Origins of the Theory

Up to this point in the book, you should have a fairly good understanding of how White Hat and Black Hat Core Drives function. In this chapter we will discuss when and how to use them for optimal motivational systems.

Though every single Core Drive in the Octalysis Framework has been researched and written about individually (including the differences between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation), I believe my work on White Hat versus Black Hat Gamification theory is fairly original and provides a unique design perspective.

I began developing the White/Black Hat concepts while I was studying the Endgame Phase of different games. I became curious as to why the majority of successful games were obsessively addictive for many months, and then experience a huge user dropout with large numbers of players moving on with their lives.

On the other hand, I looked at how a few games such as Poker, Chess, Mahjong, and even Crossword Puzzles stood the test of time and never...