Battle Pass Thesis

As Figure 1 shows, outside the BP and Gamification circle, which was discussed in the introductory part of this chapter, the next circle would be described as “Game Psychology”. It became clear that there are a few fundamental research papers and rather a lot, more recent, ambiguous non-peer reviewed research. Since game psychology was used as a reinforcing communicator/bridge between the BP and customer psychology, the rather important literature was the one that focused on the player community and personality of gamers to create a better image of the customers when applying customer psychology. 

This image was created through Richard Bartle’s model of player types (1996) , which suggested that there are four distinctive types that interact in a lot of ways with each other creating experience, environment and motivation echoing within those mentioned groups. Not only did this research describe those player types, but also how different objectives inside games cater those playertypes, basically creating a type of more differentiated focus group inside a homogenous group. Pairing this literature with a more “experience type” focused literature on players, written by Roger Calloise (2001), which suggested that there are four different “experiences” that can be made during a game, helped in identifying a more clear picture overall. 

To apply those profiles, motivational patterns and desires of this customer group, it was crucial to view this research from a customer psychological perspective, more directly from research within customer psychology, that could help in connecting these findings and the gained results into more meaningful and coherent answers. The best framework to apply, was the “Customer Value Framework”, from Babin and Harris (2010) which showed a deep analysis on how value is created, divided into several categories like “internal influences, external influences, consumption process…” which were appropriate and in alignment with the findings to foster a strong cohesive result.

Whilst motivational psychology and its literature was touched on briefly, it certainly helped in backing up the analysis, after it was done on the basis of previously mentioned research. The most general motivational description of human beings was represented in the Maslow’s pyramid of needs (Maslow, A. H. 1943), which “stated that people are motivated to achieve certain needs and that some needs take precedence over others.” (McLeod, 2020) beginning with physiological needs at the bottom and ending with self-actualization at the top.

It is however important to note, that one topic does not exclude another and that the size of each circle, is not describing the importance of the theory in the context of this research but the number of people affected by each of these theories in general. Although motivational psychology affects every human being for example, BPs only affect people who purchase them.

3. Conceptual Analysis

Because the topic of the BP could be almost described as a niche within a niche, which is also a rather new occurrence in that particular niche, it was not an expected outcome, to find directly related resources to build upon, but rather to take the matter at its fundamental and start so, by dissecting the functions of the BP, into basic self-sustaining functions, as they can be found separately in other contexts. For example, a coffee stamp card could be described as a progression-based reward system and has two of the four basic attributes of a BP system. The dissection of each function was done in accordance with the following set of rules:

-          Each function must be applicable in another context as a standalone function, regardless of differences in complexity.

-          Only functions that exist throughout all BP systems can be taken into account in the fundamental definition.

-          Functions that some BP’s have and others do not can be summarized as advanced BP functions.

The reason behind this procedure was that breaking down a structure, into smaller but still functioning pieces, allowed the finding of more well-established research on these functions. The coffee stamps for example, even if their progression and rewarding elements were designed pretty basic (so different in the complexity to the rewarding system of the BP), it existed for a much longer time in different shapes and forms, as premium or loyalty programs, which came into existence around the 19th to 20th century, for example, from which many psychological experiments were conducted and much knowledge about customer loyalty was gained, and this knowledge could be used in this research (Lonto, 2004).

Following this, the Battle Pass was analysed in its entire process from beginning of a purchase period to an end. During the analysis, every process that was connected to the BP, was written down in a document. The analysis was based on all BP Systems that were chooseable as an option inside the survey. Each description of a process in one BP, was then compared on its occurrence inside the other BPs on this list. Like this, the descriptions were filtered according to the first rule, mentioned above. 

The descriptions that passed this filtering process, were then systematically broken down and compared with existing definitions, that would encapsulate the meaning in its fullest extent. For example, after purchasing a BP, each round that was played in any of the games, contributed points to a collective of points. The development of this “collective of points” allowed the user to gain more rewards. Which can be described as “the process of changing or developing towards an improved situation or state”, which is the definition for “progression” (Cambridge Dictionary n.d.). At the same time, can the word “progression” be taken out of the context of the BP as a function, i.e. “Person A can have progression in their career/in a game/in their personal life..”. 

In the following, the Persona used inside the examples was “Steve”, Steve does not represent a real person and only serves the purpose of simplicity in describing the examples. 

The application of this procedure on the entire BP, resulted in the following fundamental functions:

• The Battle Pass is a type of premium (1) membership. 

The descriptor used for this was: “The BP costs a certain amount and allows access to objects, which equal to more than the usual amount of objects, that are otherwise only difficult or impossible to acquire”.

 
The definition of “premium” (Cambridge Dictionary n.d.), encapsulated the meaning of the descriptor in its fullest extent, furthermore can “premium” be taken out of context of the BP as a function, i.e. “Steve has a premium - access to an online movie provider or status on his credit card…” and so on.

 
There was no definition of how much the premium could cost, it varied from game to game.

• The Battle Pass is a temporary (2) offer.                                                                                          

The descriptor used for this was “The BP goes only for a set period of time until which every object has to be collected before it resets and it does not last permanently”.

 
The definition of “temporary” (Cambridge Dictionary n.d.), encapsulated the meaning of the descriptor in its fullest extent, furthermore can “temporary” be taken out of context of the BP as a function, i.e. “Steve has only temporary time to accept the offer during Winter/Summer sales or Steve has only temporary time to collect stamps offered during an event to redeem it for something”. 

 
There was no definition of how long the temporary phase could go on, it varied from game to game.

• The Battle Pass is progression based (3).       

While this example was mentioned above, the exact descriptor used was: “The BP depends on the collection of points in order to give out rewards, the development of points is displayed in a progression bar”.

 
The definition of how complex the progression must be was not specified, but the progression must be connected to at least one of the following criteria: the amount of time spent ingame, tasks completed or also experience points gained through completing ingame objectives.

• The Battle Pass is rewarding (4).                                                                                  

The descriptor used for this was: “The behaviour of the customer is positively reinforced when said behavior is aligning with what is expected as a criteria chosen in how progression is filled”.

 
The definition of “reward” (Cambridge Dictionary n.d.), encapsulated the meaning of the descriptor in its fullest extent, furthermore can “reward” be taken out of context of the BP as a function, i.e. “Steve is rewarded for entering a store, with a “thank you for being our customer”, to reinforce the behavior of coming to the store” (Carey, et al.1976). Because this function must be connected to an example to work itself out, it was important to showcase this with a direct research example and furthermore connect it to an example inside the BP.       

The definition of how complex the rewards inside the BP must be, was not specified, but the rewards must be connected to at least one of the following criteria: Rewards can be progression based, meaning rewards can boost or skip progression outside and inside the BP. Progression boost can take the shape of experience boost for faster XP gain or the shape of in-game currency, which allows the player to invest in the in-game shop. Progression skip is a rare and difficult to balance case, it can take the shape of items, for which the player otherwise has to grind several hours in another way (examples for progression skip were non-existent, though it has to be mentioned that some rewards could lead to progression skip in a more passive way, hence it is taken into consideration). The last and most common rewarding element can take the shape of cosmetics to individualize the character or the game environment.                                     

All types of rewards usually occur throughout all variants of the BP. 

This procedure led to the creation of the term “Temporary progression based premium reward system” which essentially describes every BP that exists to this day. These functions were then labeled with numbers to ensure a categorization for the literature research. 

5.4 Value Assessment

One question, which on the surface was rather similar to what was already presented was Q8, in which the participants were asked after how much progression specifically, they already felt that the BP was worth the purchase. The important result to focus on was not the number of people in the 80–100% range (which was 45.38% with 59/130 people) because that is what the BP is already designed for in the first place and under rational circumstances should always equal to all people answering in the 80–100% range.

The interesting results were the numbers below the 80–100% mark, between 40 and 80%, which encapsulated 46.9% (61 out of 130) of the people. In combination with the more extreme variants of people seeing it already as worth it with below 40% (additional 10 people in the lower 0–40%), this meant, in total more than half of the people described a value surplus of the BP, even though only 23.08% (30 out of 130) of the participants chose the answer “It is worth every cent!” in an earlier question about the BP’s worth. This showed the existence of a type of personal values attached to the BP’s worth, which would be later found in another result as well and set into the context of research.

A more complex set of entangled questions, assessing on value perception were asked toward the end of the survey with Q13–15. Question 13 gave the research direct insight into the value each participant thought they added throughout the grinding process and how much value was behind the premium rewards they gained in the process. The first thing to note is that despite the direct guidance of the question, to enter a value and nothing else, 12.5% (14 out of 112) of the people said that they would not sell it under any circumstances or entered a relatively immense compensation, which in the process of analysis was set equal to “not selling,” for example 10.000€ and 99.999€.

Because this question was also not guided in the sense that people had to choose between different multiplicators, the answers were difficult to group afterward. The criteria for grouping resulted in four segments (A, B, C, and D), which were parallelly used in the entire set of these entangled questions looks as follows:

Segment A consisted of people who did not add any value to the BP, or in the case of two outliers, people who were selling it undervalue.

Segment B consisted of people who added a worth equaling to a one-digit multiplier from 2 to 8 (interestingly the x9 multiplier did not exist in both cases).

Segment C consisted of people who added a value equal to a multiplier with at least two digits (up to three digits).

Segment D consisted of people who did not want to sell or too high amounts (as previously mentioned). Hence, it was not included in the average multiplier calculation due to the non-quantifiable results.

Segment A had 21.42% (24 out of 112) of the people

Segment B had 57.14% (64 out of 112) of the people

Segment C had 9.3% (10 out of 112) of the people

Segment D had 12.5% (14 out of 112) of the people

On average, leaving out Segment D, the added value onto the BP, when selling it was x7,8 folds the average value of the BP of 10€.

This showed a clear increase of the BP’s value. However, this answer itself was interpretable in many ambiguous ways. Hence, the context of the following question was needed.

Applying the same segmentation of the answers, with the exception that now Segment D equals people not wanting to buy, instead of not wanting to sell, to the following question we got these results.

Segment A had 30.35% (34 out of 112) of the people.

Segment B had 42.3% (48 out of 112) of the people.

Segment C had 6.25% (7 out of 112) of the people.

Segment D had 20.5% (23 out of 112) of the people.

On average, leaving out Segment D, the value added to the BP when buying was 4.94-fold, 37% lower than when asked to sell.

Figure 6 shows that the tendency to trade is higher when being asked to sell, but only for a much higher price. Meanwhile, buying it is less of an option and if only for a lower multiplicator segment. In addition, the extremes on the far left (not buying) and far right (not selling) show us that people are generally unlikely to buy it at 100% progression than sell it under the same circumstances, regardless of price indicating a personal connection to the BP. While Figure 7 (see Appendix 1) is a more detailed representation of the same numbers, to give a better understanding of how the individual multiplicators were distributed.

Even though the results of the survey are showing a relation between the existence of stress and the time spent, it does not specify the exact reason how the stress is caused. One theory, which can explain the stress that is caused by not completing the BP, is the Zeigarnik Effect (Zeigarnik, 1927). The Zeigarnik Effect shows, among other things, that task completion is connected to tension release and once the tension is released through the completion of the task, the brain returns to a “comfortable state” (Zeigarnik, 1927, p. 85). From this, we can assume that not completing a task within a BP period after making the conscious decision to finish it with the initial purchase can lead to unreleased tension and cause an uncomfortable state of mind. However, it must be kept in mind that Zeigarnik also says that the process of tension creation can differ from individual to individual, depending on their perception of the given task (Zeigarnik, 1927, p. 85). For example, a person would buy the BP and naturally expect to finish it. This expectation or “willpower” would turn into a type of tension, but if the task would be then too difficult, or in the case of the BP, too long to accomplish, the tension could slowly fade off during the completion of the BP, and as mentioned, it would differ from individual to individual, what is perceived as attainable. However, this does not mean that an extreme low level of difficulty is advisable, one reason is that the Zeigarnik Effect shows in other studies, that tasks with unreleased tension makes people remember them more often than completed tasks (Savitsky et al. 1997). So having unfinished tasks, inside the BP, can cause the user to remember the BP, more often and cause more playtime than a finished BP. Another reason why the BP should not be designed with a too low level of difficulty however is going to be mentioned in the context of another implication. 

As a conclusion to this effect taking place, it would be important to design the BP in a way that is challenging for the player, yet accomplishable. Though causing an “uncomfortable” state of mind, might sound atrocious at first, the duration of the optimal BP, would be one that inevitably would have to cause this state of mind, in order to allow the user to feel tension release, a feeling of victory, achievement and personal value. An advanced implication of this originally fundamental implication would be the creation of a type of short question at the end of a BP period, which would be designed to find out how challenging the last BP was in order to modify the difficulty level of the upcoming BP, either in its duration, experience needed to complete or additional tasks during the BP.

On the contrary, increasing the time needed for completion will also have a positive effect on the personal value of the BP as mentioned before. As the results in Q13 and 14 made clear, there was a personal value inherited in the first place. However, as of this moment, we cannot say how far the personal value increases or decreases or how far its value exceeds the other factors. However, research shows that overall value is closely connected to personal value as Babin and Harris mention in their paper about the customer value framework: “value represents a personal assessment of the net worth obtained from an activity” (Babin and Harris, 2009). Hence, this point should not be disregarded and researched on in the future. On another note, supporting this fact, the endowment effect also shows that “rewards that require effort but seem attainable are motivating, while rewards acquired too easily appear gratuitous and are uninspiring” (Nunes & Dréze, 2006, p. 510).

Another fundamental implication was gained through the results of Question 8, the existing perception of a value surplus, in saying that the BP is already worth below the 80–100% mark. This existing value surplus can be turned into profit and become a value equilibrium. The goal of this implication would be to adjust the rewards within the BP in such a way that few people would already think that it is worth it with 40 to 60%, but rather starting by 60%. This would have two effects on the group of people who voted for “It is worth around 40–60%,” both decreasing the number of people inside the group. One effect would be that people would stop buying the BP because it would not be worth it anymore. Another effect, however, would be that these people would buy the BP but think that only 60–80% is now worth it and, hence, invest additional time in the game because we have shown that time spent correlates with perception of value. Of course, the company has to measure what is worth more and what causes more satisfaction in their respective community. One outcome would be that the game would have more people who play less. Another would be to have few people who would play more.

“In particular, time pressure has been shown to lead people to complete the most pressing task to the exclusion of others” (Leroy, 2009 cited by Ordóñez, Benson, & Pittarello, 2015). The same research tells us that most literature treats time pressure and time constraint interchangeably. It is later established that these are to be seen differently. By applying the BP System in the framework of that research, we find that the BP is a representation of a scenario of time constraint, which according to the research, is described as “often internally or externally imposed deadlines.”(Ordóñez, Benson, & Pittarello, 2015 p.520) When exploring the effects of time constraint, it becomes clear that, among other things, the productivity of a certain activity can rise on average and that creating a sense of urgency can create a positive energizing effect that impels consumers to finally engage in a certain activity (Ordóñez, Benson, & Pittarello, 2015 p.523). This leads to two specific advanced implications for the BP, one is that this feeling of urgency can be utilized subconsciously (as already used in many marketing strategies) with simple reminders and notifications inside and outside the game. It is also imperative to never overstress the user and allow them to be able to finish tasks divided into milestones, so that the Zeigarnik effect, as mentioned before, does not perish and the user can experience tension relief from milestone to milestone. Hence, even in designing the notifications, it is important to set these not in the scope of the entire BP but until the next milestone. The second advanced implication for design is only applicable if the XP-based progress of the BP is being collected without even purchasing the BP first, for example when the game has a free version of the BP, which would be called a “temporary progression based free reward system”, which most games with BPs have. In this case, the implication would be to also send out reminders to the people, who did not buy the BP, to buy it and unlock all rewards they are entitled to before the season for the BP ends (presumably for a lower special price). In this way, people who did not purchase the BP could also experience a sense of urgency leading to a purchase. It has to be kept in mind that the latter option has to be made toward the very end of the BP only for people who exceeded a certain amount of progress already, to ensure satisfaction for the number of rewards received at once without experiencing too much time pressure before season ends. Effectively turning the purchase into a typical bundle purchase rather than a BP purchase.

The existence of loss aversion effect, which is shown by questions 13–14, shows that changes in economic variables that affect the BP’s value can have direct favorable and unfavorable effects on purchasing behavior. After setting this in a purely economic sense into the context of the research done by Kahneman, Knetsch, and Thaler (1991), the suggestion would be the following:

“The possibility of loss aversion effects suggests, more generally, that treatments of responses to changes in economic variables should routinely separate the cases of favorable and unfavorable changes. Introducing such distinctions could improve the precision of predictions at a tolerable price in increased complexity.” (p. 205)

The advanced implication of this applied on the BP is already heavily in use. It is the presentation of the “potential” loss for every gamer, who does not own the BP. This is achieved through the constant direct comparison of the BP to the “temporary progression based free reward system” (from now on referred to as TFS), also to people who do not own the BP. This is usually presented in some type of level bar, which has a reward on each level for the BP, but only a reward in every fifth level for the TFS. This is a constant reminder of what kind of loss is occurring because usually, the XP collected to fill the TFS is applied to the BP as well. Thus, it is a feeling of constant waste of XP collected and the goal is to show that the potential loss of not investing the 10€ is a greater loss than what can be gained. Another example, in which loss aversion is poked on, is similar to the strategy as many insurance companies are using, which is, the listing of potential huge losses that can occur when the insurance product is not bought, in comparison to the small and constant payments the customers would have to make. And of course the listing of those losses is displayed in numerical values.

Applied to the BP, this happens in the in-game shops of some games as well. Rewards that are attainable with the help of the BP  can be unlocked directly for a certain amount of currency, this currency is usually chosen to be the more valuable currency inside the game, (often the currency which is bought for real money). The amount of currency, however, is usually a significant fraction of the BP’s value, or in some cases, 2.5 times the BP’s value. It has to be kept in mind that this already applies to one out of several rewards, from which all can be unlocked within the  BP, that cost on average as much as the BP itself.

Of course, both these options might make sense at first from the loss aversion and economic perspective but this might also lead some customers to a feeling of being forced to buy the BP because of the constant reminder of what is lost without investing money into the game. The premium value of the BP and its rewards might be modified up so much that it would create a huge fear of missing out on rewards that are not feasible to buy in any other alternative way, which would basically result in “buy all or nothing.” Some answers to questions 13 and 14 were rather extreme in their formulations. Some people got more emotional just about the mere existence of the question, with answers like “I wouldn’t sell it, its dumb” or “I love these skins, I will never sell them,” while the question didn’t even allow the option of not selling it. This was a great parallel to the exact same reactions participants had, in the research of Kahneman, Knetsch, Thaler (1991 p.202) when they were testing the loss aversion effect. A few outstanding remarks were also made on the other side of this survey. Participants who never bought a BP said that the BP was an abuse of fear of missing out (FOMO) tactics. Of course, as of now, these are just extremes, and the majority seems to be satisfied on a healthy basis on how it currently is. However, as in the other design implications, this finding should allow companies to design and update their BP’s while having the fundamental implications at the back of their heads. Modifying the BP in extremes, like it was done in a few loot box examples (allowing players to skip processes which gave them a competitive advantage inside the game), might lead to a backlash in its overall perception. Hence the reward design should be made in the scope of loss aversion for not only the people who are already buying the BP but also for people who are not.

An advanced implication without an underlying fundamental implication was found when analyzing differences in the results between people who already bought the BP and those who did not. A very common occurrence was that people who never bought the BP also did not think that the BP was worth the money. However, the majority of the people who already bought it once, thought completely otherwise, indicating that the experience of the BP itself, can change the perception of its worth. Although it must be mentioned that not all people who did not buy it did so because of the worth but for different reasons. A few examples were people who in general did not spend any money on the game or were against the idea of cosmetics inside a game. However, if the small sample size of people who did not buy a BP is generalizable to all non-BP owners, then a large chunk of the player base could be won as customers, through an advanced design implication of giving a free BP for anyone who played the game for a certain amount of time, so that they can make the experience with the BP at least once, to gain a new perspective.

On an endnote, some findings of the survey, however, could be interpreted outside the specific design elements of the BP, into more general takeaways especially for companies who are currently not using the BP System. One rather fundamental finding was that the BP can, indeed, be utilized to gain an advantage over games that have no BP competition-wise, as seen in the results of Q11. Another more ambiguous interpretation of this result is also that BP’s that are designed better would also affect the competition between games that have the BP. Interestingly enough showing a parallel outcome to the outcome of the endowment effect, in which customers would also prefer to engage more often with the company, in which they have a running progress level that leads to a reward (Nunes & Dréze, 2006). On top of this, the multidimensional complexity of the BP allows adjusting and improving endowment effects. One such way that already exists by fundamental design is the collection of experience points inside the game equaling an alternative medium, which increases the endowment effect “profoundly” (Nunes & Dréze, 2006, p. 510). A further finding that supported the result of Q11, concerning showing the possibility for improved revenue performance for the company, was the result of Q10. Question 10, showed that only a small portion of the participants spent much less money after buying the BP while some increased spending. This shows that the BP can be used as a mechanic, to increase revenue without compensating with a revenue loss on other fronts.

6.2 Implications of the Research Observations

Some researchers found that customer attractiveness and customization are positively correlated to the creation of flow and customer loyalty (Liao et al., 2019). It is also apparent that rewards can be used to reinforce behavior (Carey et al., 1976). The effects of flow as they were defined by the originator of this theory Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, and summarized in an applicable manner for this research by Obadă (2013) in his study entitled “Flow Theory and Online Marketing Outcomes”:

“(1) clear and distinct goals, (2) temporary loss of self-consciousness, (3) distorted sense of time, (4) actions merging with awareness and immediate feedback, (5) high concentration on the task, (6) high level of control, (7) a balance between the available skills of the individual and the task challenges, and (8) autotelic experiences.” (p. 552)

were applied countless times on player experience inside various games, to show a connection between the gaming experience and the flow state (Nah et al., 2014; Jennett et al., 2008b; Liao et al., 2019; Kaye et al., 2018). In other terms, or game terms, the state of flow was already characterized as being “in the zone” before the publishing of the flow theory, by Roger Caillois in his book “Man, Play and Games” 1958. However, Caillois described this exact state in only one game experience, the “Vertigo” (also called “Ilinx”) and not in the others, important for this research, the “Competitive” (also called “Agon”). From the research on flow, however, we know that flow is the “holistic sensation that people feel when they act with total involvement.” This total involvement can happen in all different game types, and can differ from individual to individual, and one way of categorizing the individuals that play the games that the BP systems are used in is through the definition of player types by Richard Bartle (1996) in his work “Hearts, clubs, diamonds, spades: Players who suit MUDs.” Bartle stated that there are in total four player types/classes, which are the achievers, socializers, explorers, and killers. Researching through the games that offered the BP and reading through Bartle’s papers, it became clear that all games without exception that offer the BP and were used in this research were games catering to the killer player type. On the contrary, however, the BP and TFS act as positive feedback for the killer type and enable achiever types to have more to work on and achieve during their game session. According to Bartle, managing the number of player types inside a MUD (meaning, Multi User Dungeon, which all games on the list also categorize as) can impact the number of other types.

Which he illustrates like: “For example, too many killers will drive away the achievers who form their main prey; this in turn will mean that killers will stop playing, as they’ll have no worthwhile victims (players considered by killers to be explorers generally don’t care about death, and players considered to be socializers are too easy to pose much of a challenge).” (Bartle, 1996, p. 5)

He follows up by saying that a low number of overall players would then drive out the socializers because there would be few people to socialize with, which would mean a total positive feedback loop of more and more people leaving (Bartle, 1996).

Although this is a rather broad connection between the theories, it can be said that the BP acts as more than just a monetization driver. Through the rewarding effect of the BP, the player type of killers would have more sources from which they could get positive feedback to feed the state of flow even better than without the BP, following the fourth point made in the description of flow.

The rewarding moments that the BP creates would feed the state of flow and, from a broader perspective, the rewards themselves, such as cosmetics and customization, would do so too, as found in the research about character attractiveness (Liao et al., 2019). This would enable the players to fall into a positive feedback loop while having fun and being in a state of flow more easily than players who do not enjoy the rewarding elements of the BP. On a further sidenote, it must be mentioned that the BP would be a great tool for “administrators of the game” to create an artificial balance between the player types inside the game. The following was suggested in the paper by Bartle (1996):

“Making sure that a game doesn’t veer off in the wrong direction and lose players can be difficult; administrators need to maintain a balanced relationship between the different types of player, to guarantee their MUD’s ‘feel’” (p. 5)

9. Appendix