Play-Persona: Modeling Player Behaviour in Computer Games

esults in the relatively easy task of confirming whether these values are transferred to the
successive layers of the scaffolding for experiencing.
The Narrative Play-Values (NPV) identified are:
• NPV1: the revenge of an underdog facing overwhelming odds forced into trusting
untrustworthy allies. Importance of the “fragile alliance” 5 .
• NPV2: a highly moral man cast by misfortune in a highly immoral environment, trying to do
right by doing wrong.
• NPV3: the main hero is a man that loves his daughter, a legendary mercenary and possibly
a traitor.
Functional Play-Values (FPV) are:
• FPV1: action, emphasis on fighting rather than opening doors or operating equipment.
• FPV2: simplicity, to support a fast paced game play and to increase the appeal to console
gamers commands need to be very simple.
• FPV3: creativity, players should have the freedom to creatively use tactics in varied ways to
engage the enemy
As expected, narrative play-values mainly informed the flow of the action and the structure of the
tasks and missions of the different levels in the game, while functional play-values dictated the
choices made by the designers while defining play-modes, so far confirming the hypotheses laid out
in the scaffolding theory.
4 PLAY- MODES, SCHEMAS AND GESTALTS
As mentioned earlier play-modes are each and every one of the rules of the game, all the actions
available to the player while playing a game.
Play-schemas are the mental models that players utilize to understand the context and represent
their actions. According to Lindley, they are “cognitive structures that link declarative (or factual)
and procedural (or performative) knowledge together with other cognitive resources (such as
memory, attention, perception, etc.) in patterns that facilitate the manifestation of appropriate
actions” [8].
5 Fragile alliance is a multiplayer mode that sees several players cooperating to pull off a bank heist, with the
possibility at any point in time, to betray partners for a bigger share of the stash.
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