New Ideas for Gamified Applications: Focus on Long-term User Retention

Over the years, gamified applications have achieved some success in driving user engagement in the short term, but most have failed to achieve long-term retention. This is mainly because they overlook the core principles behind excellent game design - user retention.

Successful video games like "World of Warcraft" and "Candy Crush" have been able to attract players for over 10 years because their mechanics align with users' intrinsic motivations. These games provide players with a long-term growth path by establishing feedback loops, teaching, and rewarding users.

Today, many outstanding applications have integrated these game design principles into their core product design. These game-like experiences provide users with enjoyment and cultivate long-term usage habits. This category of applications spans multiple fields, including productivity, social networking, finance, mental health, and education.

Motivation, Mastery, and Feedback

Although there are different views on "what a game is," most people agree on three core principles:

1. Motivation: Why do users want to use your app?
2. Mastery: What are the rules and systems of application?
3. Feedback: How do users learn these rules?

Let’s take a look at a few cases that successfully apply these principles.

motive

Most game designers currently agree with the Self-Determination Theory, which posits that behavior can stem from intrinsic or extrinsic motivations.

Extrinsic motivation comes from external sources, such as monetary rewards or commands from others.

Intrinsic motivation stems from innate psychological needs, such as the desire for autonomy (, the desire for competence ) to control outcomes, and the desire for relatedness ( to connect with others ).

Most games focus on intrinsic motivation, viewing it as the most effective and long-lasting driving force for behavior. Taking the opening of the classic sci-fi action game "Mega Man X" as an example, players will encounter the powerful enemy Vile and be defeated within the first 5 minutes of the game.

However, the player did not see "Game Over", but was saved at the last moment by a red robot named Zero. Zero, clad in magnificent armor, claimed that the player would eventually become powerful, "even possibly as strong as I am."

This design cleverly stimulates the player's intrinsic motivation, encouraging players to set two goals:

1. Become as powerful as Zero
2. Defeat Vile

These goals constitute the "victory conditions" of the game and are motivating because they directly enhance the player's ability ( to become stronger ) and autonomy ( to decide how to achieve ).

More importantly, players are motivated to continue playing without the need for any gamification tactics, no badges, and no points. Players act to achieve their self-defined goals, and the game provides them with the tools to accomplish those goals. This design aligns the product with intrinsic needs.

Many gamified applications fail to grasp this key principle. Instead, they view the accumulation of badges or points as the goal in itself. Without intrinsic motivation to support them, these mechanisms ultimately become shallow external drivers, quickly leading to user fatigue.

( proficient

Cognition is the second key principle of game design. A player motivated by the condition of winning is ready to learn the game rules. In the case of Mega Man X, these rules include the control scheme ) on how to move and attack ### and the behavior patterns of enemies. These rules show players how to win: a gradual path to mastery.

Mastery is an important component of every activity, related to the intrinsic need for ability. People want to improve their skills in the process of engaging in activities, whether it's learning a new sport or playing a game. Of course, they also expect the process of mastery to be fair, and progress should be based on skill and choice, rather than luck.

Game designers often struggle to find the right balance of difficulty, not too hard and not too easy. A well-crafted game can create a flow state, allowing users to be highly focused on the present, making time fly by.

Non-gaming products are the same. For example, painting or playing a challenging guitar piece often also leads to a flow state.

Combining intrinsic motivation with a balanced mastery path is crucial for maintaining learning effectiveness. As long as the rules are fair and the goals seem achievable, users are likely to persist. A common mistake in gamified applications is to merely celebrate the use of systems for tracking mastery, such as levels, experience, and badges, without providing real challenges or mastery pathways.

( Feedback

Feedback is the third key design principle, which refers to how users learn the rules of the application.

The best games teach through repeated cycles of clear cause and effect. For example, "Super Mario" teaches players through the feedback loop of death.

As soon as the game starts, an enemy Goomba appears. If the Goomba touches Mario, he will die and respawn, but only go back 3 seconds. This brief, harmless loop encourages players to experiment until they find out they can jump over or stomp on the Goomba.

Iterative loops also provide positive feedback to players. For example, "Candy Crush" celebrates players matching 3 candies of the same color with spectacular explosion effects. The game also incorporates randomness, surprising players with unexpected outcomes. When players link matched candies, they appear on the screen in layers, so fast that they are difficult to track, creating delightful moments of unexpected appearances like fireworks, fish, and lightning.

Excellent designers usually assume that users will not read the manual, but instead design products in a "learning by doing" manner, setting up iterative feedback loops along the way. These loops help guide users in progressing towards mastery, ultimately achieving their goals. Few gamified applications can establish feedback loops as naturally as the examples mentioned above.

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Game-like, not gamified

For many years, the three core design principles of motivation, mastery, and feedback ( MMF ) have far exceeded the gaming field. In the 1990s, the renowned design company IDEO incorporated them into human-centered design. Today, many of the most popular consumer goods and enterprise applications utilize MMF in their core design.

( social application

Many popular social networks are gamified applications. Apps like Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok directly tap into users' intrinsic motivations. Users express their autonomy ) when creating content and establish connections ### with others. There is also an optional mastery path where users can strive to attract fans and receive feedback in the form of likes.

Clubhouse further embraces randomness. The app creates joyful moments by allowing users to enter live rooms, recreating the feeling of "bumping into" friends. Top hosts can allow other users to co-host or enhance public speaking skills.

It is worth noting that these social applications have abandoned points or badges, yet they possess strong long-term user retention, which is a hallmark of gamified experiences.

( productivity tools

The new generation of productivity software is more like games rather than tools. The browser-based IDE Repl.it and the collaborative design tool Figma have introduced multiplayer modes for coding and design respectively. Developers can collaborate in real time, comment, and learn from each other, and this "human element" makes these software more interesting than traditional single-user operations.

The email application Superhuman is also a prime example of gamification. Under the leadership of former game designer Rahul Vohra, Superhuman sets a goal for users to achieve inbox zero and provides detailed controls and rules to help users complete tasks. When users reach "zero" inbox, Superhuman displays a daily changing high-definition nature landscape image and tracks the number of consecutive days users have achieved, reinforcing the path to mastery.

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) mental health app

Forest is a gamified application that enhances productivity and mental health, with over 6 million paying users. It turns staying focused into a game.

Users begin focused training by planting a virtual tree. The tree grows while they work, and if they leave the app early, the tree will wither. The withered tree serves as negative visual feedback, discouraging users from getting distracted. Successfully maintaining focus nourishes the tree, and users can plant in their personal forest, where the lushness of the forest displays the user's focus achievements ###. This is one way to mastery (.

Forest hopes to cultivate users' long-term habits around "being present" and "being mindful."

![a16z Partner: The Most Successful Applications are Packaged Games])https://img-cdn.gateio.im/webp-social/moments-c679df0b3cbfc86f801486b70e4d689a.webp###

( Financial Applications

Chime's automatic savings account turns saving money into a game. Chime sets clear savings goals for users and designs a complete process to help achieve them.

The Chime debit card rounds the transaction amount to the nearest dollar and automatically transfers it to a savings account. This savings amount varies with each transaction and is prominently displayed on the app's home page, providing users with a pleasant surprise.

By adding an element of randomness, Chime makes the traditionally tedious task of reviewing bank statements more enjoyable. This positive feedback loop reinforces savings goals and helps users develop good habits. Over time, users may even feel motivated to save outside of Chime.

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) fitness app

Zombies, Run and Strava are gamified personal fitness apps that make running and cycling more enjoyable.

Zombies is an audio application where users play as survivors during a zombie outbreak. The app motivates users to run by setting target tasks like finding supplies or escaping zombies ###. Users win by reaching specific speeds or distances. The app tracks each run, sends daily progress reports, and celebrates milestones and task completions.

Strava adopts a similar goal-setting and feedback loop, adding social elements. Strava maintains leaderboards for users' running or cycling activities, allowing users to see their progress relative to peers. When users run faster, they can see themselves rise in real-time on the leaderboard. The leaderboard itself does not have intrinsic motivational value, but it works well in Strava because competition is a natural competitive activity, and users want to compare themselves with their peers.

Education Application

Duolingo is a popular game-like language learning app. It sets language learning goals for users and recommends studying for 15 minutes a day to achieve proficiency.

The courses are divided into short, easily achievable levels, similar in length to mobile game stages. The course is well-designed to help users achieve a state of flow. Each lesson mixes new and old words and adjusts based on user performance. If the course seems too easy, new words will be introduced, and vice versa.

Duolingo also tracks users' consecutive learning days and sends reminders when they maintain continuity. This helps in keeping the learning habit.