Do you guys know GetGlue? I saw a friend of mine was using it (on Facebook). It's another example of 'gamification' or rather 'badgification'. This tool rewards you for sites you visit, books and movies you buy, etc. It's a pity most gamification concepts don't come across just rewarding people with points and badges. They forget that in a game people also have to make sacrifices and put effort in to things before actually being rewarded. They have to put lives at stake (!) to achieve their goals, for instance saving the princess from a barrel-throwing monkey, with only 2 lives left...
In Foursquare they recently changed the ruleset which totally made the concept redundant. You can now check in from where ever you are into what ever place you want!? Wasn't the fun in Foursquare that you actually had to 'be there'...? In that case being able to see 'who else was there'...?
My best friend (you know who you are!) recently stole the mayor badge of my OWN HOUSE off me, checking in every day from HIS house, which is about 30 kilometers from my house... I have never felt so bad and I never checked in anywhere else afterwards. One lesson that the developers of Foursquare (and other so-called gamification concept developers) need to learn is that your ruleset has to be realistic, righteous and consequent (consistent in English I guess).
The feedback system is not the only element of a game, there is also goals, variables to achieve your goals, rules to limit your options and a reward - or - feedback system.
So please - when you are developing a good gamification concept, bare in mind these things. Use the basic drivers people have to develop your concept, then look at specific context-related behavior and activitites that consumers display. You can read more about our vision on Gamification HERE. It's one of my earlier posts.
Or for a good concept send an email to Bart at BrandNewGame ;-)
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