A Design Framework for Reflective Play

A Design Framework for Reflective Play

A Design Framework for Reflective Play

Josh Aaron Miller, Kutub Gandhi, Matthew Whitby, Mehmet Kosa, Seth Cooper, Elisa Mekler, Ioanna Iacovides

Abstract

"Recent research has begun exploring games as a medium for refec-tion due to their afordances as interactive systems of challenge. However, little efort has been put into (1) synthesizing insights across studies and disciplines and (2) translating the academic work on refective play into practical takeaways for game developers. This article takes the frst steps toward summarizing existing work on refective play and translating insights for practical implemen-tation by identifying key game elements present in games that evoke refection. We divide these elements into fve approaches: Disruptions, Slowdowns, Questioning, Revisiting, and Enhancers. Finally, we provide an actionable supplement for practicing game developers to apply these concepts to their games."

Reference

Miller, J. A., Gandhi, K., Whitby, M., Kosa, M., Cooper, S., Mekler, E. D., & Iacovides, I. (2024). A design framework for reflective play. In CHI ’24: Proceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1–21). ACM. https://dl.acm.org/doi/full/10.1145/3613904.3642455

Keywords

Games, Refection, Refective Game Design