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The number of levels doesn't matter, because players don't generally play (or decide to not play) games because one has more or fewer levels than another. Levels are shorthand for accomplishment. Level 51 is the highest in WoW because that's how much content and accomplishment they could determine. It's entirely arbitrary based on your application. All of the reasons are entirely arbitrary based on your application. It doesn't matter because they are manifestations of psychological principles. You could have levels, or you could have ducks. You could have points, or you could have dogs. Every time you hit Submit in your app you get a dog, and every six dogs you get a parrot, and every three parrots you get a duck, and you need to email that duck to support@yourapp to unlock a new feature, or you can paint that duck a particular color and save it in your right sidebar, but you can't do both. It doesn't matter, because it's not a recipe or a formula. They are representations of attributes to poke a person's psychology to tell them they are making progress (dogs to parrots), to reassure them (ducks being emailed), to give them investment (ducks being painted), etc. You need to understand the psychological principles involved before any of it will make sense. The questions you're asking have no answers because they're ultimately nonsensical questions. Gabe Zichermann's book is crap, and maybe that's why this doesn't make sense to you. None of those books you listed are by psychologists, mainstream video game designers, or research academics. |