Ep 175| The Power of Gamification in Product Design Enhancing Experiences Across Industries

Gaming can play a significant part in our life irrespective of any age. Nobody forgets their early hood playing games like Mario, MotoGP, NFS, FIFA. So one or the other way, either in mobile or computer, we would have had experience of playing games. Everybody has a nature to play games inside them and we've been evolved in that way. There are many podcasts which I've recorded also earlier in that. But this is a very new perspective, guys, how you can really incorporate gaming in all aspects of your design career. No matter what you work in which industry, education or product design or furniture design or experience design, doesn't matter. This is going to give you a very different view of how you can use gamification in order to understand that in a more detail. Okay, so take a lot of notes. We are going to understand the science, the reason why it's important, and some statistics and different industries, how we can work and how we can exactly implement it step by step in order to create that beautiful experience for your customer. Okay, so let's jump into this podcast. Welcome to Design for Change. Thank you for staying tuning in with me, guys. First of all, gaming is an integration of many game elements, mechanics and in order to make a very engaging user experience for a different, different behavior of people. Okay, see as a product designer, how we can understand gamification is very, very crucial, guys. Why? Because it's creating a great enhancing immersive experience no matter which industry you are. Okay, so being in this podcast, I can explain you a little bit, but if you can, if you can able to recollect some of your childhood memories, some of you can think of how you played Mario, right? Think of why did you play that for hours together. How many of you here have really played that? Mario? Of course in this podcast I cannot see the live experience. I was thinking it like a zoom call, but yeah. So if you can recollect, okay, in your heart, just think about, close your eyes one second and think why did you play that game for hours? In spite of our parents restricting that, in spite of our school or colleges or vacations, we spend huge amount of time for that, right? We play. There is a game called need for Speed, Most Wanted. I mean till now there is no game which can match that kind of a storyfication, guys. It's a beautiful game. I've completed thrice. You, you won't believe. During my 10th, 11th and 12th standard, it was from 2006 to 2009. That was the epic game ever. And I mean I have not seen any game like that there are a lot of hi fi graphics game and there are a lot of games like let's say Cyberpunk and pubg and there are other games which can be like, you know, there are huge games like let's say Red Dead Redemption, God of War, GTA 5. But need for Speed is something very interesting and everybody has their own way of engaging in the games, right? So you have to understand guys in education sector gaming holds an immense potential. You have to shift your focus towards that to understand why it is really transforming that. Okay, See being a designer you have to really understand how it incorporates certain elements like points, levels, rewards in order to create that learning engagement. Have you gone into Udemy, have you gone into Skillshare, have you gone into some of the learning management platforms where people can learn through getting some points, people can get rewards, people can get some what you call point system dashboard gamification. The reason, reason being it creates a great amount of engagement for a user. Right? See if you are not given a reward for something, what we're doing, then we won't be interested, we won't be motivated enough. That's a basic inherent psychology of a human. When you play games, you cross the level, you have the completion, you have a endorphin segregated in your body that keeps you very calm. Many of the people whom I interacted with have told that they have reduced lot of stress and depression by playing hours of games. Even if they have a lot of problems in their families, in their work life, in anything. People have played 30 minutes to one hour of a game and then they completely get rid of that. Lot of people have even come out of suicide because of playing games. It is really, really interesting guys, because if you say, if you, if you understand the deeper intention why gamification needs to go into all industry is because of these reasons. It's not just we are creating some kind of a gamification, we are putting some points this, that no the impact how much it creates any industries guys, literally you can, you can like let's say if you're designing a cooking device, let's say if you're designing a payment device, let's say if you're designing a furniture, product, car, any product design or service you name, let it be digital or physical gamification can be put inside it because it holds that potential to transform the traditional learning method. Right? People can learn much faster. Like let's say if you have a cooker, okay, nobody knows how to operate a cooker because it's a very Ultra modern high cooker. Ok, so how do you really keep that device in a gamified way so that people can understand the way of using that cooker? By just seeing that maybe a voice can come and explain, maybe a small animation can come, maybe a display can explain. So I don't know how it will happen, but you as a designer can really bring that new perspective to it. Okay, let's say if you're designing a very complex equation for teaching your students, let's say if you are going to communicate a very complex system to your client, being in a design digital product, or maybe if you are designing a physical product, can you just make it in a more simplified way so that you can able to communicate? Let's say if you're in an education industry, you wanted to create some education related applications or website, your user is some teacher or a mentor who is really wants to communicate certain complex science concepts. If you are not having that perspective to simplify and gamify these things to your audience, then you can't help that tutor or a mentor or that client who wants that simplification. Okay, let's say if my client wants to, if my client's client like let's say they want to learn some mathematic formula, you are the product designer, you are the website designer there. So how do you bring small, small animations in order to bring that addition, subtraction, multiplication, division through playful games, through giving some number of balls and they can reduce the number of balls and they can learn subtraction. See, I'm just giving a small example, but it could be applied in any part of life, any part of games, any part of products or service because people will not forget that experience. See, by implementing this training programs through improving the performance, through improving the metrics and it can even improve your team building ability. It can even improve your cognitive learning ability. And gamified simulations can help employees practice more complex task. Guys, in risk free environment even you can train your professionals. So gamification is very, very significant. Guys, I already told you, in the realm of customer user experience, gamification can be a very powerful tool for increasing this engagement. You know what? Rewards like badges or maybe personalized experience like business can incentivize user to interact more frequently with their products. And you know what? The loyalty programs many times your organization offers can improve and leverage the gamification to create a sense of achievement and belonging. Okay, even if you are designing home appliances, every mundane task like laundry, dishwashing can be made more enjoyable through gamification. So have you ever understood this? Have you ever thought in that way even you can create more adrenaline rush, right? See when you go for a roller coaster, when you go and fall from the top of the roller coaster and dip 90 degree, what do you really feel more than a fear? You get a adrenaline rush, right? People pay to get that adrenaline rush. So beyond simply engaging users, gamification can create adrenaline rush and intensive emotion. Guys. It can create a gameplay by understanding the psychology behind how designers can really come into this competition way, this risk taking way, this achievement way to create the thrilling experience in your product and service. Okay, see I, I'm, I'm trying to make you view the gamification in a very, very different way. Okay? See there are some, some what you call statistics which I'll tell you because you need to understand why we are doing this, right? Hey Jagdish, it seems very fancy here, but will I really get a job? Will I have a real potential? Will I have my design skills implemented in this gamification? What end benefits you're going to get? Let me tell you guys, global gaming market was valued at $1.159 billion in 2020. So far it's projected to reach $287 billion by 2026. It's growing at a cumulative average rate of 9.7 percentage during the forecast. Yes, it's by research and markets. So mobile gaming accounts for the largest share. Guys, you know what? Because people love traveling and people love moving different places and people have a handy device that would be enough for them rather carrying their PC or Workstation or PS4 to play, right? So the revenue is expected to reach 120 billion by 2021. It's a new zoo revenue report. Gamification market size is expected to reach in 50.91 billion by 2026. This is an again an insight from Fortune Business Insights. So various people are forecasting the billion dollar industry of gaming has really evolved. You know what guys? Scientifically you need to understand what it happens to your brain. So study published in Journal of Neuroscience found that gamification can increase your dopamine, right? See why we do certain things, why we really engage in certain hours of time watching some Netflix or maybe some movies or engaging some sport or any. We have a dopamine hit, right? We have a huge dopamine hit in our brain that leads to an enhanced motivation and engagement. So capturing that dopamine, how you can reverse engineer in order to create your user for create that dopamine hit for your user by engaging in your website. Like let's say if your website is a financial transaction website, okay, how do you keep your user engaged? How do you give your user reward? How do you give your user, what is the goal? How do you create a user engagement for your user? By understanding this games, points, rewards, challenges. Let's say if your user is creating an educational program, you can create a challenge like a 30 day challenge. If one by one challenge people are completing, they'll get a reward, they'll get a certificate, they'll get a course completion badge or something. So see guys, client will not tell you this. Client will give a problem statement. This is my audience, I wanted to design a website for them. That's it, right? That's what, that's the max. The client can say it's your responsibility as a designer to go overboard, to go beyond, to go really, really in a bigger perspective to understand the psychology and behavior of your client's client, the users, what do they really need? And when you are able to tap that guys, nothing is going to stop you. Research published in Frontiers in Psychology suggests that gamified learning environments can improve cognitive abilities. It improves academic performance. It's amazing guys, you know, Falila and Riccardi 2015 reports according to a computer behavior which was done, gamification has been shown to activate brain regions associated with rewards processing positive emotions leading to a greater enjoyment and satisfaction. Hamari at 2014 reporter said that so what are you waiting for proof and scientific journals and informations are sufficiently available. If you are able to really understand why we are discussing this topic, then you will not see the same way of solving problems in your way. Let's say if it's an education sector, you can use points badges, leadership boards and knowledge system, something like that. If you, if you're in a typical product or manufacturing industry, you can use sales incentives, you can use employee onboarding programs, you can create a gamified version of training program for a machine shop. You can create a gamified version of having a team building activity. If you're designing some cooking devices or home appliances, you can create some kind of a exploration where you can create a habitual way of how people are working in a kitchen. If you want to really improve certain kind of a product design, like let's say if you're designing a fitness tracker, you can design some challenges, goals, gamification interfaces. So it could be literally going into any market. Guys, people have really proven in the last three years, okay, statistics are booming in the game market. Like anything you can read a report in New Zoo and Statista. I'll be pasting that link also here. Okay, so in next five to 10 years, everybody is going to have an emphasize on gamification potential. Guys, when it comes to government policy, when it comes to like let's say hospital, medicine, everything, it's going to have a huge impact in the gaming design. So what do you mean by that? Every industry is going to inevitably have that. Okay, so let me recollect you guys. See, I would tell you, you please experience playing some of the games. You plus experience why adults and teenagers, people are really getting involved into the games. Okay? Being a designer, you can even experiment that there is a good game called God of War. It has a very beautiful graphics and other things. If you play that game, you will get into a reality which you will really forget, which you really. After 10, 15 minutes people have told me they forgot the joystick as if they are feeling in the real world experience. Okay, you can experience a game called Red Dead redemption. It's a 19th century game. Of course the hero dies at the end, but he's a cowboy and he's what you call redeeming his mistakes and things what he did in the past and particularly this is divided into six chapters and missions. Okay? So each of the stages creates different role play. It creates a great story and then you will in fact be go into that level of suffering what the hero is really painting at. Okay? And you can play a game called gtfi. Lot of people in the office and other school colleges, a lot of stress is happening, right? So people play this in order to get the stress buster, okay? Particularly people who are going into office, they throw things this that, right? And when it comes to a huge stress and also these people really get into a big stress buster when they pay this GTA 5 game. And also in real time learning people can able to implement this kind of games to learn and complete certain missions. Let's say if your course is designed in a mission. In fact, in my program in Hackathon, I usually tell my students to complete this whole hackathon in a way of mission which my mentor taught. If you complete that to a mission, you won't feel like learning effortlessly. You will not feel like learning very consciously. You will feel effortlessly, you will learn a lot of concepts in a very short span of time and then you will have some accomplishment also at the end. And also, in fact, people really forget sleep while playing these games and then they get into a complete mode of gamification and you Know what? There is a beautiful game called Cyberpunk. Okay, the narrative of this game is in 2077 how the human world will be okay. In fact there are a lot of organ transplant will be there. There will be some future of medicine, technology, how it will be. And in that particular game, like you will be having some disease where you have to pay some currencies and you'll have to replace that entire heart or circulatory system or a digestion system, whatever. Okay? So that's the kind of future technology 2077 what people will have. So that's a depiction of that game and you can play a game called cricket 19, FIFA 19. I mean this has an individual mode also as well as a team mode also. Okay, so you can able to play that. In fact, NFS Most Wanted. I already told it's a beautiful game and it's a ever wonder game and you can play that and even you can try harder games. Okay, Outlast is a beautiful game. Like it will be in a mental asylum where you will be put in a given a torch and you'll have to navigate inside and cross that. So you can even put in a. I mean that game is a first person play. So imagine you will be really experiencing as if you're standing in that kind of real darkness. Okay, so Pubg is a beautiful game and a lot of people come together. I've seen people sitting in streets and roads and offices and playing this game. So that brings you a lot of team effort also. So people have told they've come out of this depression, they've really felt satisfied. And even some of the games like, you know, witches three people have learned a lot of good English skills by cracking exams as well. So this gives a very good understanding that people are not just enjoying and entertaining, they're also learning inherently. Okay, so all people have psychological drive to play some games, guys, okay? It improves your cognitive skills, it improves your responsive time. It eventually builds a habit of quick response and alert so that your hand, eye and leg and everything is coordinated in order to do you know what? You can play games like Counter Strike, it improves your reflex and you can play a game called Planet Coaster, particularly if you wanted to really become a good architect. This game is really enjoyable as well as you can learn lot many things in architecture. Okay, so the reason why I'm giving you this kind of suggestion is when you're able to observe closely through these games what are really kept in these games in order to keep the people engaged and hooked for a very longer point of time. You can able to copy that, you can able to decipher that, you can able to use that in your products and services in order to drive that insane thinking. Okay, I hope this podcast would have gone into you very deeply. I've gone a little long, but I'm sure that if you understand and imbibe in your product design, the way in which you design products and services will be much, much, much different than the people out there designing some products and services and all. Okay, I hope this part of podcast would have given you a great clarity. Thank you for staying tuning in with me. If you find this useful in Spotify and Apple, you can give me a best star rating. And if you need my mentorship support, learn and participate in my hackathon missions to complete in the span of six weeks to eight weeks and get a very good job in less than 10 months in 90 days, 3 months, you can very well sign up for my mentorship program. You can write that email DFC Design for Change. Me or my team will help out you and there is an eligibility process under qualification. If you're crossing that, you may even get some scholarship also enrolling in that. Okay, so thank you so much guys. Take care. All the best. Bye bye.