Alexander Jhin has had some second thoughts about his article on the coolness of using behavioral psych in game design. He used to think it was cool, now he thinks it denies the possibility of art in games. I'm not so sure, and I posted this in response. If there's anybody out there who actually reads all my posts, you'll see a lot of repetition here:

Behavioral psychology has the luddites imagining *Clockwork Orange* and pigeons pecking at levers but it was my favorite subject back when I got my psych degree. As I was graduating in 1991 there was a semi-new movement afoot to stop thinking of behavioral psych in terms of manipulation but in terms of communication. The pigeon isn't pecking at the lever because it knows it will get food; the pigeon is pecking at the lever to communicate with the researcher that it would like some food now, please. Or, the researcher is communicating with the pigeon - "Let me know when you want food by pecking this lever, ok?"

Games may be one of the only media that can use this avenue of communication. Will Wright could have written a book where he might say, "Debt is poisonous to a municipal government because of such-and-such." Instead we have this game where he shows us what debt does by punishing us for using it. (I've learned a bunch of other lessons from Will, such as "Nuclear energy is safe and efficient" and "Always hire a maid". I'm not saying what he's communicating is right, I'm just saying it's a unique, engaging way to get communication across. If he had written that hypothetical book...I never would have read it.)

Another way in which we communicate is to guide the player into having the experience we want them to have. Zelda's pieces-of-heart rewards exploring and puzzle-solving, for example. Tony Hawk rewards busting mad tricks and getting huge air. We must be extremely careful with this technique, as what we consider a reinforcer may actually not be, like in the famous experiment where kids were rewarded for drawing and the next day ceased their creative activities. I did not explore much in the latest Zelda.

Which brings me to a final point; behavioral psych, at its origin, is simply this: watch behavior; change stimuli; watch behavior again. Which is what all game designers should be doing: watching people play the game, changing the game, and repeating the process. (Until you run out of time and have to ship.)

So, while I agree that using these techniques to make a game addictive may be bad game design--my wife has finally overcome her Animal Crossing habit, thank God, I thought I was going to need to arrange an intervention--let's not throw them out altogether. You wrote a good, useful article.

Warren Spector's speech, what Greg Costikyan calls the "Don't worry be happy" speech, is available at Gamasutra. I, myself, liked it, but hey - I'm working on a sequel *and* a license. We're taking some fairly big risks this time around (last time around just trying to port an engine to three consoles and make some original content in eighteen months seemed like risk enough) and I'm scared as hell but Warren says that's a good thing. Maybe tomorrow I'll worry less and happy more.