I watched the online course "Gamification and Behavioral Design: Eight Core Powers to Create Attraction": Gamification Design, from Knowing to Doing

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When hearing the word “game”, whether it is a child or an adult, the corners of their mouths will unconsciously curl up and their eyes will light up. Yes, we all love games!

Wikipedia tells us that the so-called game can refer to both a type of entertainment activity and the process of this activity. The main components of the game include purpose, rules, challenges and interactions.

Why do people like games? Because games generally have psychological or physical stimulation, many games can develop related skills and have physical, educational, simulation or psychological significance. Games have been part of human experience since 2600 BC and have appeared in all cultures. Games such as Ur Royal Game, Senet and Boqi are all games with a long history.

French sociologist [Roger Queiros](https://zh.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E7%BE%85%E5%82%91%C2%B7%E5%87%B1%E6%B4%9 B%E6%96%AF&action=edit&redlink=1) in his book “Games and People” (Les jeux et les hommes) defined play as an activity with the following characteristics:

• Fun: The game has relaxing features
• Independent: has a special place and time
• Uncertain: The outcome of the activity is unpredictable
• Unproductive: Participants cannot receive substantial compensation
• Bound by rules: The game has its own rules, which are different from those in ordinary daily life
• Fiction: Participants know this is different from reality

I believe that friends who usually play games must be familiar with the above features. Having said that, because everyone loves to play games, many experts and scholars have tried to learn from games and developed the concept of “gamification”.

The Essence of Gamification and the Octagonal Framework

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Photo by Filios Sazeides on Unsplash

According to Wikipedia, gamification refers to the use of game design elements and game mechanisms in non-game fields to enable players to solve problems and increase their contributions. It hopes that when people enjoy life, companies can also benefit. Through gamification techniques, companies, gamification designers (us), and end users can achieve a win-win situation through some gamification designs.

Gamification has its origins and has a history of at least more than ten years. Many companies have integrated game elements into their products or services and have achieved good results. For example, Jesse, deputy director of digital technology at USA Network Redniss](http://venturebeat.com/2011/01/21/usa-network-scores-with-gamification-on-psych-tv-show/?utm_source=feedburner& utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Venturebeat+(VentureBeat)), once revealed that adding games to the website is a good marketing strategy, because in addition to the increase in the number of visitors, most visitors’ stay time on the website will also increase accordingly.

Gamification is a kind of “Human-Focused Design”.

The concept or logic of gamification seems simple, but it contains many profound principles. Although everyone knows that the so-called gamification is to put game design elements and principles into non-game content. But how to do it? In fact, it’s still a big question. Fortunately, in the past few years, we have seen that Business Week Publishing has introduced the masterpiece “Gamification Practical Book: Gamification Master Teaches You to Turn Work, Teaching, Fitness, Marketing, Product Design… into games” by Chinese-American author Zhou Yukai. The more fun it is, the more attractive it will be! ”, through the systematic guidance of this book, everyone can have a glimpse of the secrets.

Zhou Yukai Chuangfa [Octalysis] (https://yukaichou.com/gamification-examples/octalysis-complete-gamification-framework/) (Octalysis) combines game design theory, motivational psychology and behavioral economics to classify human behavioral motivations into eight core motivations to design interesting, attractive and endlessly enjoyable experiences!

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Photo by yukaichou.com

The learning process from books to online courses

I still remember the time when “The Complete Book of Gamification Practice: Gamification Masters Teach You to Turn Work, Teaching, Fitness, Marketing, Product Design… into games, the more fun they are, the more attractive they will be!” 》This book was very expensive in Luoyang when it was released. It immediately aroused the attention of related industries and was also sought after by many readers! I still remember that time, not only the HPX reading club community that I participated in, but also organized several reading clubs to read ” A complete book on gamification practice》.

Although this book is quite detailed, I thought while reading it: It would be even better if the author could help guide the reading or provide analysis on certain cases while reading!

Well, I wonder if my “wishes” have come true? Recently, I actually heard that MasterTalks introduced the online course “Gamification and Behavior Design: Gamification Octagonal Framework Decrypted”. What’s even better is that this course is taught by Yu-Kai, a world-renowned expert who has lectured at Stanford University, Google, Lego, Boston Consulting Group and TEDx and the creator of the Gamification Octagonal Framework. Chou) is responsible for teaching.

Students in this course will be able to understand how the brain works and how behavioral design can be applied to different aspects of life, such as fundraising, sales, team motivation, parenting, teaching, and relationships. Specifically, students will be able to use what they have learned to identify the difference between white hat motivation (which provides strong motivation but lacks a sense of urgency) and black hat motivation (which provides a sense of urgency, fascinates but also exhausts people), and learn to judge which motivation principle to choose in what situations.

As soon as I saw the information about this online course, I wanted to buy it. Because although I have already read the “Complete Book of Gamification Practice: Gamification Masters Teach You to Turn Work, Teaching, Fitness, Marketing, Product Design… into games, the more fun they are, the more attractive they will be!” ](https://www.books.com.tw/exep/assp.php/vista/products/0010753821?utm_source=vista&utm_medium=ap-books&utm_content=recommend&utm_campaign=ap-202012)》I have read this book several times, but the understanding I can get from just reading the written materials is ultimately different from the author’s personal guidance.

Later, I was very lucky to get [Free Course Experience] (https://www.facebook.c) provided by MasterTalks and HPX Book Club om/groups/hpx.bookclub/permalink/4325874517439329/) gave me the opportunity to start reading the online course “[Gamification and Behavioral Design: Decryption of the Gamification Octagonal Framework] (https://mastertalks.tw/products/gamification)”. Here, please allow me to thank MasterTalks and HPX Book Club again.

Well, let’s get down to business.

Course Structure and Practical Application

As a professional lecturer who has also developed online courses, compared to my curiosity about the content of this online course, I pay more attention to the course structure and what problems does this online course “[Gamification and Behavior Design: Gamification Octagonal Framework Decrypted] (https://mastertalks.tw/products/gamification)” want to solve?

For myself, I have always been interested in the field of gamification, and I am also looking forward to applying it in corporate teaching and [e-commerce retail](https://www.cyberbiz.co/blog/%E6%89%93%E9%80%A0%E7%94%A8%E6%88%B6%E4%B8%8A%E7%99%AE%E7%9A%84% E9%81%8A%E6%88%B2%E5%8C%96%E8%A1%8C%E9%8A%B7%E7%AD%96%E7%95%A5%EF%BC%8 1%E7%9C%8B%E6%98%9F%E5%B7%B4%E5%85%8B%E5%A6%82%E4%BD%95%E9%81%8A/) and other categories. So from the course syllabus, I learned that this online course spends a lot of space talking about the gamification octagonal framework; but to be honest, if this course only introduces these frameworks, then buying a book and reading it is enough. But what’s interesting is that I was able to see from the video Chou Yukai talking about his knowledge and understanding of gamification, and how to apply gamification to various products or services. Well, these are the real value of this online course.

For example, when talking about humanized design and [functional design](h ttp://www.naipo.com/Portals/1/web_tw/Knowledge_Center/Laws/US-117.htm), Zhou Yukai mentioned some real cases, which inspired me a lot. In addition, in the third chapter, he mentioned how to use the octagonal framework to create a gamification experience from scratch. This part also helped me a lot! There is also the design case study of Octalysis Prime, which is also quite interesting to read.

As an aside, I saw on the course introduction page that a friend signed by Xue Weiming left this course evaluation:

The whole book “Gamification Practice” is basically a master’s thesis, and this class is basically a thesis oral examination report!

Well, this description is not only interesting, but also appropriate. After reading this online course “[Gamification and Behavior Design: Eight Core Powers to Create Attraction] (https://mastertalks.tw/products/gamification)”, I have a deeper understanding of gamification. Any knowledge must go through many attempts from knowing it to doing it, especially gamification design that is closely related to human nature.

What Gamification Really Means

In recent years, many people have heard of gamification, but they have also misunderstood the true meaning of gamification: they think that as long as game elements such as points and achievements are added to the product development process, consumers or players will definitely be favored. In fact, gamification has methods and frameworks that can be followed. It does not mean that making a product or service “very fun” will be effective.

Gamification does not mean turning everything into a game, but properly applying game elements and game design techniques to non-game environments.

After reading this online course by Zhou Yukai, I have a deeper understanding of gamification. If you are interested in gamification like me, Welcome to join me as a classmate of Online Course and Reading Club!

Let us immerse ourselves in the world of gamification together, create charming products or services with game characteristics, and then find the shining corner in the subtleties of human nature.

Life has taken on a completely different look since I saw life as a game. ──Zhou Yukai

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