Can you make better games by understanding player psychology? By knowing what people’s primary (and secondary) motivations are in mobile games? According to GameRefinery’s Joel Julkunen, absolutely. And understanding these motivations has led, he says, to multiple hit games over the past few years.

In this Mobile Heroes Uncensored we chat with Julkunen. He’s played over 500 games, and that’s a core part of his work, believe it or not. From that and a huge amount of data from thousands of games, he’s found 12 key player motivations that determine what kinds of games we like and which we don’t.

And that can help game marketers and designers build and market the right games to the right people.

Timestamps

0:00 Playing games for a living

2:44 Player motivation framework

4:57 The 12 core mobile game player motivations

10:23 Matching motivations to personas

13:18 Crossover games

17:16 Predicting the next big mobile games hit

21:47 Be bold and brave