be a potential reason for adolescents to become