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jkanownik 's review for:
If you're not familiar with psychological motivations in games and are interested in the topic this is an easy book to recommend. It is a great overview of where games overlap psychology. Tons of examples of specific psychological knowledge with specific examples of how they apply to games. I've encountered a lot of these from different behavioral psychology books and my games experience and still found examples that increased my knowledge.
There are a few points that keep it from 5 stars in my mind. The author leaves a lot of loose threads where he has made connections in his mind but not explain them fully in the book. For example he talks about the Dunning-Kruger effect in tutorials and specific games, but leaves you hanging as to whether the specific games have addressed it or what the benefit would be to telling players they suck at a game earlier. I think that points to a larger organizational problem with the book. The sections seem forced and not fleshed out based on the larger topics. It feels like the book is covering a checklist of topics and a page count.
There are a few points that keep it from 5 stars in my mind. The author leaves a lot of loose threads where he has made connections in his mind but not explain them fully in the book. For example he talks about the Dunning-Kruger effect in tutorials and specific games, but leaves you hanging as to whether the specific games have addressed it or what the benefit would be to telling players they suck at a game earlier. I think that points to a larger organizational problem with the book. The sections seem forced and not fleshed out based on the larger topics. It feels like the book is covering a checklist of topics and a page count.