The Most Common Design Mistakes in Boosters and Leveling Systems
I’ve consulted with hundreds of companies on their gamification systems. The two mechanics they get wrong most often?…
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The Blog
Ideas on motivation, behavior & design.
Deep dives on the psychology behind why people do what they do — from Yu-kai Chou, creator of the Octalysis Framework. Pick the topic that matters to you.
Hunter’s Mark: The Pre-Commitment Mechanic Most Designers Miss
There’s a moment in World of Warcraft that every Hunter player knows. You spot your enemy. You aim.…
Reiss’s 16 Basic Desires Mapped Through Octalysis: How One Framework Absorbs Another
Reiss’s 16 Basic Desires is a psychological framework that claims every sustained human motivation reduces to 16 universal…
Bartle’s Player Types: The Complete Guide (And Why Four Isn’t Enough)
Bartle’s Player Types is a 1996 taxonomy by Richard Bartle, co-creator of the first Multi-User Dungeon (MUD1, 1978)…
Kimi AI Cheated Me Out of $200 — How Kimi AI Misled Me Before I Paid
I asked Kimi AI a direct question before paying, got a specific answer, spent $200, and then discovered…
Flow Theory: Csikszentmihalyi’s 9 Components of the Zone
Flow Theory is a psychological framework developed by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi proposing that people reach their highest levels of…
Gene Resilience: Why Your Ethnicity Changes the Health Rulebook
This is Part 2 of a data analysis covering 159 countries and 7,853 individual Americans. Part 1 showed…