(Baby, you can be my) Motivation
As game studies is a fairly young field, there are few, if any, established theories that model why people play games. Such a framework of ‘gamer motivation’ may also address why people choose to play a particular game over another, or why men and women might choose to play different games based on gendered lines. Many researchers design their own model of gamer motivation by adapting existing sociological models of use and gratification.
In the study entitled The Sims2, the researchers came up with six areas that they felt strongly influenced or drove gamers to play the game.
- Fantasy/Escapism – the desire to involve oneself in a world where things that are normally impossible in the real world are possibly experienced by the player.
- Control – the ability to have an inordinate amount of control over the experience of the world and, in the case of the Sims in particular, the life of your sims.
- Challenge – the oppurtunity to tackle and overcome challenges within the game world.
- Diversion – playing games as an act of pure distraction or diversion, to kill time, relax, forget your life.
- Enjoyment – a straightforward source of pleasure or enjoyment.
- Social Interaction – playing the game as a engine for interacting with other members of the community.
Playing The Sims2: an exploration of gender differences in players’s motivations and patterns of play. Jeroen Jansz, Corinne Avis and Mirjam Vosmeer