Jeremy Cameron

Emotional Affordances in Game Design: A Novel Approach to Design Methodology, Creating Moving, Emotively Engaging Player Experiences.

Emotion is a significant factor in video game design and can greatly influence a player's experience. However, the current understanding of how game designers can effectively utilize emotions to create moving and emotionally impactful gaming experiences is limited.

Jeremy’s research aims to fill this gap by providing new insights into the ways in which emotions can be used to engage players and create memorable and emotionally engaging experiences. By better understanding the impact of emotional affordances on player engagement and experience, game designers will be better equipped to craft games that have a deeper emotional impact on players. The research also seeks to contribute to the field by providing a deeper understanding of player interpretation and evaluation of emotional affordances (the ways an object or environment elicits emotional responses from an individual).

The study will adopt a mixed-methods approach, including a comprehensive literature review and the development of short "emotion-design" focused game experiences. The literature review will examine current understanding of how emotions can be effectively utilized in game design and their impact on player engagement. It will also explore the relationship between specific design elements, such as emotionally driven character performance, generative motion, interactive narrative, and aesthetics, and emotional affordances in game design. The game experiences will be used to gather player data on engagement and emotional response, which will be analysed using statistical techniques.

The research will result in a synthesis of findings that provides a comprehensive understanding of how game designers can create emotionally moving experiences and their impact on player engagement. It will also contribute to the understanding of the importance of emotionally moving experiences in video games and their ability to create a deeper level of engagement and emotional connection between the player and the game.

Supervisors

Areito Echevarria, School of Design Innovation

Hedwig Eisenbarth, School of Psychology

Academic Awards

2022 MBIE Grant for PhD Scholarship
Silver Award - New Zealand Design Awards for Black Channel.
NZIPP Silver award.
Top 100 played award, GGJ. Little Lost Gardener.