Artefact 5! Findings

Screen and webcam recordings of participant interaction indicated levels of engagement and interaction times. Finding the designed level banner was the most successful with the highest overall interaction time (Designed: 2min 26sec. Non-designed: 1min 41sec. Platform: 1min 48sec), proving expectations to be correct. The webcam results displayed higher concentration levels on all level banners proving higher engagement levels to be gained using levels.

A short Q&A was then completed surrounding banner preference and placement. Finding that the level banner was preferred (level: 50%. Non-level: 33%. Neither: 17%), however the reason why was inconclusive. The results were 50/50 when asked which banner was interacted with first. Indicating placement does not affect users over preference.

The next development is to create the ultimate advertising banner!

Artefact 6! The ULTIMATE addictive advertising banner

For my final artefact I will be combining all the successful findings of each of the previous tests to create an online advertising with a high interaction level and usage time proving that addiction is a possibility.

I will email around an email to check out a banner with a HTML link to the page and monitor the analytics of the page for a week. This will allow me to see the levels of returns to the page and if addiction is developing.

The Banner will incoporporate:

*Negative Reinforcement

*Social Influence, through posting on a social site so people can share the link if they want to and

intially targeting friends through email.

*Extention Rewards

*Level

*Gender Specific theme

Exhibition! Catalogue progress

Art4....Continued! Testing Gender in addiction

Aim: To find out if the stereotype of males being more addicted to gaming then females is true.

Testing: Using the game site youda games I will test males and females playing on 3 different games, a simulation game (female specific), shooter (male specific) and puzzle (not gender specific). Time results will show the levels of interaction and addiction.

Expectations: According to the stereotype you would expect that males would play on all games longer. However through the use of gender specific games I want to find whether addiction is more centred around the game then the gender.

Art4....Continued! Gender Specific Games

I found an online paper researching the idea of gender specific games. The paper states that on average, girls and women are less involved with video games than are boys and men, and when they do play, they often prefer different games.

The paper investigated and disscussed the results of studies looking at the gaming dislikes of German Females.

One of the studies looked at an online survey cocnetrating on frequency of gameplay of certain game genres for both male and females. This study found that female respondents were less attracted to competitive elements in video games, suggesting an explanation for gender-specific game preferences.

The most popular game for males were shooter and the most popular for women were role playing. However the difference I would have expected between males and females is a lot less and women seem to show less definite preference. Therefore when testing whether there is a gender specific gaming trend these would be the 2 games used within the testing also allowing whether women are in fact displaying higher levels of interest and addiction to be established.

Artefact 4! Results & the rise of female gaming!

The results indicated that those viewing the banner as a group displayed both higher levels of enjoyment and also interaction times.
It was also found that females interacted more times and for longer, this was a finding that was not anticipated due to the typical male stereotype associated with gaming. From this finding a conclusive result can not be formed as it does not test different types of games associated with genders.

Further research into gender gaming has been carried out and additional testing will be carried out as a result of this finding. Recent gaming articles surrounding female gaming addiction suggest that females are showing higher levels of addiction to gaming then previously expected and that female game addicts are out there.

One article highlights the growing issue of female gaming addiction discussing a show that was aired on MTV titled 'I'm addicted to video games.' which included an African-American female gamer named Charisse who struggled to maintain romantic relationships and her gaming habits. (http://www.gamepro.com/article/news/213723/video-game-addiction-gets-attention-from-mtv-kent-state-university/) .

Other articles surrounding female gaming highlight some shocking statistics that are much higher than I anticipated. Indicating that:

- What may be a surprising 40% of gamers are now female, with adult women making up 33%. (http://addictions.about.com/od/lesserknownaddictions/a/videogamewho.htm)

- 57 percent of online game players are male and 43 percent are female. (http://www.theesa.com/facts/gameplayer.asp)

- Women over the age of 18 represent a significantly greater portion of the game-playing population (34 percent) than boys age 17 or younger (18 percent). (http://www.theesa.com/facts/gameplayer.asp)

Portfolio work! Classic Catering design development

After Showing the latest design to some family members for feedback we have changed the layout slightly so that the text area comes across in a less standard boxed feel giving the site more of a modern edge. Simply moving the text around has given the site a informal feel but keeping in with the simple image dominant design.