What is the Player Journey?
What is the Player Journey?
What is the Player Journey?
We don’t often think about the journey we take when playing games. We often get lost in playing the game itself. We become enamored with exploring the world; connecting with others; completing quests; engaging; and having a good time.
But the player journey is an important process to understand. Especially when examining games in the realm of teaching, training, learning, and development.
This article will explore the player journey. It’ll start by defining this term and outline reasons for its importance. The player experience is an important aspect of the player journey. Therefore, it’ll be examined in depth as it relates to individual motivations and how they affect both goals and achievements during the player journey.
Feedback is always an important element for any game. Therefore, feedback will be discussed as it relates to the progression of players in the player journey. Socializing elements are also important and will be reviewed and how they relate to the different phases of the player journey.
These phases will be discussed in depth and include a cross section of different elements such as discovery, onboarding, scaffolding, play, endgame, and post-game. Each phase requires its own unique understanding of the needs of players and how they progress in the overall journey.
Finally, this article will close on actionable tips for designing the player journey. This will focus on how it supports the agency and application of effort by individuals. This embodies the most important considerations for incorporating aspects of the player journey into games-based learning.
Defining the Player Journey
What exactly do we mean when we discuss the term “player journey?” In short, the player journey refers to the overall experience, actions, and progression a player encounters through a game. These include various stages and interactions that they may have with the game and other players.
The player journey is wholly part of the player’s experience with the game that encompasses their specific actions and interactions. Likewise, there are also parallels to learning in the player journey. That lies with the learner’s journey and its relation to the holistic experience of an individual as they progress through various stages and changes of learning and development.
Specifically, the learning journey encompasses the time invested by learners to incorporate various methods and platforms created by instructional designers, educators, instructors, and facilitators to achieve specific objectives. This is related to the player’s journey as its structure accounts for the grand aspirations of the thematic demonstration of the game and its related narratives.
In turn, this is related to the learner’s journey in their progression to support their own master and learning through the development of skills and competencies. This can take place through traditional and orthodox forms of education and instruction or can more progressively be accomplished through serious games and games-based learning.
Both the player’s journey and the learner’s journey are related to the narrative focus of the “hero’s journey” as it emulates some stages such as the call to adventure, the crossing of threshold, and the return with newfound skills. This can most accurately be seen in both games and learning where players progress through both levels and stages creating a sense of achievement and motivation to continue to play and learn.
Moreover, we can also interpret the player journey to mean the overall experience that players and learners witness when playing a game. The consummate understanding of which is important for designing and supporting the learner’s journey. This results in a more holistic application and connection of game mechanics to learning outcomes in serious game design.
Why is the Player Journey Important?
The player journey is important and addresses concerns from many different stakeholders. This includes game designers and developers as well as the players themselves, educators, instructors and facilitators in games-based learning.
From a commercial perspective, the player journey is important because it provides both game developers and publishers a means of tracking player behavior through various digital and online games. From an educational standpoint, the player journey takes on significance through various learning pathways. These pathways can serve in tandem with the player journey in games-based learning as a means to shape, curate, and guide the learning and play process.
Ideally, a combined learning and player journey engages individuals in continuous play and growth as well as maintaining structure and flexibility for how individuals can discover what to learn, how to learn, and how to best play towards their strengths. The benefits of viewing both the player journey and the learning journey in tandem with each other is that both honor the agency and navigation of individual players. In doing so, they can both bring structure to the engagement process. The results of which is the acceleration towards the achievement of competency and mastery of play and through effective and continuous feedback.
Both the player and learning journey also find applications and parallel comparisons to other “onboarding journeys” that individuals might encounter. A common one is the onboarding journey for new employees as new companies demonstrate and show both company culture and operations as well as facilitate behavioral changes in new employees that are aligned with business goals. The structure of which, mirrors the steps and stages that will be outlined in this article discussing the framework for the player journey.
Overall, the player’s journey is one that is best informed by the autonomy and agency of its players and learners. Therefore, most successful journeys will allow individuals the freedom and flexibility to pick and choose how and when they want to engage. This is done simultaneously in relation to the structured pathway and scaffolding set by game designers and educators respectively.
Player Experience in the Player Journey
The ability for individuals to exercise their will and agency in the game is a holistic part of honoring the player experience in the player journey. This is especially important for learners, because they demonstrate diverse behavioral patterns that could encompass dominant and self-centered roles to more collaborative ones and everything in between.
This is why it’s important to serve these diverse roles as well as institute consistent and repeatable mechanics for the player to adopt throughout play. This is especially important for gamers who may not be used to the platform, modality, or genre of game. These core mechanics and loops of gameplay can be further reinforced through fun, engagement, and activities that serve individuals’ needs.
Often this is described as “fun” in the play process and is a main driver for intrinsic motivation in game play. It’s the primary allure of games and why many players choose to play them. However, not all games deliver fun unilaterally. This is especially true with learning games or serious games. However, a purposeful design towards honoring player agency and autonomy as part of the player experience, helps facilitate this process.
This is why gamification can often be seen in learning programs, pathways, and learning management systems. Since gamification applies game-like elements in non-game settings, they can be used sparingly and surgically in areas of the learning journey where the promotion of motivation is most important. This can often be seen in how much time an individual player devotes to specific virtual games which may resemble actual work performed in business corporations.
However, no matter how the player’s experience is determined through the player journey, the tracking of progress remains a stable and critical aspect for judging play. One of the most common mechanics for tracking progress is simply for a type of percentage based reinforcement for linear progression in learning content. This can be most commonly observed through the user experience in either time or content % completion bars.
Some applications of both learning and game content combines both aspects in the development of character progression where leaners are represented by an avatar that grows, develops, and matures due to their own decisions and developments within the game.
Motivation in the Player Journey
Motivation is a key part of understanding the player experience. As such, it’s worth it to determine and understand what motivates player behavior.
The goal for motivating individuals in the learning and player journey is to appeal to intrinsic motivation. That means making the journey the actions, options, and outcomes more enjoyable and appealing to deeper desires. This enables individuals to explore, learn, and master skills voluntarily.
Knowing what these intrinsic motivations are helps to create player journeys that appeal to diverse users and player profiles. While you may not be aware of all of the varieties and experiences of individuals players, knowing what motivates them to play, learn, and engage helps to create a pathway for their progression.
This is why intrinsic motivation is important to promote in the learning journey. Doing so reinforces individuals innate skills and abilities and motivates them to explore different learning experiences. This is often why gamification is turned to first in augmenting the learning experience. Gamification’s application of game-like elements in non-game settings focuses on these intrinsic motivating factors rather than complexity in adapting games for teaching and learning.
Therefore, when authoring a combined learner and player journey, it’s important to focus on intrinsic benefits to the individual. This can be supported through their own agency to access information, performance tools, and social interaction with other learners in similar states. The results of which are the creation of scaffolding for them to succeed in either a gaming environment, a learning environment, or both.
A significant part of motivation in both learning and player journeys is the need and desire to keep players engaged and motivated throughout their play. Doing so results in their continued experience and path along the journey.
Goals and Objectives in the Player Journey
Player motivation is often tied to in-game or learning elements. This is often observed in both goals and objectives in learning and gaming content. Goals can serve both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation simultaneously and are crucial for player engagement. Both can be seen in regularly scheduled activities such as daily tasks, assignments, or quests.
Often these goals in learning content can be hard to author in a personalized and authentic way as it requires a better understanding of individual learning styles and preferences. However, one could make overcoming obstacles in a learning or serious game part of the challenge and outcome of play.
Therefore, in order to create a coherent player journey; it helps to break down both goals and objectives into short-, medium-, and long-term varieties. Doing so scaffolds the player to address the challenges innate in each, and helps them reach and discover the next challenge having surmounted the previous ones.
This can also be reflected in progression systems in games where players are offered vertical or horizontal progression systems that either promote their own abilities and capacities as a player character or promote their advancement through the game. These varieties and density of different goals and objectives also help to address player boredom and provide multiple paths for growth.
Additionally, care should be taken to provide appropriately balanced rewards for achieving these goals and objectives as part of the player’s journey. Doing so offers significant, but also meaningful feedback, for play that advances individuals motivations and desires.
Feedback in the Player Journey
Both induvial player motivation as well as goals and objectives form a framework for the feedback loop for interaction during the player journey. The feedback loop is incredibly important for retaining engagement. Its main purpose is to provide insight and information on individuals’ performance in the game or achievement through learning.
Feedback received through the loop and can be interpreted in different ways depending on the use case and modality. Many people play games for the sense and feeling of feedback from play. This is often counter to traditional learning environments in which feedback for learners’ behaviors is not provided quickly or expediently. Therefore, overall engagement begins to wane.
The wanning of engagement can be exacerbated due to real and perceived risks by individuals and learners. If they feel that they have something to lose (whether that be face, time, or any other type of asset), then they are less likely to persist, which leads to gaps in practical knowledge for learners and lack of play for gamers.
Therefore, it is important that feedback be provided in the player journey regularly and consistently. This can occur in various formats. Examples in games have included mission hints, achievement hints, achievement messages, and level messages. These forms of feedback encourage players to pursue certain behaviors over others. This can be emulated in the learner’s journey by providing a curated selection of choices that honors their agency and provides specific bits of insight into a particular course of action should they chose to pursue it.
It’s important that these pieces of feedback be provided on a regular basis in order to reinforce that the entirety of the player or learner journey is based on a continuous process and not a one-time event. This communicates that the entire endeavor of play or learning is not an inconsequential activity; but one that is based on investment and process.
This progress is further emphasized when players are offered ways for them to start a new game or a new instance of a current game after a particular accomplishment. This is seen in traditional learning when new or relevant courses that are related to the one just completed are offered to individuals to continue their learning journey. This further emphasizes their growth and overall progression through their player journey.
Progression in the Player Journey
The player and learner journey are one that is fixed on aspects of growth and development for the player. But to accomplish that, they must first become competent in various areas of game play and learning. For games, this could include considering game specific rules; the internal economy; and the core loop of gameplay. For learners this could include aspects of assessment, evaluation, and a requirement for their own participation and engagement.
Both well designed games and learning have structured player and learning journeys which emphasize a satisfying and repeatable core loop or behavior that can be leveraged through practice into eventual mastery and progression. For learning pathways, this is often linked to what learners can do at the conclusion of the course or program that is often connected to new workplace competencies, vocations, or occupational offerings.
Therefore, for progression to become regular and relevant for players throughout the player journey, the core loop of gameplay should be engaging causing the minimal amount of frustration in order to maintain engagement. The successful accomplishment of which is connected to specific learner and player milestones which are earned by individuals after completing specific goals and objectives.
However, the means in which the core loop connects goals and achievements to player milestones is highly subjective. Designing a successful player and learner journey does this while also emphasizing a strong sense of place where the player is given agency to use their own speculative imagination to fill the gaps in between.
Holistically, this means designing and mapping a player and learner journey that acknowledges both positive and negative experiences for individuals and celebrates the former while examining the latter. Doing so ensures that enjoyment (or at least tolerance) is had from the experience while reflection and learning can be had from the more negative outcomes.
Those negative moments can be further examined by educators, instructors, and serious game designers by determining learners’ needs, experienced emotions, interactions, and influences that all had an impact and lead to that negative experience.
It’s perhaps even more critical to offer up an exemplar or example of what could be accomplished through successful achievement of the player journey. This could be had by demonstrating other individual success stories and how social connections between those success stories and the individual link them to that successful outcome.
Socializing the Player Journey
Some, but not all, games include some kind of socialization in the player’s journey. This can come through some kind of cooperative play with other players; competitive dynamics between players in online communities or gatherings which support and reinforce play with each other. The same can be said for learning journeys and education which can occur as an individual pursuit or through a communal process.
The aspect of building relationships with peers, mentors, and educators is often seen in traditional learning through collaborative projects and group activities. These are often cited as experiential ways of developing both communication and teamwork skills. Though, these methods are often adapted as one size fits all application of learning. More modern techniques addressing the learner’s journey often acknowledge the creation of learning communities that foster personalized pathways for learners.
This is often done in parallel and in relationship with games-based learning with cooperative games that emphasize the same level of teamwork and communication skills that are evident in communal or group projects. However, there are other methods and means of supporting the agency and individuality of learners throughout the learning journey.
The first can be addressed in socializing learners’ concerns. This can include the introduction of learners to a socialized learning system with other individuals experiencing the same thing. Otherwise, they can create a more intimate environment by pairing learners up with other individuals for dual learning relationships: like how lab partners are assigned for classes involving lab work.
This strategy is often the most fruitful when socialization is included in other aspects of the environment such as with organizational learning and operations which are often accomplished in similar veins to player journeys in commercial games. This comparison also requires that community development around both play and learning thrives through the development of fresh content through sharing achievements, difficulties, and challenges with one another to sustain continued interest.
Phases of the Player Journey
Socialization often occurs throughout the duration of the player and learner journey. However, the entire journey can be broken down into several distinct and different phases. These are informed by the player’s journey in gamification through (DOSE) which includes discovery, onboarding, scaffolding, and endgame.
These stages can also be expanded to include “mastery” which is a critical part of the learner’s journey. In games, this is often reflected where players become familiar with the game and tackle more complex challenges by accomplishing goals and objectives.
As a whole, individuals’ engagement encompasses a broader timeline of interaction known as the “emotional arc” of play that begins with the players and learners initial engagement and continues through their eventual resolution. In games, this is most often seen through narrative storytelling, music, and game mechanics and dynamics which evoke a range of emotions.
While this stage of the learner and player journey can adequately described; it often helps to create an active map when designing and structuring said journey. Mapping forms a visual recreation of an individual’s play and learning experience spanning from their discovery and introduction to post game and course activities.
This initial introduction phase includes stages addressing newcomers to the game and through habit-building and the core loop of play; turning them into regular engagers who will persist through the end of both game and learning mastery.
The whole purpose of actively mapping both the player and learner’s journey is to set appropriate expectations and predict progress for individuals while simultaneously staying focused on goals. The successful application of which, include seamless transitions between stages that enable players to refine their insights through their engagement as well as through iterative feedback.
Therefore, this article will address the different stages of the combined player and learner journey through the following phases: onboarding; scaffolding; play; endgame; and post-game.
Discovery Phase
Both the players and the learner’s journey begin with discovery. This is where the individual learns about the game, course, and content and then decides whether to play it or engage with it. Therefore, the discovery phase represents the initial exposure of the individuals. They have not yet made a solid commitment to the activity and are not sure of the amount of time and energy they are likely to invest in it.
This is both critical and relevant for games as they need to create and demonstrate a specific hook to continually engage players. Likewise, in learning content, the starting point of discovery means laying the foundation of the journey and addressing relevance between what insights are to be gained versus the cost of their time and attention.
This evaluation of learning content is usually focused on the transparency of goals, objectives, and outcomes. This is most likely disclosed in the learning objectives of the course, but can also take on the form of pre-activity assessments to determine the level of mastery and knowledge of prior skills and abilities.
Both games and learning have intersecting interests in this area as truly intrinsically motivating learning is based on curiosity of the individual to learn more. Likewise, applications of gamification in learning rely on aspects of both individual relatedness that speaks to intrinsic motivation, as well as social influence of peers and inspiring individuals whom the learner can emulate.
For games, this could include the introduction of “first” touchpoints in play which allows users to conduct meaningful impactful activities while also demonstrating core mechanics and competencies in games. This is often seen in mobile games which have to compete against other mobile games for time and attention of casual players. Therefore, they include introducing stages and activities which quickly engage the user while also demonstrating a core function of gameplay.
This approach can be adapted for the learning journey by applying game themes to the learning experience by representing the player as a navigator and packing and wrapping the entire experience in a narrative framework. Therefore, the journey is less of a traditional course and more of an experience for the learner to engage and thrive in. This wrapping is important for both learning and games as the discovery phase provides the opportunity for individuals to make the first, big, impactful choice: determining whether or not to play.
Onboarding Phase
The onboarding phase comes next and includes elements of the discovery phase but also takes the individual deeper through the process. This is where additional game mechanics, controls, and starting objectives are disclosed to players. These formative moments are critical as they set the tone for the rest of the experience.
Traditional learning environments can emulate this stage by providing learners with a sample of goals and expectations as well as how sessions and meetings will operate and occur on a regular basis.
Like the discovery phase, “hooks” represents moments of play and learning that are crucial for getting players to buy into the game and for learners to engage with the experience. Doing sure ensures that they’ll continue through the onboarding phase and learn the basic level competencies necessary for them to play and excel.
These hooks in turn can influence and connect to regularly scheduled goals and objectives. This is often seen in mobile game features such as daily tasks and login calendars that invest individuals on regular and recurring activities and engagement which help cement the learning and play process as part of regular routines.
These regular routines can be reinforced through the aspect of graphical progression tracker which emphasize intrinsic motivators on personal development, competency, and accomplishment to keep individuals engaged. In turn, this engagement is meant to gradually ramp up the investment and engagement of individuals so as to cultivate intrinsic motivation through the introduction of more complex and challenging activities through scaffolding .
Scaffolding Phase
As both players and learners advance through the player journey, they will encounter more challenging and difficult objectives and activities. This means that there needs to be scaffolding in place in order to surmount those challenges. This also requires connecting and guiding players and learners from outcomes of prior activities to their applications in new activities.
Ideally, these earlier activities should be done while building fundamental knowledge and skills through a mix of formats. Video games do this well by providing basic and rudimentary game mechanics that are exercised frequently in the core loop of game play and then incrementally increased in difficulty and application as the game progresses.
Scaffolding takes advantage of this core loop and process by facilitating rewards that reinforce player motivation. This accomplishment of a reward or “win-state” by players encourages them to return and keep playing. This is especially useful for learners as they can return to learning content to apply and exercise what they have learned to continue to refine their practice.
It is also useful for instructors to apply metacognitive activities to players on the learner’s journey by asking them reflective questions and providing tailored feedback on what they have accomplished so far and what challenges they are experiencing. Doing so helps them situate their current location in the player journey and where they intend to go next.
Scaffolding in traditional learning environments is often seen in the review of the course progress so far. Learners are tasked with focusing on summative assessments such as tests and projects and how they relate to course objectives. Scaffolding for both learners and players transitions along set milestones on their path towards the completion of those objectives.
Perhaps the most underrated element of scaffolding for both players and learners is the establishment of confidence. Confidence plays a critical role in self-determination theory of empowering both the agency and autonomy of individuals to pursue the goals and activities that they feel reasonably equipped to achieve.
The effect of this confidence is that players stop requiring the “crutch” of tutorials and can instead focus on to the next phase of the learning journey which is a level full of play and application of knowledge.
Play Phase
Play is a common element for games; but is not so common for learning. However, “play” embodied in learning is the apogee of agency and autonomy for learners. It’s through play where players interact with mechanics of games; progress along the player journey; and face challenges and objectives along the way.
While play does exist as separate phases of the player journey, it encroaches on other areas of the player experience as they are onboarded and begin playing a new game.
In early gameplay, players are involved in the first few levels or mission of the game. They are often getting used to the game and are applying their game literacy to decipher and determine how this game plays like other games of the same type or genre.
In mid-game play, players encounter the different kinds and types of scaffolding discussed in the previous phase. This is where added complexity of challenge, and puzzles may take place. Players may face tougher enemies or other player-characters as they progress through the game. Learners may encounter different questions or applications of past knowledge that they had not encountered before.
In all of stages of play, individuals are empowered to make meaningful choices that affect the direction of the game. Likewise, learners can also use that agency to determine how the learning content they consume will change, influence, and affect them. Some may only localize it to a single unit or course; whereas others could see the connection between this content and other applications they may encounter later.
All this activity and play reaches a climax which is the peak of excitement, challenge, narrative, and experience in the “flow state” of game play. It is often the most intense moment of gameplay; learning; or insight and signifies the turning point in the game that greatly impacts the engagement and investment of players.
While engagement after the high point of play may be difficult; it is often important to emphasize this as the transition into the endgame phase. This transition requires a careful balance of engagement and rewards to keep individuals motivated and invested through a reflection period.
Endgame Phase
The play phase ends with the transition into the endgame. The endgame can be a combination of late game play as well as wrap-up and debriefing. Often, the end game phase is encountered through the climax and eventual resolution of the main objective through play. This is when players have acquired earned skills and the knowledge to navigate them.
The endgame facilitates the transition from the play phase by providing a conclusion to the game’s content with other options to re-play; re-experience; or explore different areas. While not a case of either learning or games; streaming services like Netflix offer additional shows and content for individuals to watch that are like what they recently completed. This is an endgame feature of the consumer’s journey and incentivizing viewers to stay on the platform.
In learning journeys, the end game represents learners’ culmination of their educational efforts and a transition towards preparing and readying to onboard and mentor other learners in a socialized environment. Otherwise, they may choose to do this in addition to expanding their knowledge further in other courses to explore.
Maintaining a positive balance and remaining forward looking are crucial for the end game transition for individuals. This future orientation is meant to break free from past attachments from the game or course and look for other means for experience or application. This is most evident in traditional learning where individuals see the conclusion of a course, grade, or other discrete form of instruction as a stepping stone to the next experience in their educational journey.
While the endgame can be interesting as a natural resolution to learning and play; care must be taken to retain individuals through the final and last stages which are incredibly important for games-based learning. These include the post-game phase where a review of the play, activity, and experience is accomplished through structured debriefing and addresses metacognitive outcomes for learners.
Post-Game Phase
The post-game phase includes the end game and the formal conclusion of play for individuals. This is also a time that is ripe for self-reflection and evaluation of learning experiences. Such activities encourage and promote personal and academic achievement and overall applications of learning due to feedback.
Therefore, the post-game phase can often be interpreted as a consolidation phase where interaction with other peers and learners contribute to the community knowledge of the group in a socialized environment as well las their own created knowledge through experiential learning.
This is often broached through a time commitment to reflection and debriefing. These represent critical activities for the post-game phase where learners seek to develop their own understanding of the experience as well as application for their knowledge.
After the formal conclusions of these debriefings, traditional educational pathways guide students and learners towards completion. Traditionally this has taken the form of certificates, credentials, and degrees. However, most recent trends point towards badges and other forms of micro credentials.
Usually, these credentials form the steppingstones and building blocks for further professional development and academic pursuits focused on self-directed learning and further skill development. Overall, this represents a positive feedback cycle since learning represents a continuous process of examining one’s understanding and re-evaluating them in the wake of new evidence and experience.
Designing the Player’s Journey
The steps and actions taken by individuals through play and learning are not easy or simple to design and structure. However, doing both are critical to tailoring the player’s experience through both play and learning.
Modern digital games are testaments towards honoring the structure of the player journey in the face of diverse players; playstyles; and modalities. This has made it so that players with a high degree of game literacy will recognize one player’s journey as similar to the next when comparing games. Therefore, player journeys in games may no longer be considered unique.
However, what can be designed for each game and opportunity for learning is a means to augment and influence the emotional arc of play. This means starting with the backgrounds of individuals and creating a framework that addresses the kinds and varieties of emotional impacts the game can imbue on them.
A focus on individual engagement and involvement in the journey is often the concentration of learning design. A traditional outlook here, focuses on the linear pathway between when a learner starts the journey and the individual steps that they take along the way. However, this disregards learners’ agency and autonomy and does little to augment the growth of their insights and development of skills. Therefore, well-structured learning journeys should address both the cognitive as well as the emotional milestones of individuals.
This is best done by honoring individuals self-determination and the promotion of flow state through frequent and engaging play. Doing so makes the experience relevant from both an educational and play perspective. This is best done in concert with creating clear goals for players and organizing them through scaffolding where the success of one lead to the next.
Game designers can take this process to a more visual level through journey mapping which means visually representing the player’s experience and optimizing for their engagement through adjustments and changes in the user experience. Though, this process can also be used from an educational standpoint as understanding and empathizing with the learner’s perspective offers insights into how the journey can be improved.
While strictly linear learner journeys cannot always be avoided; a priority should be placed on activities that allow individuals to experientially apply knowledge they have learned through play. This is accomplished through both high impact learning as well as through play as it engages individuals regularly and thoroughly throughout their whole experience. This speaks directly to how their agency is honored throughout.
Agency and Application of the Player Journey
Individual participation is important. It is a critical element of any game and is required for impactful learning. When educators and learning designers want to give leaners a degree of agency, they often provide the means for them to choose their own personalized routes; activities; and assignments as a means of enabling this agency.
This is important: especially for adult learners and professional development as allowing them to set their own goals and manage their learning promotes their sense of self-determination in vocational learning.
However, this level of agency in the player journey is not always scalable depending on how learning is constructed and deployed. Therefore, one of the ways this can be addressed on an individual basis is through the manual design around pre-defined playstyles or experiences. This means, that certain games, content, goals, or objectives are selected for learners based on what they already know or are capable of achieving.
This can be seen in professional development and enablement where learners of a particular background, skillset, or efficacy are assigned advanced content based on what they can do and are competent at.
A more advanced method of achieving this same level of agency in a more formalized way, is through the empowerment of learners to build their own stories and means for evaluating their own outcomes. This is a concept explored with games-based learning through matrix games; but can be emulated as means of personalization and self-authoring their own learning journey.
Another option that is often found in commercial games is the means of randomization. This approach involves randomizing events (and often outcomes) as a way to engender engagement. However, this approach has limited appeal for long term engagement in applications other than commercial aspects and can disincentivize learners in games-based learning.
The Player Journey in Games-Based Learning
Games-based learning represents an opportunity for educators to use games as the medium for learning. As such, games-based learning transforms traditional education environments into interactive and engaging ones. Part of the success of the transformation is the design, scaffolding, and progress through the player journey. Doing so ensures that learners actively participate in the learning process.
Educators can play an active role in this process by empathizing with learners and their background, knowledge, skills, and abilities to create a more effective learning experience; thereby enabling long-term success. This usually occurs through a deliberative approach to using games-based learning and the player journey by scaffolding when and how players will interact with the game and learning content while also remaining flexible for changes along the way.
Therefore, knowing the different phase and stages of the learning journey aids the designer in creating more human-focused educational experiences as well as for educators to create learning experiences that honor player agency and autonomy. This is especially important in remote, digital, and distributed, learning environments for adult learners, as learning is not compressed into a single event – but rather supported over a period of time and through different modalities.
Therefore, the learner’s journey is paramount for both players and individuals alike in developing the skills necessary for them to excel in the game and to reach the objectives set by designers to meet their educational outcomes. These can be approached through different venues and strategies with applied games-based learning.
The first includes the participation in simulated real-world scenarios. Many educational programs already include these and include games like the stock market game as well as role-playing and table-top exercises. The use of these applications provides practical experiences for learners to engage in decision-making opportunities in a risk-free environment.
Educators who choose to use commercially available off-the-shelf games for teaching and learning can benefit by using only some or part of the game for learning. This adaptive approach to games-based learning makes it so that the educator is in control of the experience and the player journey. Thus, they can adapt parts of the game for content and for player skill level. This ensures a personalized learning experience that structures and scaffolds interaction and engagement for learners promoting a sense of earned accomplishment.
Games in general, also promote the acquisition and demonstration of specific skills through play. The platform itself enables players to acquire and hone skills necessary to excel in the game including problem-solving; critical thinking; teamwork; collaboration; tactical thinking; and strategic planning to name a few. The competencies of these skills are often critical to address and surmount various challenges within the game.
Finally, games-based learning address learning efficacy through the player journey through the pervasive retention and application of earned knowledge. The immersive nature of games makes it so that knowledge is not transferred didactically; but rather created experientially. This is accomplished through the application of knowledge through gameplay as well as through various contexts within the game.
Takeaways
This article explored the player’s journey as it relates to gamers and learners alike. The player’s journey was defined as well as why it’s important to consider for learning and play. The player’s experience was explored as it related to the player’s journey with specific aspects of individual motivation discussed.
Goals and objectives were covered as formal aspects of the player’s journey and how the approach and accomplishment of them provide a feedback loop for individuals to review. These feedback loops provide steps that allow individuals to progress along and through the player journey. This progression is often influenced by socializing aspects of both play as well as learning.
The different phases of the player journey were discussed as they related to learning, play, and applied aspects of gamification. They included the discovery phase where individuals are introduced to content; and onboarding where they learn the basic competencies and mechanics needed for intentional engagement.
Further advanced competencies were discussed as it related to the scaffolding phase which led into the play phase were individuals were given the agency and autonomy to pursue and engage according to their own motivations.
Eventually, the play phase ends and this transition players into the endgame phase of the player journey where the climax of play and the apogee of learning is reached through different challenges or summative assessments. This is not the end of the player journey though, as the post-game phase requires that players engage in active debriefing with themselves; peers; the content; and the instructor for maximum gains in learning and development.
Finally, this article closed on applicable approaches to designing the player journey for both play and learning as well as how agency and application of the player journey can be seen in various applied game approaches. The player journey was also examined as an integral part of games-based learning.
This article was about the player journey. To learn more about gamification, check out the free course on Gamification Explained.
Dave Eng, EdD
Principal
References
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Cite this Article
Eng, D. (2024, March 5). What is the Player Journey? Retrieved MONTH DATE, YEAR, from https://www.universityxp.com/blog/2024/3/5/what-is-the-player-journey
Internal Ref: UXPMY9R0MTXM