Understanding Player Experience Using Sequential Analysis

This paper argues that player experience cannot be fully understood through static measures such as surveys and focus groups, because the order in which players' emotional and behavioural states unfold carries meaningful information beyond their overall totals. Drawing on sequential analysis precedents from marital interaction and child-play research, the authors develop a socially grounded behavioural coding scheme covering frustration, boredom, curiosity, engagement, and engrossment. The scheme was refined through a pilot study and tested for reliability, with inter-observer agreement reaching Cohen's Kappa values between .74 and .91, suggesting it can be applied accurately and replicated by different observers.

The core empirical work is a repeated-measures study of ten participants playing two early iPhone games, one rated 6.6 by participants and one rated 4.1. The higher-rated title produced significantly more engagement, both in frequency and cumulative duration, while the weaker title elicited more frustration and curiosity, along with more frustration-to-curiosity transitions. Net positive behaviour was consistently higher for the better game from the earliest time blocks, indicating that quality differences surface quickly in observable player behaviour. The authors are candid that the small sample and short gameplay windows constrain how broadly these results can be generalized.

Looking forward, the authors propose that sequential behavioural analysis could forecast a game's market success from only a brief observation period, by correlating behavioural variables with indicators of quality. If validated, such an approach would offer considerable value to both game developers and researchers seeking early, low-cost signals of player response. The work is situated within the literature on immersion, flow, and behavioural observation methods, and its test cases are mobile titles from 2009 and 2010, reflecting the early smartphone gaming market it examines.