Psychology research and studies are increasingly permeating more areas of the market related to new technologies and cultural products.

The electronic entertainment sector is no exception, and that is why it is increasingly common for teams of psychologists to be incorporated into video game development plans or to offer pointers and advice to help create fully immersive playable sensations. And we are not only talking about video game brain training, but almost any aspect can be reinvented by psychologists dedicated to this interesting field.

Interview with Psycogaming

In Spain, one of these examples of entrepreneurship that straddles basic psychology, the creation of video games and the dissemination of the potential benefits they can offer beyond leisure is the company Psycogaming, created in 2013 by Sergio Alloza and Marc Costal. We have set out to interview them to find out more about this relatively little known marriage between psychology and video games.

Psychology and Mind : How did you come up with the idea to start this project ?

Psycogaming : Well, the initial idea came up during the last year of my career. It was the second semester and we weren’t sure what we would do when we finished. After a class, in which we were asked to try to join our passion (whatever it was) with psychology, we started to think about how to join the wide field of psychology with the huge world of video games. And from that union came Psycogaming , a project that in its beginnings had the objective of analyzing video games from a psychological point of view, but that has grown over time.

What is the aspect of video games that interests you most as psychologists?

Marc: I’m very interested in the look of the game design itself. Giving the characters a background by making them more in line with the type of personality you want to convey, finding contextual flaws in the scenarios that can interfere with the immersion felt by the player, or even making the emotional situations that occur in the video game’s plot consistent with the emotion you want to make felt.

Sergio: Without a doubt, motivation and engagement techniques and the phenomenon of flow. How a person can feel immersed in a video game and lose track of time, think and feel in a virtual world. And, furthermore, how our brain adapts and changes to those routines and how certain abilities are intrinsically trained.

How have you been learning about the relationship between psychology and video games? Is there any book or magazine that you recommend?

PG: Well, from the beginning of the project and having finished the degree, we realised that our training was going to be self-taught. Since there were no postgraduate courses on this specific subject, we began to train ourselves, studying the bibliography resulting from past and current research on the relationship between video games and psychology. In addition, we did several courses on video games and learning, game design and game development. Even today we are still training in these subjects, among others, and expanding our knowledge.

We recommend, above all, in addition to the existing bibliography, a book entitled: Don’t bother me mom- I’m learning! , by Prensky, which gathers together quite well some of the ideas set out above.

Do video game developers already use teams of psychologists, or is it something relatively new?

PG: As far as we know, only a few large companies have a psychologist on staff who helps design the games with the rest of the team. We certainly think that’s a great idea, since merging various disciplines always results in better work.

In most videogames there is a narrative dimension and a playable dimension. In which of these two do you think people who are dedicated to psychology are most needed?

PG: In both, totally. A lot of times we play a video game with incredible mechanics, graphics, and design, but the next day we don’t play it again because it doesn’t have a story that engages us. And a lot of times we’ll have played a game where the first impression was very good from a narrative point of view, but because some of the mechanics are badly designed they don’t invite the user to keep playing.

Hence, supervision of almost every detail is necessary on both sides to ensure that people will have a good experience with the video game. After all, that’s what it’s all about.

And I guess we also have to see if the mechanics and the narration fit well together.

PG: Yes. In general this is not a big deal. You just have to adapt the mechanics to the limitations of the game or programming language you’re using. Rarely will you find that the narrative limits the mechanics and vice versa. Many times, unique mechanics will come out of the game’s narrative itself, and the mechanics can provide ideas for how the game can be developed.

In what aspects of videogame development do you think it is most useful to have the advice of specialized psychologists? For example, in game mechanics, scenario and character design, etc.

PG: We can certainly help in the development of all aspects of the video game. From the commented ones to many more. It is true that there are elements in which as psychologists we can be more helpful, such as the mechanics of video games to help optimize cognitive abilities, or in the design of a coherent context to improve the user experience. Although for this it is necessary to touch almost all the elements. However, there are aspects, such as music, that we leave in more expert hands since our training and experience do not help us much to improve that element.

Regarding the design of scenarios, have you noticed if environmental psychology is starting to investigate and intervene in video games? I think it would be an interesting field for people who work in this branch of psychology.

PG: The truth is that we haven’t met anyone in this specialty yet in the world of video games. Usability? I’m sure they could provide their expertise on the interaction between the physical environment and the player, only in this case the environment would be virtual. Perhaps when the definitive “boom” of Virtual Reality occurs, we will see much more interest between this field of psychology and video games.

What are the main barriers that a person coming from the field of psychology will encounter if they decide to dedicate themselves to something similar to what you do in Psycogaming?

PG: The first, and surely the most important, is the lack of formal training in this area within psychology. There are all kinds of specializations: clinical, educational, business, legal… but it’s very difficult to find something that brings together the concepts of psychology and video games.

And then, you would encounter the hard business world and the difficulty of getting into the world of video games (like getting into a video game development studio).

And it won’t be easy to start having contacts either.

PG: No, it’s not easy.We assume that if you have an acquaintance in the world it can be easier, since there are “hangouts” and events where developers get together to present projects, meet each other and so on. In our case, we had no idea that this kind of event exists, so we had to go a lot further. A friend told us that there was a kind of developer meeting in Valencia, and after thinking about it we decided to go for a couple of days and introduce ourselves. As a result, we were given the contact of a group that works in Barcelona, ZehnGames, and from which we began to know the whole Indie world in Barcelona. In fact, now in December we have been in Granada Gaming with them and it has been a very productive experience.

Beyond the problems that may have arisen along the way, how do you assess the journey you have made so far with your project?

PG: Well, the truth is that we value it very positively. It’s true that the beginnings were hard, with a vaguely defined project and a lot of literature to study, but the opportunities that have arisen have made the whole journey to the current point worthwhile. Even so, we are aware that we have a long way to go and we hope to continue having the same luck.

Finally, a question that must be asked. What is your favorite video game?

Marc: The Legend of Zelda, A Link To The Past, from Super Nintendo. The graphics are poor for today, but it has an immersive narrative and a considerable degree of freedom in such an ancient game. Plus a scary soundtrack.

Sergio: Without a doubt, Golden Sun, from GBA. An incredible narrative, graphics and artistic design suitable for its time and interesting and attractive mechanics. Although we could devote another whole interview to throwing flowers to a never-ending list of “favorite” video games.