Addiction

gamestudent

I've recently noticed that people seem to assume that because their game is hard it must be addicting. I doubt thats true, although I could be wrong. However, I wanted to know what you guys think goes into making an addicting game. Is it something to do with the way points are scored? Or what. Thanks guys.

tatiang

What do you think makes an addicting game? What are some of your favorite games and why do you continue to play them repeatedly?

Lovejoy

Everyones opinion is going to be different. Me for example, stupid hard games like flappy or swing copters don't appeal to me, they get deleted right away.

Socks

Agreed, there are a lot of difficult games masquerading as addictive when they are simply hard to get anywhere with. Difficulty is good when it's combined with a great game and where the effort overcoming the difficulty is rewarding, but a lot of games just throw difficulty into the mix for little reason other that to be 'addicting'. I blame Flappy Bird.

But I am much more troubled by US speaker's use of 'addicting' ! It's use always looks wrong, over here in the UK we say 'addictive' (it's an adjective !), I knew we shouldn't have let you lot use our language, couldn't you have used Spanish or something ?

yattamove

What makes flappy bird addicting is the social media connected to it. If nobody is beating other people's scores, you wouldn't mind playing it the second time. You just tell yourself, f it! Delete, delete...

jamie_c

@Socks said:
I knew we shouldn't have let you lot use our language, couldn't you have used Spanish or something ?

Let us use it?! We took it by force!

*And then hacked the crap out of it....

pHghost

@raycur09 said:
Me for example, stupid hard games like flappy or swing copters don't appeal to me, they get deleted right away.

As @yattamove‌ says, social media plays a big part. The main reason that Flappy Bird took off was people challenging each other.

@Socks said:
Agreed, there are a lot of difficult games masquerading as addictive when they are simply hard to get anywhere with. Difficulty is good when it's combined with a great game and where the effort overcoming the difficulty is rewarding, but a lot of games just throw difficulty into the mix for little reason other that to be 'addicting'. I blame Flappy Bird.

An addictive game is more challenging rather than just hard. The difference is that challenging means you can master them (with a lot of effort), whereas hard is just annoying, usually.

A great example of challenging for me is VVVVVV. Flappy Bird is more on the side of annoying, though granted, it also has a learning curve and you can get better at it.

gamestudent

ok, thanks guys. Oh and socks, In america people speak many languages including spanish and french and ASL(which makes sence right?);)

ADSentertainment

Games that promote creativity are almost always addicting. How do you think games like Minecraft became such a huge success that people still play it for hours to this day.

RP

Rewarding effort and an engaging experience. Difficulty alone does not make a game addictive. A current example is something like Destiny. It CAN be hard if you choose that route, but that is not what makes it fun or addictive.

Bionic Commando (NES) is difficult, but being difficult is not longer an issue as it tough gamers how to "game" better and once you got it down, it was rewarding as heck.