Biofeedback game design: using direct and indirect physiological control to enhance game interaction

  • Authors:

  • Lennart Erik Nacke;Michael Kalyn;Calvin Lough;Regan Lee Mandryk

  • Affiliations:

  • University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada;University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada;University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada;University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
  • Year:
  • 2011

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Abstract

Prior work on physiological game interaction has focused on dynamically adapting games using physiological sensors. In this paper, we propose a classification of direct and indirect physiological sensor input to augment traditional game control. To find out which sensors work best for which game mechanics, we conducted a mixed-methods study using different sensor mappings. Our results show participants have a preference for direct physiological control in games. This has two major design implications for physiologically controlled games: (1) Direct physiological sensors should be mapped intuitively to reflect an action in the virtual world; (2) Indirect physiological input is best used as a dramatic device in games to influence features altering the game world.