Researchers at North Carolina State University believe that they’ve developed a way to predict how gamers will proceed through MMOs. They’ve tested 14,000 World of Warcraft players using groups of achievements called cliques. The achievements that players chose to complete and their progress towards their completion compared to the others in the game have allowed scientists to correctly predict a player’s next moves 80 percent of the time. ”A good game stands on its own. If you want to improve it, you have to make sure players will like any changes you make”, says NCS computer science professor Dr. David Roberts. ”This research can help researchers get it right, because if you have a good idea of what players like, you can make informed decisions about the kind of storylines and mechanics those players would like in the future.”

Source: Kotaku