Why everything looks like a game

On gamification, the eternal status game, and the psychology behind games and consumer apps.

You hop into the experience. You’re greeted by a little bird that beckons you forward in the adventure. You start gaining experience points and questing for achievements. You level up and get a robust daily streak going. You feel weirdly attached to the bird, who is happy and cheerful when you play regularly and sad when you’ve neglected it for a while. You feel that you’ve really accomplished something.

You’re playing Duolingo.

This little green bird has used streaks, leaderboards, badges, XP, lives, characters, storytelling, progression, and more to ride its way to over a $7B market cap and $500M+ revenue. However, most people simply point to the features that can be slapped on top of an app rather than understanding the underlying psychology of why those features are compelling. Gamification design is important to achieve the goals you want.

A few screencaps of Duolingo, showcasing different types of gamification in the app (streaks, characters, leaderboards, badges, goals, levels).

For instance, former CPO of Duolingo Jorge Mazal chronicles in this essay on how their initial attempts at gamification (progress bar, move counter, referrals) all failed to move their engagement and growth metrics. Once they got the team identifying the right metrics (in their case, cumulative user retention rate) they could tackle the product features like streaks and leaderboards that really moved the needle and improved DAUs by 4.5x (!). Qualitatively, gamification can also improve knowledge retention amongst students too (longitudinal study of 617 students here). And of course, from a monetization standpoint games drive the lion-share of IAP-spend on the app store.

Data from Statista on mobile app spend across categories (2022).

So it’s pretty clear why mobile app developers want to “gamify” their app. The problem is a lot of people talk about gamification from an optimization standpoint, trying to slap on features to improve engagement. But without understanding the core player motivations, it can be difficult to meaningfully move those target metrics. So I wanted to dive deeper into the role gamification plays and the psychology behind it, what player types each consumer falls into (killers, achievers, socializers, explorers), and muse about how games can be leveraged for several popular consumer categories: edtech, healthcare, fashion/e-commerce, etc.

This essay will be broken down into three sections:

1. The psychology of games

2. Types of gamification and their function

3. Gamified markets I’m excited about

I. The Psychology of Games

Games have been around since ancient times; the Royal Game of Ur is a two-player strategy racing game with some parallels to Backgammon that dates back to 2600 BCE while modern day chess traces back to the Indian Gupta empire of 600 CE. There are many definitions for what constitutes a game, but they all involve (1) players (2) interacting within (3) a defined set of rules to achieve (4) a formalized outcome. Often those interactions involve decision making and uncertainty; take poker as an example where the best players estimate the expected value of a bet based on the pot size and assigned probabilities of hands, but ultimately there is quite a lot of variance in the outcome (winning or losing money). There are two formal definitions of games that separate games into two categories: PvE (player vs. environment) and PvP (player vs. player):

1. PvE: A game has “ends and means”: an objective, an outcome, and a set of rules to get there. (David Parlett)

2. PvP: Games are a “system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome.” (Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman)

Great, Robin, so how do PvE and PvP apply at all to consumer apps? They’re important because they tap into the core psychological motivations for why people engage in games all together: to compete, to solve problems, to socialize, to think, to be entertained, etc. Taking classes or trips together might be co-op PvE, while the entire culture of Wall-street bets and the leaderboards of Zwift / Peloton are certainly PvP. We can dive deeper into player psychology with Bartle’s Taxonomy of Player Types:

Bartle breaks down players into four different basic categories: killers, achievers, socializers, and explorers. The x-axis is the PvP or PvE part of the framework, whether you’re interacting with other players (PvP) or interacting with the world (PvE). The y-axis is the “vs” part of the paradigm, are you playing co-op with other players or are you playing competitively against them. Of course, modern day player game design has gotten more detailed in breaking down these psychographic profiles into specific sub-genres and audience types (e.g., the lone cowboy who explores the frontier and hunts down infamous outlaws for social gain falls into multiple categories), but this is the core root behind it all.

My theory is that all consumer apps fall somewhere on the spectrum of Bartle’s taxonomy, and that gamification can be used to expand breadth (reach a new audience/category) or depth (engage an existing audience more deeply).

Take social networks (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) as an example. These primarily target socializers in both large (Twitter) and small (non-influencer Instagram) groups. However, they also target achievers with their system of likes and followers, and you have clearly defined players interacting socially to achieve a goal (increase your like / follower number) with a set of rules (social norms, text/image/video content of a certain size/length) and uncertainty in the outcome (some posts hit, some don’t). Of course, some may use social networks to PvP and engage in arguments with others, as that can be highly entertaining and viral, a meta-strategy for some top influencers. However, most people are just engaging in the social “read” part of the game, not in the “write” part, and even less in the “write against someone” strategy.

It’s a status game that we play.

Let’s look at some other categories:

• Travel (Airbnb, airlines, hotels) of course taps into the explorer in each of us, and most of the ads that you see are appealing to that primitive desire to explore. Airlines have long had literal status games that reward you for engagement, and it’s well known that people will go to extreme lengths to keep their premium seats and faster boarding.

• Finance apps generally use mechanisms to reward achievement: setting goals, saving more, investing better. Mint has rings to close, Venmo has semi-private social feeds, and Robinhood has, well, Wallstreet bets, the ultimate game that pits anonymous reddit users against hedge-fund veterans, or so they like to think.

• Dating apps target socializers as the primary component, but have added a layer of achievement on top with pay-to-win features (super-likes, roses, premium subscriptions for more swipes and algorithmic featuring). Tinder literally has a $500/month subscription for its highest tier members.

• Fitness apps are a combination of killers and achievers; you often have leaderboards so that the top competitors will go head to head against one another for glory (Zwift or WHOOP leaderboards), whereas those starting out on their journey might just be looking to get a streak going or lower their mile time to get that next badge (Apple Fitness rings).

Many of the common gamification “tools” that you can use to gamify your app will fall into one of these four categories too. The trick is figuring out which ones will actually enhance the experience for your users, because some could be detrimental to the core loop. For instance, if you designed a leaderboard in an educational app by proficiency instead of by time spent, that could discourage newcomers from learning because the goal will feel too far away to be achievable. Or, if you put a leaderboard in a stock-trading app by dollars earned or % returns, that could encourage more FOMO (fear of missing out) / jealousy / risk-taking behavior for people to aspire to those higher gains.

II. Types of gamification and their psychological function

1. Leaderboards (killers and achievers): These are commonly used to spur engagement through competition. The most important part is deciding what to reward in your leaderboard: skill, effort, time spent, output, etc. Traditionally competitive games like League of Legends reward pure skill (win/loss ratio), but not all consumer apps should use skill as the primary motivator. It works well for fitness (see Peloton example below), but social apps on the other hand might not benefit from a leaderboard since it would take away from the current use case for many people which is reading / socializing with their core group. For those that do want to play, there is a “mental leaderboard” of a theoretical number of subscribers / followers to aspire to.

Peloton leaderboard demo. Note that the filtering is an important feature to comp against your specific group (source)

2. Streaks (achievers, socializers): Streaks are a daily motivational behavior that create a sense of achievement from doing the habit every day, and strong loss aversion as you build up a significant streak. There are two types, singleplayer and multiplayer:

   1. The singleplayer streak is common in any daily activity - fitness, education, meditation, healthcare, etc - and can be used to reward a specific type of behavior. There are even apps like Conjure or Streaks that allow you to customize your own types of habit trackers. Games have advanced versions of streaks that serve as strong engagement and monetization vectors that other consumer apps can learn from:

      1. Battlepasses that give you rewards as you advance and will usually have a free and paid tier to increase % conversion

      2. Check-in rewards that give you different bonuses to encourage you to try out different parts of the game

      3. Come-back rewards where you get boosted rewards when you are a resurrected user that has stopped playing for a bit (increases resurrected user retention rate RURR)

      4. In general, games will have multiple “streak” type features that give a sense of achievement: user level, character level (often with multiple characters), battlepass progression, daily check-ins, beginner quests, daily challenges, and more. Just check out the home screen for Supercell’s new game Squad Busters. By the way, you can pay to maintain your “Top-5” streak if you miss a game in the Top-5; many games will do this to monetize loss aversion.

   

   Screencap from Squadbusters, note the multiple progression systems in your level, your squad levels, the book (challenges), the gem pass, and beginner challenges.

   1. Multiplayer streaks involve two or more players to work together to maintain a streak. This was primarily popularized by Snapchat in 2016, with the launch of their streaks and best friends feature. The streaks are socially reinforcing and require multiple people to participate, which was a genius design choice because if you have multiple streaks running then you have multiple people applying social pressure to sustain your engagement with the app. The best friends feature is essentially a semi-blind leaderboard, where you could tell if you’re on someone else’s list but not your exact position. This helps add some ambiguity and variance to the social game which keeps things exciting.

3. Characters and narratives (socializers, explorers): Compelling IP and stories can make players more emotionally attached to the core loop. This can be particularly engaging for socially motivated players that want to help others (including virtual companions!) or uncover mysteries.

   1. Many casual games like Merge Mansion or June’s Journey have innovated on the genre through adding IP and narrative. The core loop becomes that much more interesting when there’s a metagame on top.

   2. You may have also seen Royal Match’s “Save King Robert” interactive ads which invoke the player’s inner heroism.

   3. Duolingo’s Duo is probably the best example for a consumer app; the team has done a great job humanizing Duo and giving it a lot of personality. I mean, don’t you feel bad that you made Duo cry because you didn’t learn Spanish today?

      

      The many emotions of Duo.

4. Badges and XP (achievers): Badges and experience points (XP) are a staple in gaming used to reward players for completing specific tasks or reaching certain milestones, giving a sense of accomplishment or progression. They can be used to encourage desired behaviors or celebrate user achievements (more detail here). Headspace, for instance, grants milestone badges for minutes meditated.

5. Lives (achievers): This is a common game mechanic where players have a limited number of attempts or "lives" to complete a level or task before having to wait for a cooldown period or purchase more. This creates stakes and urgency, and mobile games also use it as a monetization technique, tuning levels to fit player skill levels and sometimes failing players right before they finish the level. Lives have to be balanced carefully for consumer apps, since they can also lead to reduced user engagement if you lose all your lives or psychologically don’t want the pressure. Duolingo employs a "hearts" system, where mistakes deplete the user's hearts, in order to discourage binge-learning and check information retention.

   1. One interesting vector for consumer apps to think about is whether they could create idle progression mechanics (AFK Arena) for monetization and retention. Banked steps in fitness games or time-based fetch quests in fashion games would be examples here.

6. Guilds / Social (socializers, achievers): Guilds, teams, or social features foster collaboration, competition, and community within an app. They appeal to both socializers who seek interaction and achievers who are motivated by group goals and recognition. Fitbit, for instance, allows users to join groups, participate in challenges, and compare stats with friends, leveraging the power of social accountability and support. Of course, these derive from the guilds of old MMORPGs like WoW, Runescape, Ultima Online, etc.

7. Likes / shares (socializers, achievers): Social validation mechanisms like likes, comments, and shares are powerful tools for driving engagement and virality, catering to those who seek validation for their contributions. Don’t think I need to give examples with this one :)

You’ll see that most of these features normally target achievers, because most apps are inherently singleplayer and thus use RPG-esque (roleplaying game) mechanics to enhance engagement. Managing your finances, booking a flight, learning a language or tracking your fitness start as singleplayer activities. That’s why a recent wave of innovation has been adding the social layer on top (e.g., Pinduoduo for fashion or Strava for fitness). What I’ll be interested to see is how apps change as they adopt deeper gamification practices and look increasingly like games themselves.

III. Markets I’m excited about

This essay got longer than I intended it to be, so I’ll cover a few areas here in brief that I’m excited to see gamified app experiences in. Each sector could be its own essay and market map!

• Healthcare: There are two areas where gamification could be useful, what I’ll define as strongform games and weakform games:

  • Strongform games: These are games that have specific clinical endpoints that they target in order to improve outcomes, which generally tend to be mental health / depression related. There are a lot of great startups I’ve met innovating here, from Hero Journey Club which conducts group therapy in Minecraft to Hedonia’s mood bloom for reducing depression to Mindforce Lab’s companion/pet game, among many more!

  • Weakform games: These take the form of gamified companion apps that work to improve patient adherence and engagement, one of the most common issues with the healthcare system. Are patients taking their medication / rehabilitation seriously? Examples are apps like MySugr or Endo Health for diabetes tracking and Noom or Plant Nanny for diet / nutrition.

• Fashion: Pinduoduo and Whatnot revolutionized the social shopping experience, making it communal and live, like a modern version of old auction houses. Meanwhile, Roblox and Fortnite are experimenting with what it means to bring fashion into a 3D digital space. While I don’t think we’ll be shopping in a 3D metaverse just yet, we already conduct a lot of our research, browsing, and shopping online (~30% of sales in Western markets). What I would be interested in is a modern take on Kim Kardashian Hollywood, Covet Fashion, Love Nikki, and other similar dress up games in a modern, multiplayer context.

• Music: Rhythm and dance games like Just Dance, Guitar Hero, and Dance Dance Revolution have been around for ages, just take a look at any asian arcade and you’ll see a wide variety of all the ways that people will mirror their actions to the music. But most music apps are still surprisingly singleplayer experiences: just read, no write, very little social. Tiktok is the biggest innovator here of course, but I’d love to see some more exploration for other game formats and music. What would be an inherently social experience that uses music as a primitive? Soundmap is a great example that combines the collection and trading of Pokemon with the familiarity of artists and songs.

• Fitness: Gamification has enormous potential in the fitness industry, as it can help users stay motivated, engaged, and consistent with their health goals (Johnson et al. conducted a systematic review of the existing literature here). Apps like Nike Run Club use a combination of challenges, badges, leaderboards, and social features to incentivize physical activity. Zombie Run! is another excellent example that overlays a narrative-driven game onto running, turning exercise into an immersive, story-driven experience. And there’s been a slew of great startups building interesting new experiences: Talofa Games, Genopets, and of course, Zwift.

• Education: Let’s end it how we began it. Researchers have found that gamification leads to statistically significant improvements in motivational, behavioral, and cognitive learning outcomes. While Duolingo has conquered the language learning market, but there are many other areas rife for disruption: mathematics, writing, science, etc. Kahoot! is another good example of gamifying learning through competitive quizzes.

And of course, there’s more than I haven’t mentioned here: productivity and finance being just a few of them. If you’re a founder building in any of these areas, let’s chat!