THE VIDEO SHELF · game reward psychology
The Skinner Box - How Games Condition People to Play More - Extra Credits
An Extra Credits episode on how games use Skinner box operant conditioning and reward schedules to keep players playing and spending. It argues for more immersive design mechanics than simple reward loops.
Why HN readers recommended it
HN points to it as a short source on operant conditioning in games, loot boxes and engagement loops, with design alternatives.
This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.
Video & recommendation details
- Creator / channel
- Extra Credits
- Topic
- game reward psychology
- Format
- explainer
- Level
- intro
- HN recommenders in dataset
- 2
- HN mentions in dataset
- 5
- Recommendation years in dataset
- 2015–2019
These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.
From the original HN conversations
Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.
> time slips away It doesn't help that many modern games explicitly use Operant Conditioning to keep people playing. MMOs and "free to play" games are notorious, but you will find Skinner Boxes in a lot of modern games. Extra Credits has a nice overview, …
pdkl95 on Hacker News · 2015-09
In Playing video games can improve our livesTake a look at this video [1] for explanation, and possibly other Extra Credits videos if you're interested in game design. [1]: [VIDEO]
glogla on Hacker News · 2017-09
In Parents Who Pay to Be Watched
Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.