Tools To Adjust Tension And Suspense In Strategy Games: An Investigation

Tools To Adjust Tension And Suspense In Strategy Games: An Investigation

Tools To Adjust Tension And Suspense In Strategy Games: An Investigation

By Daniel Gomme and Richard Bartle

Abstract

“This paper investigates the concept of tension —players feeling suspense while trying to achieve an opposed objective — in two parts: validating the relationships between its components, and exploring in-game events that elicit changes in tension and perceived power. Participants play through strategy game scenario with objectives designed to tweak tension's components: investment, perceived player power, perceived opponent power, and uncertainty. A questionnaire then measures tension and its components for each objective, and asks players for events that changed their perceptions of power and of tension. We find that the relationships between tension’s components match theory, with the exception of investment, which needs further investigation. By using thematic analysis on players’ experiences of power-changing and tension-changing events, we find that controlling information and resources that players have appears to be effective in manipulating tension indirectly, with fog-of-war being a potent tool to achieve this. We also find that providing windows of opportunity to players with no hope can either result in high tension or fall flat.”

Reference

Gomme, D., & Bartle, R. (2022). (PDF) tools to adjust tension and suspense in ... - researchgate.net. Retrieved July 26, 2022, from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/361720976_Tools_To_Adjust_Tension_And_Suspense_In_Strategy_Games_An_Investigation

Keyword

Player experience, tension, uncertainty, opponents, games, suspense, research