Research Article
A Review of Game Design Techniques for Managing Suspense
@INPROCEEDINGS{10.1007/978-3-031-28993-4_13, author={Ying Zhu and Daniel Kim and Alex Alsheimer}, title={A Review of Game Design Techniques for Managing Suspense}, proceedings={ArtsIT, Interactivity and Game Creation. 11th EAI International Conference, ArtsIT 2022, Faro, Portugal, November 21-22, 2022, Proceedings}, proceedings_a={ARTSIT}, year={2023}, month={4}, keywords={Suspense Game Design Game Mechanics Artifacts}, doi={10.1007/978-3-031-28993-4_13} }- Ying Zhu
Daniel Kim
Alex Alsheimer
Year: 2023
A Review of Game Design Techniques for Managing Suspense
ARTSIT
Springer
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-28993-4_13
Abstract
Suspense is key to the enjoyment of games and interactive storytelling. Although suspense has been studied extensively in traditional media such as fiction and film, there has been relatively little research on managing suspense in games. As interactive media, games differ from traditional media in many ways. Although many conventional techniques for managing suspense still apply to games, certain suspense manipulation techniques are specific to games. In this paper, we discuss a framework for managing suspense in games and present a comprehensive study of various game design techniques for managing suspense. In particular, we focus on the use of game mechanics and game artifacts to manipulate suspense, which has not received enough attention in previous works. Our goal is to provide a comprehensive guide for game designers to explore different ways to manage suspense in their games or use it to analyze the suspense management techniques in existing games.
