Meaningful Play: Getting Gamification Right

Foursquare, GetGlue, Nike+, Badgeville: more and more “gamified” applications and gamification vendors hand out points and badges, promising anything from increased engagement and retention to plain mind control. Some see adding game elements to non-game applications as a new decade of design. Others criticise current implementations as shallow “pointsification” and the overselling of a new digital snake oil.

In this 2011 Google Tech Talk, Sebastian Deterding, a researcher and designer working on persuasive, playful and gameful design, asks what lessons games really offer user experience design, which criticisms are valid, and what designers can do to steer clear of the worst pitfalls.

He gives an overview of the gamification movement, its most troubling blind spots and the motivational powers of games, and explains how to design for a playful experience that is truly meaningful to its users. Patterns such as achievements, appropriate challenge and autonomy show the game elements involved and the motivation behind them.