Game preferences and the Bartle Test

Ben and I were talking one evening and the topic shifted to FEZ (the indie game phenomenon featured alongside Braid and Super Meat Boy in Indie Game: The Movie) and its merits. Whereas I saw a variety of worlds and puzzles to be discovered and explored, Ben saw a slow, repetitive, and rather engagement lacking experience that bogged him down. As I thought about the reasons behind his dislike for FEZ, I wondered about the mechanisms behind how we choose if a gaming experience is engaging and thoughtful and how we mold these experiences for ourselves given the chance. In other words, what motivates us to continue playing a game?

I thought this kind of question reflects personality psychology's trait theories, a series of models that aims to pin down certain stable conditions that describe someone as a whole. Here's a model based on two spectrums, emotional stability and introversion/extroversion:  

click to enlarge images

These can get a lot more complicated. Psychologist Lewis Goldberg proposed a five-dimensional model; Raymond Cattell came up with one using sixteen different factors. Looking at the above diagram, we can definitely attribute these personalities to gaming personalities: extraverted players may have a higher affinity towards social games whereas introverts prefer single-player experiences; more emotional players might prefer an engaging story whereas more emotionally calm people may be happy with a simple casual puzzle game. 

Writer, professor, and game researcher Richard Bartle described player preferences in a similar fashion to trait theory in his paper "Hearts, Clubs, Diamonds, Spades: Players Who Suit MUDs." This paper was written in 1996 and pertains mostly to MUDs (multi-user dungeons) and MMORPG's, but I feel like we could try and apply this to other game genres. Take a look at the foundation for Bartle's ideas:

which are you?

Bartle's characterized players into four groups named after the four suits in a deck of cards, labeled for their respective traits: hearts (socializers), clubs (killers), diamonds (achievers), and explorers (spades). Each describes a drive or motivation a player seeks in a gaming experience: hearts love the social aspect of games and helping others; clubs can't wait to show their 1v1-me-bro skills and their abilities to read an opponent; diamonds glitter in the best gear, bathe in achievements, and adorn the top-score or top-time listings; spades dig around for secrets and hidden passages, leaving no stone unturned. It is this amalgam of the four that I feel succinctly and fairly describes a gamer. 

All of these areas have overlaps with the other groups in some way or another. For example, diamonds may seek the top of the leaderboard in a game like StarCraft where 1v1 reigns supreme and is home to clubs. The spade may also belong to a guild where he or she shares information about the latest patch and where all the good loot can be found in a newly released area. We are a composite of all four suits with emphasis on different areas depending on what kind of game we're playing. 

Let's apply Bartle's model to two games outside of MUDs and MMORPGs and see what happens.

Team Fortress 2- If my friends and I were to make a top ten or top five favorite games of all time, I'm willing to bet Team Fortress 2 is going to be on there. The hearts love to play with friends in this multiplayer setting; clubs want to show that they are the best on the server; diamonds are trading away for the latest in hat fashion; spades are looking for the latest hints and clues towards the next update (or they're looking for map exploits).

SpaceChem- Probably my most favorite game. Hearts might be busy on the forums discussing the latest technique and helping people with some of the puzzles; clubs are lined up at the tournaments ready to show their SpaceChem wits; diamonds want the highest efficiency rating possible; spades are delving into the newly released player-made puzzles working out new techniques and tricks.

Team Fortress 2 and SpaceChem are completely different games and rightfully have different areas of emphasis to different people. For me, Team Fortress 2 emphasizes the heart and club- I want to get better at the game but I find it boring without playing with friends. SpaceChem invokes my inner spade as I search around for new ways to complete the puzzles. 

another handy chart

FEZ called upon the spade in me like in SpaceChem; the curiosities and fine details leave me wanting to look for more secrets and areas within the game. As for Ben, he mentioned FEZ's platforming lacking urgency or skill, so maybe his diamond facet was dissatisfied. Whatever the case, this all illustrates that our alignment in the spectrum isn't tied down to one or two suits: our alignment and preferences changes from game to game, genre to genre. 

The next time a game pops up in your mind, think about what lead you to like or dislike the game and try applying Bartle's model- you might come to some interesting incites. But how does a game manage to alter your alignment across genres? Why don't hearts stay hearts and clubs stay clubs across all games and genres?- after all, one of the defining assumptions in trait theory is that traits are relatively stable. And if they don't change for you, why is that? These are some interesting questions we can look into later on.