A Grounded Analysis of Player-Described Board Game Immersion

Timea Farkas; Sarah Wiseman; Paul Antony Cairns; Rebecca Fiebrink

doi:10.1145/3410404.3414224

A Grounded Analysis of Player-Described Board Game Immersion

Timea Farkas, Sarah Wiseman, Paul Antony Cairns, Rebecca Fiebrink

Computer Science

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution

Abstract

Substantial research has explored the experience of immersion in digital games, but it is unclear whether this phenomenon extends to other game genres such as board games.
Immersion is a concept widely discussed in the board game
community by both developers and players and yet there is
relatively little research in the area. This paper presents a
grounded theory analysis of board game players’ online discussions of immersion. This data is augmented by interviews
with five board game players describing their experiences
of immersion. The resultant analysis highlights that board
game players discuss immersion in terms of both engrossment in the challenge of the game, and submergence within
the game world the board game creates. We also focus on
elements of game play which players reported in helping
and hindering their immersion; importantly these elements
do not always come from the game itself. We conclude that
board game immersion shares similarities with the literature
on immersion in digital games, despite the lack of multimedia
interaction

Original language	English
Title of host publication	Proceedings of ACM CHI Play 2020
Publisher	ACM
Pages	427-437
Number of pages	11
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1145/3410404.3414224
Publication status	Published - 2 Nov 2020

Bibliographical note

This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. Further copying may not be permitted; contact the publisher for details.

Access to Document

10.1145/3410404.3414224

Farkas_CHIPLay2020
This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. Further copying may not be permitted; contact the publisher for details.
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Farkas_CHIPlay2020Accepted author manuscript, 724 KB

Cite this

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title = "A Grounded Analysis of Player-Described Board Game Immersion",

abstract = "Substantial research has explored the experience of immersion in digital games, but it is unclear whether this phenomenon extends to other game genres such as board games.Immersion is a concept widely discussed in the board gamecommunity by both developers and players and yet there isrelatively little research in the area. This paper presents agrounded theory analysis of board game players{\textquoteright} online discussions of immersion. This data is augmented by interviewswith five board game players describing their experiencesof immersion. The resultant analysis highlights that boardgame players discuss immersion in terms of both engrossment in the challenge of the game, and submergence withinthe game world the board game creates. We also focus onelements of game play which players reported in helpingand hindering their immersion; importantly these elementsdo not always come from the game itself. We conclude thatboard game immersion shares similarities with the literatureon immersion in digital games, despite the lack of multimediainteraction",

author = "Timea Farkas and Sarah Wiseman and Cairns, {Paul Antony} and Rebecca Fiebrink",

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