Dynamic Pressure Cycle Control: Dynamic Diffculty Adjustment beyond the Flow Zone

The degree of difficulty is a key element of fun in digital games. Players enjoy games and improve their skills if the difficulty is set in their personal Flow Zones. The existing Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment (DDA) is a suitable technique to automatically control the difficulty within the proper range in games. However, sometimes players feel uncomfortable when they recognize that the difficulty is being modified automatically. We devised a new game design concept called "Dynamic Pressure Cycle Control," which still adds fun for players even when the difficulty exceeds the proper range. Our method's fundamental idea is to modify the difficulty extremely, increasing and decreasing it beyond the Flow Zone. We implemented our method combined with DDA and conducted experiments to verify it through playtesting. Results show that the proposed method succeeds to add a new element of fun to the game. Also, show the existence of a game design method which offers comfort to players even when they recognized the intentional change of difficulty during gameplay time.