I had never imagined myself getting obsessed with a multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game like League of Legends (LoL). The game appears simple: I control a champion in a 5-member team and aim to destroy the enemy’s Nexus. However, after playing the first match last summer, I found myself spending hours every day “killing” minions, destroying turrets, and “slaughtering” enemies. When college restarted in October, I realised that I could not uninstall the game because I craved for more matches. How did LoL captivate millions of players to this virtual battleground?

Video games, positive reinforcement and the Skinner box

Essentially, game developers understand operant conditioning: a process by which a person (or animal) learns a behaviour through reinforcement or punishment. B. F. Skinner (1938) explains this mechanism through an experiment that cages a rat with a lever.

If pressing the lever results in the dispense of food, then the rat learns to repeatedly press the lever to satisfy its hunger. In this scenario, food is a positive reinforcement that strengthens the behaviour of pressing the lever. In contrast, if pressing the lever results in electric currents, then the rat learns to stop pressing the lever to avoid unpleasant feelings. In this case, the electric current is a positive punishment that reduces the behaviour of pressing the lever.

Video games resemble the Skinner box (above) utilising positive reinforcement to increase players’ frequency of playing games (Doan, 2016). Playing LoL gives rewarding feelings when you defeat an enemy. This feeling increases your brain’s dopamine levels. You remember this pleasure and anticipate more, so you further engage in matches for more rewards (Zastrow, 2017, p.4269-4270).

The LoL utilises a variety of reinforcements to attract players at different levels (Mathews et al, 2019, p.68).

Starter level “pressing the lever”:
Reinforcement begins after you download and launch LoL. If you never launch the game, then LoL’s reinforcement mechanisms never occur (Gray and Bjorklund, 2014, p.119). However, successful LoL advertisement increases your likelihood of playing the game. After you launch the game for the first time, you have “pressed the lever”, and the game prompts you to continue playing.

Beginner level:
The LoL first teaches you how to “kill” minions and enemy “champions”. These initial tasks are simple: you merely press “A” to kill an enemy with low health points. Then, the game rewards you with virtual currency, an exciting “Shut Down” (below image) announcement, and stimulating graphics of the enemy being slain. Wood et al (2004) suggest that realistic sound effects and graphics attract players by providing a sense of accomplishment (p.4).

The rewards for killing enemies demonstrate a continuous reinforcement: you receive the reward every time you kill a minion or champion. Additionally, the game congratulates you for consecutively killing enemies by announcing “double-kill” and “triple-kill” accordingly.

This reinforcement follows a fixed-ratio schedule: you receive the rewards after killing a fixed number of enemies. Continuous and fixed-ratio reinforcement triggers a high response rate, which means that people quickly learn that playing LoL gives them rewarding feelings (Gray and Bjorklund, 2014, p.119). Thus, LoL attracts new players to play more matches.

Intermediate level:
After several matches, you realize that having a “Victory” is random because it depends on the level of your teammates and opponents. A Victory gives you rewarding feelings while a “Defeat” gives you frustration. Because the brain is more sensitive to positive than negative stimuli, you continue to anticipate victory even after several losses (Rachlin, 1990, p.295). In addition, your teammates can potentially “Honor” you if you played well in the match. Receiving Honor gives you a sense of recognition, which encourages you to continue playing (Madigan, 2013). Both “Victory” and “Honor” follow a variable-ratio schedule: you cannot predict how many matches you need to play before getting these rewards. A variable-ratio schedule has a slow extinction rate, which means that players keep playing LoL even when they do not receive “Victory” and “Honor” for a long time because they expect that these rewards will eventually arrive (Gray and Bjorklund, 2014, p.120).

Advanced level:
As an advanced player, you might be on the brink of getting bored playing with the same set of champions. Nevertheless, LoL keeps you enthusiastic by occasionally introducing new champions. In fact, the game “teases” the release of three new champions this summer (Goslin, 2020).

Bunzeck and Duzel (2006) suggest that experiencing novelty gives you rewarding feelings because it activates dopamine production (p.369). Champion update follows a variable-interval schedule: the time period in between each update varies. Similar to the variable-ratio schedule, the variable-interval schedule produces a slow extinction rate, which makes players keep returning to LoL in expectation of experiencing new champions (Gray and Bjorklund, 2014, p.120).

Professional level:
Furthermore, LoL ranks players by nine tiers (image below) from “Iron” to “Challenger”. Every season, LoL refreshes players’ rankings, so they need to continue playing to climb up the ranking ladder. People want to get a higher rank because it gives them prestige and allows them to influence others (Henrich, 2016, p.119). The seasonal ranking follows a fixed-interval schedule: the ranking refreshes every ten weeks. This reinforcement schedule increases playing frequency before a season ends, as players compete for better rankings (Mobalytics, 2018). By refreshing ranks every season, LoL compels players to continue playing in the next season to maintain their ranks.

It may seem that once you “press the lever” of LoL, you always crave to play more. Nevertheless, the majority of gamers are not seriously addicted to gaming (Mathews et al, 2019, p.67). This is because ultimately, we are not locked inside the Skinner box like the rats are; we have the opportunity to escape video games’ reinforcement trap. If you ever notice yourself craving for more matches, take a deep breath and walk away from your computer. Once outside of the box, you will realize that the real world is more fascinating and gives you more choices than the LoL battleground. You will experience rewarding feelings by spending time with your friends and family. LoL might be a Skinner box, but we can choose not to be Skinner’s rats.

Notes:

• This blog post expresses the views of its author(s), not the position of The Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science or the London School of Economics.
• Featured image by Didin Bahana via Unsplash

References
Bunzeck, N., & Düzel, E. (2006). Absolute coding of stimulus novelty in the human substantia Nigra/VTA. Neuron, 51(3), 369-379.
Doan, D. (2016, December 22). GameDev protips: How to use operant conditioning to improve your game’s design. Retrieved April 7, 2020, from https://medium.com/@doandaniel/gamedev-protips-how-to-use-operant-conditioning-to-improve-your-games-design-ae4d1ac46e9f
Gray, P., & Bjorklund, D. F. (2014). Psychology (7th ed.). New York, NY: Worth Publishers, a Macmillan Higher Education Company.
Henrich, J. P. (2016). The secret of our success. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Madigan, J. (2013, January 4). Modifying player behavior in League of Legends with honor. Retrieved April 7, 2020, from https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/mind-games/201301/modifying-player-behavior-in-league-legends-honor
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Mobalytics. (2018). Climbing the ladder in League of Legends: Patterns in player performance. Retrieved from https://mobalytics.gg/lol-ladder-research-2/
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Zastrow, M. (2017). Is video game addiction really an addition? Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 114(17), 4268-4272.