A Heuristic for Empowerement through Games
SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULLFILLMENT FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER
OF SCIENCE
M
ASTER
I
NFORMATION
S
TUDIES
Information Systems
F
ACULTY OF
S
CIENCE
U
NIVERSITY OF
A
MSTERDAM
11794526
10-07-2019
2nd Examiner
Dr. Frank Nack
Informatics institute, Faculty of Science,
University of Amsterdam
1st Examiner
Gabriele Ferri, Ph.D.
M.Sc. Digital Design, Amsterdam University
of Applied Sciences
A Heuristic for Empowerment through Games
Arthur Emanuel Ebrahimi
University of Amsterdam, arthur.ebrahimi@student.uva.nl
ABSTRACT
There are several studies on the subject of empowerment, in the context of HCI, and play. However, there is very little work done in the interdisciplinary �eld of play and empowerment, coined "play-ful empowerment" by Schouten & Ferri. This paper focuses on a preliminary evaluation of an unpublished model, a set of heuris-tics, developed by Schouten & Ferri for determining empowerment through a playful interaction. After a qualitative game analysis and a variant of a heuristic evaluation it has been found that the heuristics are adequate for determining whether a playful interac-tion could be empowering or not. However, there is still a large grey area and the project of Ferri & Schouten is not complete. The heuristics work well in determining the ingredients necessary for empowerment, but do not determine whether empowerment is achieved or not. The model works well for rather simple games but seems to have di�culties when the game mechanics and dynamics are scaled up.
KEYWORDS
play, games, empowerment
INTRODUCTION
The "Play & Civic Media" lectorate of the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences is a research group that conducts research in the �eld of immersive , playful and civic media. One of the main topics in their research is the interdisciplinary �eld of empowerment and play, which is guided by Ferri and Schouten. There is some work done in this interdisciplinary �eld in the context of civic purposes [4], however there is little to none literature that connects play-fulness and empowerment to each other in a general, uni�ed way. Currently, Schouten & Ferri are writing a book (which is still un-published) [25] on the connection between these two phenomena which they have coined "Playful empowerment". This book dives in the role of play in our society and how this has changed throughout the years. It also drafts a framework for playful empowerment: a set of heuristics which describe the empowering process as a set of phases or lenses. This model, which is currently in an early stage, needs veri�cation. Therefore, the model needs to be tested on a variety of games (other types of playful interactions are outside the scope of this research). This problem statement and objective has led to the de�nition of the following research question and sub questions.
What kind of heuristics are adequate for determining whether a playful interaction is or is not empowering?
• What kind of empowerment are we aiming for? • What kind of games are we testing?
• Is it necessary to quantify model outputs and if so, what method do we use to do that?
• Is there a parameter which determines if the model is either a good or bad �t?
This paper focuses on a preliminary evaluation of the playful em-powerment model developed by Schouten & Ferri [25]. First, a literature review has been conducted concerning the relevant litera-ture on the �elds of empowerment (in the context of HCI) and play. Then, a methodology has been formulated to analyse games and evaluate the heuristics. This consist of a combination of: a qualita-tive, design based analysis [20], a framework from the literature on game analysis and a variant of a heuristic evaluation method [6]. Then, the results, following grounded theory method [19], will be elaborated after which a discussion on the results and methodology will be presented. In this part the contributions to the ongoing work of Schouten & Ferri [25] will also be elaborated. Finally, a conclu-sion will be given where the research question will be answered. Also, points for future work in the form of a recommendation will be given in the last section.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Empowerment & engagement
Empowerment in HCI.There is some research done on empower-ment through technology. Schneider et al.have analysed 54 papers on empowerment and have presented their �ndings in [23] which serves as a good introduction to empowerment in HCI. Their analy-sis is guided by the characterization of empowerment which can be broken down in four components. Firstly, power is the baseline for empowerment. In this paper, there are two distinctions of power: power-to and power-over. Power-to refers to the ability of doing something and is generally related to an individual. Power-over is related to power comparisons of di�erent groups. Secondly, power could have three di�erent empowering e�ects: an experience based on feeling (i.e. improving user’s self-esteem), knowing (i.e. teaching the user a new skill) and doing (i.e. stimulating the user to work more e�cient). Some of the papers analysed suggest that a holis-tic approach, where knowing, feeling and doing are all present in the experience, is the most e�ective way to create an empowering experience. Then, the e�ect of empowerment can be persistent or transient (only e�ective for a short period of time). Also, the mindset should be taken into account. One of the most studied use cases of empowerment through technology is in the �eld of civic engagement, the participation of citizens related to their local area. This is called community empowerment [23].
Civic engagement & empowerment through technology.Civic en-gagement [30] is closely related to the research Schouten & Ferri do. For example, voting is considered a civic duty. Digital civics is an interdisciplinary �eld which seeks to understand how digital technologies can empower citizens in their civic duty. The goal of digital civics is as follows: by working with both governments and
citizens on problems within the community through a participa-tory platform, citizens can take an active role in decision making policies. Also, these platforms have the potential to create new type of relations between stakeholders (citizens, local councils, local businesses etc.) [30].
According to Schneider et al. [23] (video)games could engage com-munity empowerment. Kahne et al. explore the civic potential for video games as a whole [10]. They concluded that gaming experi-ences are strongly related to the civic and political engagement of the users. More speci�cally, playing games with others in person might be related to civic outcomes. However, this research was only designed to represent teens (from 12 to 17) [10].
Stewart et al. [28] perform a research on a another type of game: Digital Games for Empowerment and Inclusion (DGEI), which are a subset of serious games. Although, serious games and DGEI might appear similar, there a notable di�erences. The serious game in-dustry targets a much wider area than DGEI. However, the serious game industry is essential to the success of DGEI, since this indus-try will provide the ecosystem needed for DGEI.
Bruggers et al. [3] show the relevance of empowering games in the health sector. Health-promoting interactive technologies can provide opportunities for patients to a better understanding of dis-eases, symptoms and medication. Currently there are two di�erent types of health-promoting interactive games. Sedentary games, focus on educating patients on a speci�c medical condition and activity-promoting video games. Finally, the researchers state that the notion of fun, or play, is important in the success of these games in healthcare [3].
But, of course, not all evidence points at entirely positive results. For example, Meissner et al [17] explored how people with dis-abilities experienced the empowering experience of DIY assistive technology. Their �ndings showed some proof of empowerment through making, however the empowering experience was more a matter of the users’ personal agenda than of the technology it-self. They conclude that there is still a grey area in designing for empowerment as researches are not sure what it exactly means to achieve empowerment.
Play & games
We all know games and have played them before. The formal de�ni-tion of a game, given by [27] and referenced from [9]:"a rule-based formal system with a variable and quanti�able outcome, where dif-ferent outcomes are assigned di�erent values, the player exerts e�ort in order to in�uence the outcome, the player feels attached to the outcome, and the consequences of the activity are optional and ne-gotiable.". Stewart et al. [27] also argue that one speci�c subset of games, digital games, are very popular (especially for leisure purposes). This is mainly because digital games combine various methods to engage the player and create motivating features such as: a sense of control, competition, and reward. However, in or-der to unor-derstand games one should zoom out and analyse why games are fun to play. This is called playfulness. According to [14] in common language play and games are often used as the same word. However, games are a subset of playful interactions, which is a certain design quality or human activity that makes certain experiences "fun".
Playful experiences can be divided in two main categories: paida and ludus. Ludus is structured, rule bound goal directed and mostly closed-context. Traditional games are a perfect example for ludus type activities. On the other end, paida is unstructured, sponta-neous and the context is open. An example of a paida-type activity is drawing on a condensed window. Play is something which is inherent to games and we can design for. To capture, formalize and categorize di�erent kinds of playful experiences the PLEX frame-work has been created [13]. This consists of 22 categories such as "captivation", "humor" or "sympathy". Although, the PLEX frame-work is an e�ective tool to design for playful interactions, it is still hard to de�ne what "fun" exactly is.
Game design analysis
In order to analyse games and game characteristics (such as "fun") objectively and uniformly there needs to be some sort of formal approach. There are several frameworks available and used (i.e. Rapid Analysis Method (RAM) as proposed by [8]) In the previous section the PLEX framework is already mentioned as a method to formalize playful interactions. In this section one of the most used and the industry standard for game analysis will be introduced and elaborated: the Mechanics, Dynamics, Aesthetics (MDA) framework. The MDA approach is, as stated by [7], ...a formal approach to under-standing games - one which attempts to bridge the gap between game design and development, game criticism, and technical research. This framework decomposes games in three components: rules, system and "fun". More formally these components are called Mechanics, Dynamics and Aesthetics. Mechanics are what one would consider the "rules" of the game. The rules of the game lead to dynamics, a certain system behaviour which is not pre-programmed but emerge from the mechanics. A more formal de�nition of mechanics and dynamics is given by [12]: game mechanics are a set of rules which have a certain output and a corresponding output (they call it "in-teractions within the system", whereas dynamics are the responses of users to those mechanics. The mechanics and dynamics lead to aesthetics, which is the "fun" experience. To more formally de-scribe fun in a game the following taxonomy is used: sensation, fantasy, narrative, challenge, fellowship, discovery, expression and submission. As stated by [7], MDA enables analysis of games from the designer’s perspective and user perspective: feature-driven ver-sus experience-driven. For the designer, the mechanics of the game cause the dynamics which lead to a fun experience. For the user, aes-thetics are in the forefront which emerge from apparent dynamics and mechanics.
Learning through games
Identifying games which are intended for educational purposes is complex. These type of games have been called Serious Games in the past [2] and can be applied to a broad spectrum of areas: military, government, education and healthcare [18]. These games are, in the �rst place, not intended to be played for entertainment pur-poses. This de�nition could imply that games intended for leisure purposes can not have an educational impact on the player. The essence of Schouten, Ferri’s [25] and my own research is to analyse the educational impact of games which are intended for leisure purposes. Thus, this term will not be used. According to [29] the
learning outcome of a game is dependent on three factors: a certain teaching method (or pedagogy), the mechanics of the game and the way learning is built in the game.
Uliscak [29] states that a virtual game worlds need to be consistent and logical while there also needs to be level of uncertainty, as randomness makes a game challenging. The decisions made by the player in-game should have an impact on the parameters and outcome of the virtual world. Games should be engaging to play, i.e. a reward for solved problems. Also, the proposed problems should not be too easy in order to maintain challenging elements. The proposed problems should contain an element of reality in order to be understood by the player (thus, impose learning).
An early 00’s book called What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy James Paul Gee [5] describes the opportunities of video games in learning. Cognitive research shows that players of games engage in so called "action at distance" [5] when playing games, which is a highly motivational state. Ownership and agency also contributes to this motivational state: the more a player is able to customize the playable character and make decisions that impact the virtual world and character, the more invested the player will be thus more motivated. This is important because as Gee states: "Motivation is the most important factor that drives learning. When motivation dies, learning dies and playing stops.". Finally, collabo-rating with fellow players in (online) multiplayer to play the game can create a notion of a community in which there is distributed knowledge. This forces players to engage in learning [5]. Another study [16] shows that so called game-based training, a much broader term than serious games, requires a game, simula-tion and a learning aspect. Leaving out simulasimula-tion creates simple educational games which are intended for primary school use. Leav-ing out learnLeav-ing aspects creates purely simulation games without a speci�c goal. Finally, leaving out the game aspect creates a simu-lation purely designed for training purposes, such as for military applications. This study also claims that role-playing games, ad-venture games and strategic games are complex games which are at the border of pure games and game based training. There are some features of computer games which are related to game based training. Collaborations (such as, online playing) and communities (such as Massive Multiplayer Online Games engage players to solve problems together, which involves learning. Also, players learn by watching experiences players solving problems which they are unable to solve. Furthermore, structure and motivation seems to be an important factor when designing for learning. Motivation comes from keeping players challenged and is considered the most important activation and maintenance of the learning process. In games this is commonly expressed in "levelling up". Also, according to some game designers, a nice GUI is additional, but a game-play which is continuously motivating is the most important driver for learning. An ideal situation is when both elements of a game are balanced.
Playful empowerment
The Play & Civic Media lab of the Amsterdam University of Ap-plied Sciences is writing a book (unpublished work) [25] on the intersection between playful media and their empowering features. A part of the research is a heuristic model created by Ben Schouten
and Gabriele Ferri which describes empowerment through play as a process.
There is very little to none research on playfulness and empower-ment as an interdisciplinary �eld. However, there is some research on playfulness intertwined with city-related themes which could raise public engagement, public participation and civic empower-ment. A recent study [26], has addressed the use of game mechanics in order to understand complex city problems. One particular study by Ferri & Schouten [4], took a dive in this phenomenon which they call "urban play". Urban play is formalized by appending the PLEX framework with empowerment categories resulting in the so called "PLEX/CIVIC model". The essence of this model is that Citi-zens can become engaged when they are informed and motivated, have the right abilities, skills, resources and can create chances. Furthermore, empowerment goes beyond civic engagement. This is what engaged the researchers to learn to understand the general process of being empowered.
The PLEX/CIVIC model is the precursor of the Playful Empower-ment model described in [25] and is heavily based on the PLEX/CIVIC model. The Playful Empowerment model is a qualitative-holistic approach which is based on the various examples of playful em-powerment that is found during the years. It is made up of lenses, a similar approach as described in [22]. These lenses are Motiva-tion, Participation and Engagement. Empowerment is described as a certain state of being which is achieved as a process which "passes through" each lens. Zooming in with the motivational lens the player is at the center of the experience. The player receives immediate feedback or rewards which results in continued inter-est. Also, the activity can be satisfactory in itself (for example, autonomy or self-e�cacy). This type of experience is particularly emphasized in gami�ed apps and serious games. The participatory lens complements the �rst lens. It is designed to look for a notion of a community or a connection with a broader community. Social activity engages playful experiences and also, as described above, engages learning. Examples of experiences with strong participa-tional elements are multiplayer games such as Massive Multiplayer Online Games. The last lens is the last step in the process of empow-erment. This refers to a concrete call-to-action or e�ects on the real world beyond the boundaries of the game. In summary, a player can be empowered through motivational elements, participation to a community and engagement or "call-to-action". A typical process of empowerment: players who are motivated and act as a community to address issues outside the boundaries of the game (therefore using the game as a tool for these issues).
METHODOLOGY
The main methodology used to answer the research questions is composed of a qualitative analysis of games. This includes grounded theory method [19] in combination with a mark-up on di�erent axes (see �gure 1) assigned in a way that is inspired by open coding [11]. Also, the MDA framework [7] has been used to objectively describe game mechanics, dynamics and aesthetic features. For the analysis of the model a variation of Heuristic evaluation [6] is used. The analysis of games consists of case studies that are split up in two parts. The �rst part, a test set consisting of games which are designed to have a civic e�ect, is used to calibrate the model
by intercoder reliability method [15]. The second part is made up of a set of entertainment games which have not speci�cally been designed for having a civic e�ect and will be used to test if the same output for the test set can be achieved on other types of games.
"Games for Cities" & entertainment games
First, a test "set" of games is de�ned in order to perform intercoder reliability [15] on the model. It was important to choose games for which we are quite sure the model will work and e�ectively assess the empowering features of a game. Therefore, selected games from the Games for Cities (GFC) database (http://gamesforcities.com) are chosen. Most of these games have been developed with a civic pur-pose in mind and in collaboration with academic researches. How-ever, there are also games in there which are intended to be released as entertainment games but could implicitly serve a civic purpose. These games have been studied in the past by using a framework which is the precursor of the Playful Empowerment model (the PLEX/CIVIC model, described in [4]). They have not been analysed through the playful empowerment lenses. The test is made up of eights games of di�erent kind and consists of: "Port of the Future", "Block’hood", "Cards Against Urbanity", "Cities:Skylines", "Aqua Republica", "Rezone the game", "Spent" and "Redesire". This is a combination of card games, video games, games intended with a serious purpose and games intended for leisure purposes. With the GFC set the model is calibrated. A second set of games is used to detect shortcomings of the model and also to stress-test it. This �nal set consists of a set of popular entertainment games, which are not designed to be empowering, from the 80’s, 90’s, 00’s and 10’s. Respectively: "Pac-man", "Mario Kart 64", "GTA San An-dreas" and "Fortnite". These are games which are designed to be played for leisure purposes and not to have a civic e�ect on players. We want to see what happens when we examine these games with the playful empowerment lenses and if we can �nd the same funda-mental components of playful empowerment. Therefore, they are interesting to take into account.Game analysis
The analysis of the games we perform is qualitative and design based [20]. For this analysis a format is made up using two di�erent methods from the literature. The �rst method is an unpublished model designed by Schouten & Ferri described in [25]. It is shown in �gure 1. Their research on games & play has led to the synthesis of 4 di�erent characteristics: hybridity, open-endedness, dynamical and context awareness. These characteristics are represented as sliders which are meant for comparison purposes. When games are analysed a position is chosen on the slider. This is a relative position which should be interpreted as a balance rather than an absolute value. Hybridity is the degree of which the virtual world overlaps with the real world in a technological way. The degree of open-endedness of the gameplay and the balance between me-chanics and dynamics could be related. A game which is heavily based on mechanics will most likely be rule-based. Vice versa, a game which has a open-endeded gameplay will most likely contain more dynamical than mechanical features. Context-awareness says something on the speci�city of the game: a game which is context closed has a very high dependency on a speci�c physical, social,
cultural context or subject matter. Vice versa, a game which is con-text open is independent of a speci�c concon-text. The visualization in �gure 1 are also used to distinguish between Ludus and Paida type of experiences. Games that have more Ludus characteristics will be situated on the left side of the scales while games with more Paida characteristics will be situated on the right side.
As described in [25], two of the characteristics shown in �gure 1 are speci�cally important to synthesize Ludus and Paida experi-ences: open-endedness and context awareness. The context aware-ness scale is the balance between, as described in [25], "...autotelic creativity and more utilitarian objectives.". An autotelic activity could be, as described in the related work, drawing on a condensed win-dow. An activity which could be inherently fun. On the other hand, an utilitarian activity could be fun because of a certain goal it pos-sesses. In order to visualize this these two characteristics will be mapped out on a two-dimensional plane. The two visualizations described above will be used to see if there is a relation between the characteristics of the playful experience and the lenses of playful empowerment.
Figure 1: Four characteristics of modern play & games
Heuristic evaluation
When the game experience is described and the characteristics are mapped out, the game will be evaluated with the playful empower-ment model as described in [25] and shown in �gure 2. This is a vari-ation of a heuristic evaluvari-ation method [6]. The book [25] describes that playful empowerment is a process which follows chronolog-ically from motivation to participation and lastly to engagement. Therefore, the model [25] (seen in �gure 2) can be interpreted in a left-to-right fashion. However, it does not require that all three elements have to be present in order to achieve empowerment. When zooming in on games with the lenses the bottom-up method, shown by the arrows in Figure 2 can be used.
Figure 2: Playful empowerment model from [25] The formalizing of the heuristics can be done in a similar fashion
to [21] and consists of three steps. These steps each have two components.
• 1A: A playful interaction should be inviting to play. • 1B: An empowering system should motivate to play. • 2A: A playful interaction should create a community of
shared interest, competence or any other collective activity which give the player power, possibility or means to achieve something.
• 2B: An empowering system should include have a commu-nity of shared interest, knowledge or any other collective activity.
• 3A: A playful interaction should engage or enable a player. • 3B: An empowering system should engage or enable a player
to take action.
We are looking for elements of play, such as an invitation [24] or motivation. Also, the reward model incorporated in a game is analysed here. For the second lens we are looking for collective activities, such as community building or collective competence. The third lens follows from the �rst and second lens and is, how I see it, the last "push" that is needed to "excite" a player in an empowering state. With this lens we are looking for extension of game boundaries or e�ects beyond the virtual world itself. Also, a speci�c learning goal, "take home message" or call-to-action is analysed with this lens.
The description of the experience of play using the heuristics is qualitative in nature. However, in order to be able to compare dif-ferent games a certain quantitative method needs to be introduced. Similarly to [4], I use spider graphs, seen in �gure 3, to show the balance between the di�erent elements of playful empowerment. In order to plot these, the elements should be assigned a number. The three elements could have a discrete score from 0, meaning not present, to 3, meaning fully present with increments of integers.
ANALYSIS
A full analysis has been done which resulted in twelve case studies. From these case studies, two of each set (GFC set and entertainment
Figure 3: Playful empowerment results
games set) will be shown in this section for example purposes. The description of the results incorporates all twelve case studies. As described in the methodology, the analysis of a game will be along the lines of a pre-de�ned format consisting of three parts.
Example case study (GFC set): Rezone
The Netherlands-based Bosch Architecture Initiative and Digital Workshop teamed up to create a less conventional, more playful solution: Rezone the Game. This is a digitally integrated analog game for applied urban management, focused on stakeholder role-play addressing speci�cally the problem of urban vacancy (vacant buildings) in the Spoorzone neighborhood in Den Bosch (an area which has high vacancy rates). The objective is to save cities from the destructive e�ects of abandoned urban property. Rezone is designed for a speci�c target group as it addresses speci�c areas of development and the particular stakeholders who have a interest in Spoorzone.
Mechanics.The game is a hybrid interaction form which consists of a physical gaming table equipped with a webcam combined with a computer display. The table consists of customisable, colored blocks which represent a building in Spoorzone. The computer display also shows the map with the blocks and adds an occupancy status to each building: 0 for vacant up to 4 for full use. The rules are as following: each player has a role (mayor, building owner,
engineer or resident). Each role can perform certain actions in order to �ght vacancy. The mechanics of the game do not direct to a winning point or direct solutions but rather a process that engages players
Dynamics.The actions that each of the roles can perform result in certain dynamics. For example, the engineer can upgrade a de-caying building, and the resident can choose to move in. Real world bureaucracy is maintained in the game: an engineer must �rst re-ceive permission from a buildingâĂŹs owner and the mayor before taking action with it, after which they must speak with the resident about actually using the building. The fact that the mechanics do not incorporate a winning state or solution engages players into a process to collaboratively solve the problem by creating solutions. Aesthetics.In Rezone players have to collaborate and co-create solutions in order to solve the vacancy problem in Spoorzone. This gives players a sense of challenge, discovery and fellowship. The results of the analysis of the experience and characteristics can be seen in Figure 4
Figure 4: Rezone characteristics
Motivation.Rezone is not commercially available and is speci-�ed to a very small target group. However, it solves a very actual problem through playi�cation. This game is motivational to play because of its speci�c location and context. Finally, challenge and discovery add to the motivational element of the game.
Participation.Players have to collaborate to co-create solutions for the vacancy problem. Also, the players ful�ll di�erent roles. This collaboration creates a community which adds to a sense of participation to players.
Engagement.Rezone is played in a very closed context in which players can translate urban management decisions into the real world. Also, the co-creation process adds a sense of ownership to the players (i.e. the stakeholders) which make them feel engaged in this problem. However, there is no speci�c call-to-action. The results of the analysis through the lenses can be seen in Figure 5. This game is a typical example of an empowering game. It is highly motivational and inviting to play, there is a collective competence and the players feel engaged when playing this game by learning something which is very relevant to them.
Figure 5: Rezone through playful empowerment lenses
Results "GFC set"
Five of the eight games of the GFC set could satisfy the heuristics of playful empowerment. Spent, Block’Hood and Cities, according to my analysis, do not have any elements which could empower a player. When we combine all of the MDA analyses, as seen in �gure 6 (red arrows are the games which have not been found empowering), we observe that all of the games contain challenge and discovery elements. However, this is not a guarantee for em-powerment as this only states that the game is motivational to play. When we look at the combined results for the analyses through playful empowerment lenses, as seen in �gure 7, we can see that all of the games include motivational and engaging elements to some extent.
Figure 6: Aesthetics of GFC set (MDA [7])
When we apply the visualisation of the two-dimensional map-ping of of context awareness and open-endedness to the GFC-set, as seen in �gure 8, we observe that nearly all games of the GFC set are in the context-closed space of the map. However, this property does not guarantee an empowering process.
Figure 8: Two-dimensional mapping of GFC set (taken from [25])
Example case study (entertainment games set):
Mario Kart 64
Mario kart 64 is a kart racing video game developed by Nintendo and is the successor of the similar Super Mario Kart on the SNES. The player controls one of the eight Mario characters who race in karts in di�erent types of tracks. These tracks all have a certain theme (for example, a rainbow theme). This analysis will only focus on the "versus" mode of the game, where players compete against each other.
Mechanics.Players are able to select eight characters: Mario, Luigi, Peach, Toad, Yoshi and Bowser. Also the characters are di-vided into three performance classes: lightweight, middleweight and heavyweight. The lightweight carts are the fastest in the game. During the game, the player is able to obtain items from boxes placed on the track. These items can be used to gain advantage or hinder the other players. Also, the track contains so called "stage hazards" (similar to traps) which hinder the player and should be avoided [1]. The player wins the game when they become the �rst one to �nish the race. There is also a trophy for second and third. Dynamics.Player use di�erent tactics to hinder the other players by using the items or stage hazards in a smart way (for example, bumping them into a trap). Also, players that play a lot learn the map, learn the way to easily pass all the traps and �nd little shortcuts in the map.
Figure 9: Mario Kart 64 characteristics
Aesthetics.The components described in Mario Kart 64 result in the following aesthetic features: sensation, fellowship, chal-lenge and submission.
Motivation.Although the mechanics are simple and the game-play does not change, the racing simulator characteristics make this game highly motivational. The items and traps make the game more complex which adds to motivational features.
Participation.Mario Kart 64 is the �rst game that allowed a multiplayer mode with up to 4 people competing against each other [1]. This was really revolutionary in 1996 as it replicated the same environment of an arcade hall, but only inside homes. Friends, family and peers playing against each other, teaming up and trying their best to reach that �rst place (similar to a high score in arcade halls). People were challenging each other to play Mario Kart at their houses and in that way making new friends (or enemies).
Engagement.The only form of engagement into an empowering state could be that a player would feel con�dent if he/she is the best player in Mario Kart in a speci�c household or group of peers. There is no empowerment on a personal, individual level. There is no call-to-action or incentive to "change" something in the real world.
Figure 10: Mario Kart 64 through playful empowerment lenses
Results entertainment games set
When we collect all the MDA elements of the entertainment games set, as seen in �gure 11, we observe that all the games include moti-vational elements through the challenge aesthetic. Also, we observe that games from the early decades of gaming (80’s & 90’s) where designed fairly simple in their mechanics, dynamics and aesthet-ics. Figure 11 shows that, for example, Pac-man only includes an aesthetic that was challenging, whereas GTA San Andreas includes seven of eight de�ned aesthetics.
Figure 11: MDA elements of entertainment games The growing complexity of games can also be seen when we apply the visualization of the two-dimensional mapping of context-awareness and open-endedness, as seen in �gure 12. As time pro-gresses, games started getting more complex, more open-ended, more context open and more stimulating.
Figure 12: two-dimensional mapping entertainment games (taken from [25])
However, when we look at the result of the analysis through playful empowerment lenses we do strictly not see a growing com-plexity of games (�gure 13. Certainly, a participation element was not present in the game itself before multiplayer existed (such as Pac-man), but did emerge from the social context the game was played in (for example, the arcade halls that Pac-man was played in). When we look through the engagement lens we can see that Mario Kart 64, GTA San Andreas and Fortnite hold approximately the same degree of engagement, which are games of three di�erent era’s.
Figure 13: Playful empowerment elements of entertainment games set
DISCUSSION
For this discussion section, I will speci�cally refer to the model and corresponding game analysis. It was my task to test this model and describe my �ndings. It has been found out that the model generally holds. The heuristics described seem adequate for de-termining whether a playful interaction is empowering, but there is still a large grey area and the project is not �nished. However, critical points have been identi�ed during the analysis. There are two main �ndings, or points of critique, which have contributed to the research of Ferri & Schouten on their unpublished book on playful empowerment [25].
The �rst �nding emerged from an interim presentation where a issue in terminology became evident, which caused a discussion. This discussion was about the sliders of modern Play, as shown in �gure 1. More speci�cally, the discussion was centred around the awareness scale. It seemed that the de�nition of context-awareness was still ambiguous amongst members of the team and not speci�ed. Also, I came to the conclusion that there where di�er-ent interpretations of the context-awareness characteristics. One de�nition stated that context-awareness is the degree of connectiv-ity the game has to the real world. A game which is context open would have a high degree of connectivity to the real world (the in-teractions in the game could be translated directly to the real world) whereas a context closed playful interaction stands on its own. This is con�icting with the interpretation context-awareness of other members, which is as follows: Context-awareness describes the
degree of speci�city of a game (as described in the methodology). After internal discussion the team and I came to the conclusion that actually both de�nitions, or characteristics, hold true and, more importantly, both de�nitions are relevant in describing a playful interaction and consequently playful empowerment. The interac-tion’s relation to the real world and the dependence of the context of the interaction are both important characteristics of play which could have an in�uence on an empowering experience. Thus, in this research the de�nition described in the methodology has been used. However, the context awareness scale should be split up in (at least) two sliders.
The second main �nding of this research occurred during the game analysis. The third lens of empowerment in the model, as shown in 2, is engagement. My interpretation of this lens is that it is the last "step" that is needed to excite a player in an empow-ering state. We already concluded that, in order to achieve this, a call-to-action is needed within the context of the game. However, during the game analysis I observed that, as a player, in order to be engaged to take action one should �rst learn about this speci�c action. Learning on an individual level, before acting, is not con-sidered in the model since the model only examines learning in a collaborative way. Thus, it seems that the third lens can be split in two elements: learning and acting.
CONCLUSION
This thesis dealt with a preliminary evaluation and "stress- test" of an unpublished model developed by Schouten & Ferri from the Play & Civic Media lab at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences. They are currently writing a book that explores the interdisciplinary �eld of play and empowerment, dubbed "playful empowerment", and the changing role of play in time [25]. They have formulated a set heuristics which describes playful empowerment through a lens approach [22]. In this research, these heuristics have been evalu-ated and stress-tested. The following corresponding main research question has been formulated: What kind of heuristics are adequate for determining whether a playful interaction is or is not empowering? My �nal conclusion and the answer to the research question is as follows. The heuristics are adequate for determining whether a playful interaction could be empowering or not. However, there is still a large, grey area and the project is not complete. The heuristics work well in determining the ingredients necessary for empower-ment, but do not determine whether empowerment is achieved or not. The heuristics work well for rather simple games but seem to have di�culties when the game mechanics and dynamics are scaled up.
I will elaborate further on this conclusion. To sum it up, from this research I can conclude that I have a better grasp on empow-erment (in the context of HCI [23]) as a process. I understand that this process consists of di�erent stages and that play and games can assist in this process. More speci�cally, the empowering pro-cess is, indeed, dividable in three stages: motivation, participation and engagement. From using these lens-based [22] heuristics I have
made the important observations that the last step of empowerment, which we call engagement, could be split up in two elements: (indi-vidual) learning and acting. The model as developed by Schouten & Ferri only focuses on learning in a collaborative context, but not on individual level.
From the game analysis I can conclude that challenging elements are an essential ingredient for motivation. Consequently, learning is an essential ingredient to challenge and motivation, which in turn is an essential part to engagement. This is also in line with the literature about motivation and learning described by Gee [5].
Also, the game analysis showed that there are still issues with the terminology and de�nitions of the characteristics of modern play, seen in �gure 1, as de�ned by Schouten & Ferri in their un-published book [25]. The "context-awareness" characteristic could be interpreted in two ways. One interpretation is the degree of connectivity a game has to the real world and the other is the de-gree of speci�city of a game. After internal discussions, we came to the conclusion that both of these interpretations are relevant in describing playful empowerment. The context-awareness scale, as seen in �gure 1, should be split up in two.
Going back to the game analysis, the results show that there are empowering features present in context speci�c games (Games For Cities) and that these games could be empowering. Moreover, the results show that empowering features in entertainment games are also present and these games could also be empowering to some degree. Lastly, the game analysis have shown that the context-awareness of a game seems to have an important e�ect on the empowering process. A game which, in its prototypical way of playing, is too context-open is less likely to be empowering. This has also been observed with the analysis of the entertainment games. These contain the components to be empowering, but are too context-open to excite a player in an empowering state. When their components and di�erent inter-plays are plucked apart I ob-serve elements that could be empowering.
FUTURE WORK
From the results and conclusion points arise for future work. With this research a step is made into understanding empowerment in the context of games and trying to formalize it. However, I realize that this phenomenon is still very abstract. This section could be seen as a recommendation to the ongoing research on playful em-powerment of Schouten & Ferri.
As the discussion describes, the modern play characteristics shown in �gure 1 should be reconsidered. More speci�cally, the context-awareness slider should actually be split up in two sliders. One which shows the balance of the speci�city dependence of an interaction and one which shows the interaction’s level of connec-tivity to the real world. In this research only 12 case studies have been performed due to limited time. In future studies the sample size should be up-scaled. Also, in this study empowerment in the context of games has been studied. In future studies other forms of
Play should also been taken into account.
As stated in the conclusion, the heuristics work well for syn-thesising the ingredients for empowerment, but do not predict if empowerment is achieved. I can only state if a particular game could be empowering, but I cannot conclude that for sure. Future work should focus on formalizing empowerment not only as a process but also as an outcome and de�nition. This also includes some sort of threshold which determines to what degree empowerment is achieved. Furthermore, I have observed that the heuristics work well for rather simple games, but as the mechanics and dynamics of a game are scaled up the model is having issues identifying certain empowering elements. To sum up, the heuristics, in their current version, have scale problems which need to be solved in future work. In this study, the game components have been "plucked apart" and their empowering features have been tested separately. This works well for games which have been designed to have a civic e�ect, but does not have the same e�ect for games which are designed for entertainment purposes. Future work should focus on testing empowerment on the gameplay as a whole.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First of all, I would like to thank Ben Schouten for giving me an opportunity to dive in the wonderful world of playful empowerment and for the valuable meetings we have had. Last but not least, I would like to thank Gabrielle Ferri for his day-to-day guidance and inspiration. I have learned a lot from him the past few months.
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