[MUD-Dev] DGN: Reasons for play [was: Emergent Behaviors spawnedfrom...]

[Richard A. Bartle]

On 29 July 2005, Paolo Piselli wrote:

> Why are we still arguing Bartle's Types when Nick Yee is doing
> such wonderful empirical research?

Because there's no theory behind Nick Yee's work. What use is it
knowing that people do this or do that if you don't know WHY they do
this or do that?

To be fair, Nick doesn't claim he has a theory. He presents his work
so that others may use it to create theories.

Personally, I don't think Nick's results do invalidate mine; I see
them as supporting it.

> Your statement is contrary to the evidence: "Achieving and
> Competing: While Bartle proposed that Achievers and Griefers were
> separate Types, they are in fact fairly correlated with each
> other.

If you want to change the definition of "achievers" and "griefers",
yes. Also, if you want to use the 1995 4-type model rather than the
2003 8-type model, maybe.

Just think for a moment what this result is actually saying. It's
saying that most people who are achievers are also griefers. Now in
your experience in playing these games, can you honestly say that
most people you've met who are achievers are also griefers? If this
were indeed the case, why would anyone ever make a distinction
between grief play and achievement play? I didn't invent the term
"grief play", the players did, yet how many of them regard "griefer"
as a synonym of "achiever"?  Given the reported correlation, though,
griefers and achievers should be one and the same thing.

> On limitations of Bartle's model:

This is in part a misunderstanding of the model. My model does not
say that you can't like pizza if you like ice cream; what my model
says is that if you're going for pizza, you might stop on the way
and have an ice cream, but you're still going for pizza. People have
an underlying reason for playing, but they're transitioning. If
you're a (planner sub-type) achiever, then prior to that you were
either a (scientist sub-type) explorer or a (socialiser sub-type)
networker, and following it you'll be a (hacker sub-type) explorer
or a (friend sub-type) socialiser. As you're becoming an achiever,
you'll still be doing a lot of exploring, and when you've become one
you'll start doing some socialising. Eventually, your motivation
will change to that associated with the class that follows.

> Nick's work should pretty much be considered required reading for
> discussions of player motivations.

I agree, but if you're going to cite it I want to see what you're
going to use it for. How do you use it, as it stands, to help you
design better virtual worlds?

Some general problems with Nick's approach (which Nick acknowledges,
but some of those who follow his work seem blind to):

  - The motivations suggested are implicit in the questions.

  - Brainstorming motivations from correlations is as subjective as
  brainstorming player types from interviews.

  - There's no guarantee that there are 5 facets, just that there
  are at least 5 facets.

  - There's no guarantee that the facets are at the same degree of
  abstraction. It could be like "penguin, eagle, vulture, mammal".

  - The labelling of the facets isn't provided by the factor
  analysis.

  - Some facets overlap but some don't. Leadership could be an
  expression of an achievement, grief or relationship facet, but it
  couldn't be an expression of the immersion facet - that's
  completely orthogonal.

My own theory isn't perfect. For example, it doesn't yet say what
happens when people break off from the development path they're
following.  Also, it's limited: it only accounts for people who are
playing the game, not those who are researching it or farming it or
managing it or think it's a different kind of game altogether. It
also assumes it's a game.  I look forward to the day that someone
comes up with a better theory.  Nick Yee's research may form the
basis for that theory, but they show correlations, not
causality. When someone comes up with some causality, THEN you can
argue that we have a competing theory to my player types one.

Nick and I have discussed the differences between our approaches
many times. The only real sticking point is that Nick tends towards
feeling that the evidence he has collected does not support my
player types theory, whereas I tend towards thinking it does.

For a fairly recent and fairly detailed discussion, see
http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2005/03/daedalus_projec.html .


Richard
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