Towards Balancing Fun and Exertion in Exergames
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Towards Balancing Fun and Exertion in Exergames Exploring the Impact of Movement-Based Controller Devices, Exercise Concepts, Game Adaptivity and Player Modes on Player Experience and Training Intensity in Different Exergame Settings Zur Erlangung des Grades eines Doktors der Naturwissenschaften (Dr. rer. nat.) genehmigte Dissertation von Anna Lisa Martin-Niedecken (geb. Martin) aus Hadamar Tag der Einreichung: 05.11.2020, Tag der Prüfung: 11.02.2021 1. Gutachten: Prof. Dr. rer. medic. Josef Wiemeyer 2. Gutachten: Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Frank Hänsel Darmstadt – D 17 Department of Human Sciences Institute of Sport Science Towards Balancing Fun and Exertion in Exergames: Exploring the Impact of Movement-Based Controller Devices, Exercise Concepts, Game Adaptivity and Player Modes on Player Experience and Training Intensity in Different Exergame Settings Zur Erlangung des Grades eines Doktors der Naturwissenschaften (Dr. rer. nat.) genehmigte Dissertation von Anna Lisa Martin-Niedecken (geb. Martin) aus Hadamar am Fachbereich Humanwissenschaften der Technischen Universität Darmstadt 1. Gutachten: Prof. Dr. rer. medic. Josef Wiemeyer 2. Gutachten: Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Frank Hänsel Tag der Einreichung: 05.11.2020 Tag der Prüfung: 11.02.2021 Darmstadt, Technische Universität Darmstadt Darmstadt — D 17 Bitte zitieren Sie dieses Dokument als: URN: urn:nbn:de:tuda-tuprints-141864 URL: https://tuprints.ulb.tu-darmstadt.de/id/eprint/14186 Dieses Dokument wird bereitgestellt von tuprints, E-Publishing-Service der TU Darmstadt http://tuprints.ulb.tu-darmstadt.de [email protected] Jahr der Veröffentlichung der Dissertation auf TUprints: 2021 Die Veröffentlichung steht unter folgender Creative Commons Lizenz: Namensnennung – Share Alike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) Attribution – Share Alike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Erklärungen laut Promotionsordnung §8 Abs. 1 lit. c PromO Ich versichere hiermit, dass die elektronische Version meiner Dissertation mit der schriftlichen Version übereinstimmt. §8 Abs. 1 lit. d PromO Ich versichere hiermit, dass zu einem vorherigen Zeitpunkt noch keine Promotion versucht wurde. §9 Abs. 1 PromO Ich versichere hiermit, dass die vorliegende Dissertation selbstständig und nur unter Verwendung der angegebenen Quellen verfasst wurde. §9 Abs. 2 PromO Die Arbeit hat bisher noch nicht zu Prüfungszwecken gedient. Darmstadt, den 05. November 2020 __________________________ Anna Lisa Martin-Niedecken Abstract Physical inactivity remains one of the biggest societal challenges of the 21st century. The gaming industry and the fitness sector have responded to this alarming fact by introducing game-based or gamified training scenarios and thus established the promising trend of exergaming. Exergames – games controlled by active (whole) body movements – have been extolled as potential attractive and effective training tools. However, the majority of the exergames do not meet the required intensity or effectiveness, nor do they induce the intended training adherence or long-term motivation. One reason for this is that the evaluated exergames were often not co-designed with the user group to meet their specific needs and preferences, nor were they co-designed with an interdisciplinary expert team of game designers (to ensure a good gaming experience) and sports scientists (for a great training experience). Accordingly, the research results from studies with these exergames are rather limited. To fully exploit the potential of these innovative movement tools and to establish them as attractive and effective training approach, it is necessary to understand and explore both the underlying interdisciplinary theories and concepts as well as possible design approaches and their impact on the game and training experience. This dissertation aims to contribute to a better understanding of well-balanced exergame design. It explores and evaluates how different movement-based control devices, exercise concepts, game adaptations, and player modes influence the attractiveness and effectiveness of exergames. The work provides theoretical and practical contributions to the problem area of effective and attractive exergames. For this purpose, a research and development (R&D) approach with iterative phases was followed (Figure 1). Figure 1: R&D process of the dissertation with iterative phases: Based on theoretical findings, an interdisciplinary framework model was developed in preliminary work. The findings from the first study phases were then transferred into explorative exergame designs, which in turn served to further investigate various parameters. The results provided indications for the further development and research of the exergames and the interdisciplinary framework model. As preliminary work for the contributions of this dissertation, exergames were approached from a theoretical perspective. Underlying multidisciplinary theories and concepts of exergames from relevant fields were analyzed and a generic framework was built, which structured the findings based on three interdependent dimensions: the player, the game controller, and the virtual game scenario. Some commercially available exergames were explored to verify the theory-based assumption that the interposition of technology brings specific transformations in the coupling of perception and action that do not occur in real sports situations. Among other things, the comparative pilot study showed that two different controllers (one gesture-based and one haptic device), which allowed for different physical i input, were likely to induce diverse gameplay experiences (e.g., higher feeling of flow and self-location when playing with the haptic device) with differently skilled players. However, certain design-specific differences in the two exergame conditions meant that these results could only be interpreted as a first trend. To overcome the limitations of this preliminary study approach (e.g., unequal game design of the commercial exergames and very sports-specific movement concept), Plunder Planet, an adaptive exergame environment, was iteratively designed with and for children and allowed for a single- and cooperative multiplayer experience with two different controller devices. The user-centered design was further informed by insights from the growing body of related R&D work in the field of exergames. The first study presented in this dissertation compared the subjectively experienced attractiveness and effectiveness of Plunder Planet when played with different motion-based controllers. Besides a generally great acceptance of the exergame, it was found that the haptic full-body motion controller provided physical guidance and a more cognitively and coordinatively challenging workout, which was more highly rated by experienced gamers with fewer athletic skills. The gesture-based Kinect sensor felt more natural, allowed more freedom of movement, and provided a rather physically intense but cognitively less challenging workout, which was more highly rated by athletic players with less gameplay experience. Furthermore, experiments were made with an exploratory adaptive algorithm that enabled the cognitive and the physical challenge of the exergame to be manually adapted in real-time based on the player’s fitness and gaming skills. The first and the second study also compared an adaptive with a non-adaptive single player version of Plunder Planet. It could be shown that the (well-balanced) adaptive version of the exergame was better valued than the non-adaptive version with regard to the experienced and measured attractiveness (motivation, game flow, spatial presence experience, balance of cognitive and physical challenge) and effectiveness (heart rate, physical exertion, balance of cognitive and physical challenge) by differently skilled players. Finally, and contrary to the findings from related work, the results of the third study proved that the specifically designed controller technology could be used as an “enabler”, “supporter” and “shaper” of bodily interplay in social exergaming. Based on these promising findings, the goal became to further explore the effectiveness of exergames, refine the adaptive game difficulty algorithm, and explore further attractiveness- and motivation- boosting design approaches. Therefore, the ExerCube, a physically immersive and adaptive fitness game setting, was developed. It was iteratively designed with and for adults and allowed for cooperatively and competitive exergame experiences. With its physically immersive game setup, the ExerCube combines a mixed version of the advantages of both previously tested controllers. A coordinatively and cognitively challenging functional workout protocol with scalable intensity (moderate to high) was developed and the subjective experience of the ExerCube training was compared with a conventional functional training with a personal trainer. The fourth study showed that the game-based training gave signs of reaching a similar intensity to the personal training, but was more highly rated for flow, motivation, and enjoyment. Based on this exploratory comparison of the ExerCube with a personal trainer session, valuable avenues for further design could be identified. Among other things, it could be proved that the player’s focus during the ExerCube session was more on the game than on the own body. Players experienced stronger physical exertion and social pressure with the personal trainer and a stronger cognitive exertion and involvement with