Reducing Extrinsic Burdens on Players of Digital Games: An Integrated Framework

Increasingly complex gameplay and gameworlds are placing greater demands on players, while grander approaches to help them cope, such as heads-up displays (HUDs), maps, notifications, and real-time statistics, may often create even more layers of complexity, and thus burdens, further detaching players from core gameplay. In this article, we distinguish between ‘intrinsic’ (fundamental to gameplay) and ‘extrinsic’ (peripheral or extraneous to gameplay) game elements, where the latter may be seen to increase burdens on players unnecessarily, subsequently affecting engagement. We propose a framework, comprising core, interaction, and interface layers, that reveals how extrinsicality may be minimised to better facilitate intrinsic gameplay and engagement.