Design Inspiration for Motivating Uncertainty in Games using Stage Magic Principles

Uncertainty is widely acknowledged as an engaging player experience. Practice and research have proposed various types of game uncertainty, yet there is little work explaining when and why they motivate, especially with respect to ‘micro-level’, moment-to-moment gameplay. Moreover, there is little insight into designing for motivating uncertainty in games. In response, this research aims to answer (1) what constitutes motivating moment-to-moment uncertainty and (2) how to elicit it through game design, taking inspiration from stage magic. We survey player motivation, player experience and related literature in psychology, exposing underrepresentation of epistemic emotions in games. We showcase the motivating role of uncertainty in moment-to-moment gameplay, proving its link to curiosity and other epistemic emotions. We present this with a grounded theory taxonomy of seven types of engaging gameplay uncertainty emerging from three sources - game, player, and outcome. For inspiration, we survey the field of stage magic to find design principles used to elicit epistemic emotions. We identify equivoque, an important forcing technique, to create the illusion of choice and thus engaging decision uncertainty in games. We empirically test the efficacy of equivoque through three studies: (1) using playing cards; (2) in a narrative game to create decision uncertainty; (3) repeating the trick four times consecutively in an extended version of the game. Overall, our work exposes gaps in player motivation research, especially regarding empirical work on epistemic emotions in games. It provides a taxonomy of motivating uncertainty types. It establishes magic as a promising source of game design inspiration, and zeroes down on equivoque for evoking uncertainty. Furthermore, it provides empirical evidence that equivoque can be used in narrative games to elicit decision uncertainty. Finally, it provides insights into translational work between creative fields and from theory to design.