An Exploration of Dissonant Player Experiences
Atmosphere & Challenge An Exploration of Dissonant Player Experiences by Giovanni Ribeiro A thesis presented to the University of Waterloo in fulfillment of the thesis requirement for the degree of Master of Applied Science in Systems Design Engineering Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, 2019 © Giovanni Ribeiro 2019 AUTHOR’S DECLARATION This thesis consists of material all of which I authored or co-authored: see Statement of Contributions included in the thesis. This is a true copy of the thesis, including any required final revisions, as accepted by my examiners. I understand that my thesis may be made electronically available to the public. ii STATEMENT OF CONTRIBUTIONS This thesis consists of two papers that were co-authored by myself, my supervisor, Dr. Lennart Nacke, and three others: Towards a Physiological Profile of Rage Quitting By: Giovanni Ribeiro, Rina Wehbe, and Lennart E. Nacke Atmosphere: The Effect of Thematic Audio Fit on Player Experience By: Giovanni Ribeiro, Katja Rogers, Thomas Terkildsen, and Lennart E. Nacke Dr. Nacke, Rina Wehbe, Katja Rogers, and Thomas Terkildsen provided research guidance, advice, and proofreading. Ms. Rogers and Ms. Wehbe were invaluable in the experimental design and research ideation process of their respective projects and Mr. Terkildsen contributed to the evaluation and statistical analysis of physiological data. Surya Banerjee (Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science) helped me decide what the most appropriate statistical tests to run were. iii ABSTRACT Dissonance means an unusual combination of any two things. Two dissonant experiences in video games which could lead to undesirable player states are thematic dissonance and difficulty dissonance. Thematic dissonance potentially annoys players by breaking the atmosphere, and difficulty dissonance by preventing players with low skill from progressing past unbalanced challenges, resulting in rage-quits.
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