Journal of Advanced & Applied Sciences (JAAS)

Volume 03, Issue 02, Pages 51-58, 2015

ISSN: 2289-6260

Gamification
Pulasthi.D.Gunawardhana a,*, Sellappan Palaniappan b
a,*Department of IT, School of Science and Engineering, Malaysia University of Science and Technology (MUST), Kelana Jaya,
PJ, Selangor, Malaysia
b Department of IT, School of Science and Engineering, Malaysia University of Science and Technology (MUST), Kelana Jaya,

PJ, Selangor, Malaysia

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +60-1112329209;

E-mail address: pulasthi_dg87@yahoo.com

Abstract

Keywords: Technology is evolving fast and such evolutions are spread all over the world very quickly. One
such evolution witnessed reserved in the gaming world is “Gamificacion”. Gamification is much
Gamification, different than the usual digital game we are familiar with. It moves more freely in the
Digital games, educational game technology. This article cover the background and overview of the
Education. gamification, its differences with the usual educational games and discussion about the
achievement of gamification to education.

Accepted: 11 April2015 © Academic Research Online Publisher. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction techniques in non-gaming frameworks also contribute

Since the day that digital game was invented there are a
large number of digital games with a lot of variety
which are available both as online games and arcade
games. Different companies around the world produce
different types of digital games. In this background
gamification is an area which is constantly growing. It
is a new stream in the educational digital games arena,
but it still has a long way to go with more research to
be done. Gamification creating effects on the non-
gaming field such as education, healthcare, marketing,
etc. As the gamification create techniques which are
dynamic and convenient they can be easily attached to
the industry. It is a procedure which make student to
think and act logically. At the same time gamification
to solve problems as well.
Gamification, serious games and educational games are
different type of games which were developed to
achieve different results. Generally gamification can be
used to reasonably control, motivate and encourage the
game player. It is however a mistake to believe that
various element in gamification is sufficient to form a
perfect game though there are gameification
mechanisms that can be used to build proper
gamifications. Gamification is a good tool that can be
used to boost and awaken the hidden knowledge and
skills in achieving educational goals.

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2.1 What is Gamification?
At the start of the discussion, I would like to find out
what exactly is known as “Gamification”. The term
“Gamification” is recent introduction to the digital
industry. Since the industry is constantly growing,
various researchers have different definitions about
gamification. According to the previouse research
articles and journals which I have referre, gamification
is a digital game that support educating a person.
Therefore we see different views expressed by different
researchers when defining gamification.
When reviewing research articles related to
gamification I have found that most of the studies
indicate positive results. In 2010 a research conducted
by Gabe Zichermann has found gamification as “the
process of using game thinking and game Mechanics to
engage audiences and solve problems” [1]. And also
two researches names Zichermann and Cunnigham also
defines gamification as; “The use of game-thinking and
game mechanics to engage users and solve problems”
[2]. Then in 2012 two researchers named Werbach and
Hunter have mentioned that the gamification is a more
interesting and effective digital games when attached to
business application [3]. Once again Zichermann and
his colleague Linder define gamifiaction as; “Funware
is the art and science of turning your customer‘s
everyday interactions into games that serve your
business purposes” [4]. The key purpose of the
gamification is that it is used in non-gaming context
like developing methods and techniques which drives
the user engagement. These gamifications are only use
for the use of education and or training. Once again
many have done a lot of research in this aspect and the
key element they have applied into are the purpose of
improving user engagement, find out the quality of the
available data, entertainment aspect, teaching quality
and quality of the information system.
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Word gamification is about how certain learning
process turn in to joyful experience with digital games.
There is one common definition which all the
researchers agree upon. That is the consumption of
game design thinking and mechanisms to drive user
participation. At present the interest for this subject is
growing as it move along with the new technology.
The salient features of the gamification are its element
that can be used as a motivational factor and rewards of
which the user depend upon. Gamification is the
treatment of topics which rules ideas, decisions and
action rather than its contents that go with it. Therefore
gamification can bre treated as gaming with set of
principles and techniques which includes educational
factors.
2.2 Different Between Digital Games &
Gamification
People have difficulty in identifying the difference
between Digital Games and Gamification. Before
comparing the main features, it is worthwhile to see
what previous researchers have said. In 2003 researcher
named Juuls says, that Digital Game is, “A digital
game is a rule-based formal system with a variable and
quantifiable outcome, where different outcomes are
assigned different values, the player exerts effort in
order to influence the outcome, the player feels
attached to the outcome, and the consequences of the
activity are optional and negotiable” [5]. In 2011 group
of researcher define gamification as, “the use of video
game elements (rather than full-fledged games) to
improve user experience and user engagement in non-
game services and applications” [6]. The table 1 show
you the differences between the digital games and
gamification.
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Table 1 Differences between Digital Games and Gamification

Digital Games Gamification

Define through Rules and objectives Defined using reward and collection of points

There is a possibility of winning and losing Losing is not possible as by giving point its player is
motivated to win the game

Games are complicated and expensive Gamification are not complicated and not expensive.

Content based on a story or scene. Features added without any content

can buy these point. According to the point’s

3. Gamification Mechanism & Design Elements collection, it is easy for the teachers to identify the
weak student and the area which the weakness is
3.1 Mechanism evident.

In this section, the discussion is on the four main areas Reward

which we have to pay attention in developing a This is another method of encouraging the player to
flourishing game. Especially in an educational digital spend more time with the game. Once the player
game. The key areas are; complete the given task or the particular stage
 Points successfully player will be rewarded. As to the
 Rewards gamification theory these rewards must be non-
 Badges monetary and the player is not given points for his

 Lead Boards success either. But when the student get a higher score
in a test or an exam they will be rewarded by way of

Points recognising his achievement by the class teacher or

Points are the key currency of the game. To earn points from the school itself. This will have more opportunity

player has to work hard and achieve the given task. As and chances of getting rewards by successful

nature of human being is to collect more resource and player/student.

valuable things. So this aspect works very well in

gamification as well when the Badges
In gamification, badging method is adopted to

player is keen on adding points. Point allocation is highlight the player’s competencies. This will enable

great method to illustrate players’ progress and other players to recognise his/her competencies and

capacity compared to other players. This will help rank talent of a particular game. In gamification players are

the player position too. The point system make player a able to earn their badges by playing the game with their

highly motivational one and it is very effective as well. achievements. Badges symbolise player’s profile,

These points are not just an indicator to show the achievement records, and they are responsible features

progress of the player because sometimes the player to maintain the challenges in a particular game.

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Lead Boards
Another noticeable feature in gamification is Lead
board. Through this the progress made by each player
in a particular game and their achievements are shown.
The collection of points and badges will be notify here.
By collecting points and badges and by displaying
them on a leader board, player by himself/herself could
improve their ranks as well as getting recognised by
other game players. It will also help the player or team
to adopt new techniques to get on top of the Lead
Board. When the player is found to be in a lower
position of the lead board, necessary measures could be
adopt to encourage the player to go up in lead board
and improve his/her ranking. This lead board
encourage the player to drive a sense of fulfilment and
go for target rewards and motivates them to finish the
game successfully.
Quests
All most all gamification content are “Quest”. Super
Mario, Angry Bird are some of the examples. Quest
lead the player to achieve the given task by
himself/herself. Nearly most of the action which
involves achieving a tangible target or goals are quests.
3.2 Design Elements
As for the gamification theory, to develop a proper
game, there are three main elements which should
attached to the game. These three elements listed and
discussed below;
Rules - There should be assigned rules to play the
game. These rules should be clear, fair and achievable.
The game developer should formulate rules which are
simple and easy to understand. All the players should
know of what they are playing, etc.
Goal - As the second element, the game developer
should create a goal for the player to achieve. If
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developer can create an attractive and interesting goal,
then the player will be more motivate to play that
particular game and achieve the set of goal.
Feedback System - There should be a good feedback
system attach to the game. Feedback will motivate the
player to fully interestingly himself/herself in a game
and the player could know what areas player should
improve. As I have explain earlier, mechanism
feedback is also rewarding feedback which motivate
the player to get himself/herself more involved in the
game. Therefore the game developer should make sure
to reward the player with positive and valuable
experience.
In order to build a proper gamefication we need to
identify the elements. These are known as the building
blocks of the gamification. Reeves and Read have once
noted that there are, “Ten Ingredients of Great Games”
[7]. Those ten ingredients are;
1. 3D Environment
2. Descriptive Background
3. Feedback
4. Ranks and Levels
5. Marketplace
6. Competition
7. Rules
8. Communication method which will be easy to
configure
9. Time Pressure
10. Team
These elements will be picked by the game designer
according to the need of the game. Thereafter, these
elements should be merged with various conditions
required of a game in gamification. In 2005 Juuls said
that “a game is a rule-based formal system with a
variable and quantifiable outcome, where different
outcomes are assigned different values, the player
exerts effort in order to influence the outcome, player
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feels attached to the outcome, and the consequences of
the activity are optional and negotiable” [8]. In this
scenario it is evident that the ten element we have
mentioned above not only stand for gamification but
are valid for all types of digital games.
4. Gamification on Education
When gamification is connected to education, it can be
beneficial for both student and teacher. When we
gamification is added to a school syllabus, the learning
process will be very much easy for student as they can
learn difficult subjects with an element of
entertainment attached to it. It will help the student to
memories their subject easily. Teachers or lecturers
could make the student to get involve more freely in
their lessons interestingly and actively without having a
trouble when they are given games as a part of their
learning process. Gamification help to level-up
student’s knowledge and experience by providing
information and by allowing the student to get involve
with games. That method will help the student to
practise and understand difficult lessons easily and
quickly. Therefore gamification is a different
experience when compared traditional teaching
method.
Many researchers and educationist have done a
considerable amount of studies related to gamification.
Two researchers by the names Gee and Prensky have
noted that the gamification is potential learning tool
which highly motivate for students. They have
highlighted many advantages one can drive by
implementing gamification for educational purposes
since gamification promote, self-learning, logical
thinking, dynamic learning, motivation, team-spirit,
etc. A group of researchers in their finding have noted
that the previous research documented have confirm
that the educational process coupled with gamification,
take the most actions into reality, even though gaming
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system support to detect and validating its activities,
progress, communicating and cooperating with other
players as well [9]. When we introduce gamification
into school curriculum, it will indicate that game
elements will drive students to learn their studies
properly, accurately and more interestingly. In 2013
three researchers named Klemke, Kelle together with
Specht have conducted a research regarding
gamification on education. They have insulated two
game mechanism and applied them to the curriculum
with four different students groups. One group with no
gaming mechanism, second and third group with only
one gaming mechanism and the last group with both
gaming mechanism were applied. At the end they have
found that the group which played the game with two
gamification mechanism had gained much knowledge
than other three groups. Group two and three which
had one mechanism have gained knowledge when
comparing to group one, but compared to the last group
which had two mechanism got pretty much knowledge
than group two and three [10]. According to research
published by Werbach and Hunter which was
conducted in Rochester Institute of Technology 90% of
the student who were involved in the game, which had
badges and lead board mechanism have passed the
course with good marks. Another batch of student were
given the same game without the above two
mechanism have not shown same good results.
4.1 Educational Characteristic on Gamification
In order to get through the concept of gamification we
have to identify the literacy aspect involved in it. This
aspect was explained by the famous educational games
and gamification research J.P Gee in one of his
research. According to him there are five principal we
can see in a good gamification. They are;
1. It should have a proficiency to characterising
the player and his/her responsibilities. Time
management is also important. At the same
 Pulasthi G. et al. / Journal of Advanced & Applied Sciences (JAAS) 3 (2): 51-58, 2015
time maintaining motivation to keep the game
interact to achieve the educational task is also
important.
2. Should deliver necessary information on the
player when required, within given
framework, in this occasion the class-room. It
is the human nature that, we need to work
hard to remember that much information
which is applied in its framework.
3. In gamefication it contain a setup to play for
the student players with their basic knowledge
on particular subject and it need to allow them
to make abstractions which will enable them
to sort more multifaceted problems.
4. These gamification mechanism change players
into creators, and not an ordinary receptor.
Gamification’s effect to build such creations.
5. It produces a cycle of mastery, which mean
that the players should practice more and the
game automatically level up that player to the
specific task he/she has to carry out. Once
this archived, the cycle continues to another
level with more difficult task. [10]
As a consequence, many of these features will help the
player to select gamification as an educational tool and
build relevant skills in schools or other institutions.
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4.2 Educational Gamification Guidelines
A group of researchers once noted that gamification
mechanism (Points, Reward, Badges, Lead Boards and
quest) are the popular educational factors which can be
used in gamification. At the same time there is the
gamification mechanism which goes through the
gamified procedure. However two researchers have
identified some guidelines to build a proper
gamification.
 Giving the player trialling period.
 Attaching feedback cycle method.
 Adjusting the gaming task depends on the
players skills.
 Increasing the level and the gaming task step
by step into difficult level by giving chance to
the player/ student to improve their skills.
 Breaking difficult levels/task into several sub
levels/tasks.
 Giving options to complete the difficult tasks
in a different manner.
 Reward for the successful player and
appreciate it through the lead board. [15]
Apart set of researchers have come out with a set of
properties which may cause to be effective in
educational gemification. These properties have been
briefly explained table 2;
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Table 2: Properties of educational gemification

Properties Description
Learnability Player’s capacity to read the game and be the master of the game.
Motivation The game features which inspire the player to understand particular actions
and continue it until he/she finish the task/level.
Education Educational features and the capability of the player to recognize and
achieve the educational goals.
Satisfaction The joy gained from taking on a complete video game or from some facet
of it.
Compassionate If the particular game has the ability to motivate the player for the learning
objectives and encourage him/her to learn while playing the game.
Effectiveness Gamification should give good experience for its players by fun and
learning to achieve educational target.

5. Conclusion
We have discussed about the definition the previous
researcher and educators on gamification through their
past research studies. We have discussed the
connection that gamification has as an educational tool.
In traditional educational methods some students still
fail to tackle difficult subjects, but under gamification
there are student tend to learn difficult subjects more
than effectively.
There are number of gamification mechanism are
available in this field. Anyhow we need to understand
that the gamification design task has to be carried out
with common gamification mechanisms such as Points,
Rewards, Badges, Lead boards and quests. To build a
successful application, games designers have to
anticipate the following guidelines including the
gamification mechanism and techniques. And the same
time gamification designers should understand that in-
order for them to introduce successful educational
gamification, they need to follow education
gamification characteristics and guidlines.
Acknowledgement
Though this article based on my PhD research, I would
like to take this opportunity to pass my gratitude and
appreciation to everyone who supported me especially
my PhD research Tutor, Professor P. Sellappan for
guiding me to make it success one.
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