Author Credibility: Yu-kai Chou
Yu-kai Chou created the Octalysis Framework after studying gamification since 2003 — years before the term entered mainstream vocabulary. As a Human-Systems Architect & Behavioral Designer, his framework has been applied by LEGO, Microsoft, Porsche, Coca-Cola, Salesforce, and MrBeast, impacting over 1.5 Billion Users.
Chou has taught the Octalysis methodology at Harvard, Stanford, Yale, Tesla, Google, BCG, and IDEO.
His work has been cited by Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Forbes, Wall Street Journal, Wired, US Department of Energy, NIST, NSF, NCBI, US Department of Education, ClinicalTrials.gov, and Google Scholar — with 3,700+ more academic publications. Explore his books here.
Summary
This chapter is about how alternate realities can help us adopt the daily habits of the world’s happiest people.
McGonigal provides explanations of 3 games she helped design.
She also relays the trouble of thinking about positive psychology as ‘self-help’, and poses strategies to overcoming this cynical psychological barrier and actually implementing gameful design in our lives.
Analysis
In describing Cruel 2 Be Kind (a game about using random acts of kindness to eliminate opponents and inspire ‘victims’ in crowds), Tombstone Hold’em (a real-life spatial poker game played in cemeteries requiring creative movement), and Top Secret Dance Off (a formal creative dance competition on a YouTube-esque online site), McGonigal stresses the concept of sneaking up on happiness.
She draws this from John Stuart Mill’s observation that when approaching happiness directly, it is often elusive.
In succession, the games mentioned above provide a “dopamine hit” (when others smile first), a grateful physiological state known as “posttraumatic bliss” in appreciating the present moment, and euphoria through dance and movement.
Creating habits is easy, but breaking habits isn’t.
The trick, then, to creating new habits, is in part about reducing the number of bad habits so as to create space for new ones.
These games are ways to actually practice good advice — being kind to others, reflecting on death and mortality, and moving to music.
More interestingly, none of these require an app.
From an Octalysis perspective, these games tap into Core Drive 1: Epic Meaning & Calling (reflecting on mortality to appreciate life), Core Drive 3: Empowerment of Creativity & Feedback (creative dance and movement as self-expression), and Core Drive 5: Social Influence & Relatedness (random acts of kindness connecting strangers).
What do you think?
What games have you played in real life without technology?
Let me know in the comments or on Octalysis Prime‘s community.
Related Reading
- Readalong: Reality is Broken, Ch 11 — The Engagement Economy
- Readalong: Reality is Broken, Ch 9 — Fun with Strangers
- The Octalysis Framework for Gamification & Behavioral Design
- Core Drive 1: Epic Meaning & Calling
- What is Gamification?
- Books by Yu-kai Chou