Ayogo

Accurate Countdown Timers

Technical Blog — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 07:17:14 +0000

Time is a critical component in many games. How long until your health returns? How long until your crops are ready to be harvested? How long until the next player’s turn in a turn-based game?
There are two main ways to do timers, depending on what you are trying to represent. If you are just trying [...]

Patterns, Game Design and Social Games

Social Game Design Blog — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 13:00:13 +0000

In my last post, I discussed the significance of combining in-game rewards with certain game mechanics–like achievement loops–and how this game design combination might have the ability to increase the motivation of players to do more things during gameplay. Based on our experiences with some of our previous games, especially Healthseeker, we think another way [...]

Summer Happenings: SXSW, Conferences and Gamasutra

Victoria — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 22:00:24 +0000

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we have many exciting news to tell you about. The first bit of news had to do with us going (hopefully) to SXSW. Our panel topic was selected for the community voting process and the voting opens tomorrow! Make sure to visit the SXSW Panelpicker to sign up so you can vote. In other news…

Michael just returned from San Antonio, Texas, where he was a guest speaker to a large number of mostly medical professionals at the annual conference for the American Association of Diabetes Educators. He spoke to a large audience about how social games can be used to help people habituate new healthy behaviours through gameplay. In particular, he spoke about Healthseeker, a game designed for people living with diabetes, and some of its key design features, such as how the game creates compulsion loops around reciprocal social obligation, gifting, collection, and achievement to motivate action. The idea that a game could shift a player’s concerns from big commitments over long periods of time for greatly deferred rewards to small actions in short periods of time for instant rewards was very appealing to those in the healthcare industry. We certainly think it’s a feature of social game design that could be much better understood.

Lastly, you can now find Michael’s social game design posts re-published on Gamasutra, our industry’s “go-to” site about the art of designing games. We are also beginning work on a feature article exclusively for the site that should be published later this month. As always, you can always email me at victoria [at] ayogo dot com if you have any questions or just leave a comment.

We Need Your Vote for SXSW

Victoria — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 18:14:52 +0000

Courtesy of Flickr's Theresa Thompson

Like us, you’re probably having a busy summer. Still, we really appreciate the fact that some of you have found time to leave comments, RT our tweets and suggest future blog post ideas for Michael’s social game design blog. Thanks for that! We’ve been working on a number of exciting new publishing and speaking projects, and we’re also working on developing new games, so I thought I would give you a little update.

We’ve received some great news from one of our favourite interactive and creative conferences, South By Southwest. They really liked our idea for a panel discussion we suggested on the topic of understanding how social games motivate behaviour, and how that power can be used for good. We’d love to have Michael speak on this topic with a number of other experts to add their insight, and we need your help to get the spot. SXSW uses a community voting system to select the participants, so the more votes we get the more likely the chances are of us presenting next March. The SXSW Panelpicker is officially open as of Wednesday, August 11th. (That’s tomorrow!) All you have to do is visit the Web site, http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/, sign in and vote.

Since there were more than 2800 different music, interactive and film panel proposals submitted this year, the competition is stiff. But we like to think that competition is just another form of validation and so we’re ready! Please vote for Michael’s panel called “Social Games: Manipulating Your Brain Chemistry, for Good” and/or RT this post to get others to also join in the voting process. We really appreciate it! More news in a bit, but until then, you can always email me at victoria [at] ayogo dot com if you have any questions or just leave a comment.

Rewards, Doing Chores and Social Games

Social Game Design Blog — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 13:00:48 +0000

From my previous posts, you know my enthusiasm for using social games to motivate activity and even teach new skills. In my last few posts, I discussed the idea of gamification and how we’re observing a trend that increasingly sees game elements deployed in the service of practical activity. Case in point: I wanted to [...]

Neuroplasticity, Social Games and Marketing

Social Game Design Blog — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 19:36:53 +0000

My last blog post focused on the idea of gamification. The idea behind gamification is about adopting game mechanics and game principles outside of games, for example in such things as marketing campaigns. Social games in particular seem to be very good sources to draw from as examples of motivating players to act for many [...]

Social Games, Marketing and Gamification

Social Game Design Blog — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 13:00:44 +0000

It’s hard to believe that it’s been almost a year since I gave a talk about the idea that games mean serious business. Fun (games) can be FUNctional. People are naturally playful, so motivating and incenting people to do things through gameplay, to us anyway, seems like a no brainer. I’m not surprised then to [...]

Why Social Games Can Better a Player’s Life

Victoria — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 22:10:48 +0000

We hope that you’re all enjoying the summer so far. We have a busy few months scheduled and some exciting new projects getting off the ground…we’ll be able to share those details with you with soon. For now, we’re still celebrating the successful launch of Healthseeker, our new Facebook game that helps people living with diabetes improve their lifestyles. In case you missed it, we wanted to show you the piece that CBC News Vancouver aired on their 6 pm newscast. (We are very proud!)

We’re also excited that not only the media, but that other organizations have responded so positively to Healthseeker. We think the message is clear: the fact that games have the potential “to do good” — whether that’s to modify behaviour or incent people to act — is inspiring. As Marke Andrews’s piece about Healthseeker (Vancouver Sun) sums it up,

“as social networks and hand-held devices expand online opportunities for developers, game content has also evolved beyond car races and shoot-em-ups. Games now can actually better a player’s life.”

..and we couldn’t agree more. We’d love to hear your thoughts about what you think the potential is for games “to do good.” You can email me at victoria [at] ayogo [dot] com or leave a comment on this post.

Social Games Equal Falling in Love

Social Game Design Blog — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 16:09:47 +0000

Whether it’s confirmation bias (see a very entertaining article on this topic) or not, it seems that since we announced the launch our latest Facebook game called Healthseeker — articles that have to do with either modifying behaviour through gameplay or that explore the close connection between the power of social networks and brain activity [...]

Luck of the Draw: Lotteries, Game Design and Social Games

Social Game Design Blog — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 19:00:22 +0000

As many of you know and have so generously re-tweeted and blogged about it (thanks!), we’ve just launched our newest Facebook game called Healthseeker. Like all of our games, Healthseeker was designed with certain evolutionary and psychological game-oriented principles in mind. As you know from reading my previous posts, game developers [...]