Gamers in life: what we know about generation Y

Millennials are unique in many ways - those who grew up with a game joystick in their hands. Now they are becoming the predominant generation, on which the whole environment begins to focus. Together with the Millennials, gamification penetrates the culture, which takes root in all areas, and, above all, in marketing and trade. MEGA successfully applies new technologies on its sites, and what will come out of it and how gamification affects the behavior of Generation Y will be described in our article. But we begin with the theory. More precisely, with the "Theory of Generations."

Origins

In 1991, Americans William Strauss and Neil Howe analyzed historical and economic cycles in US history and thus launched the Theory of Generations . The theory was adopted by the public and traced in other countries, including Russia.

Conclusions of the “theory of generations”

In their works, Strauss and Howe made some interesting conclusions:

1. It was determined that a generation is the totality of all people born in the interval of ~ 20 years. Such a period is equivalent to one phase of life: childhood, youth, middle age, and old age. At the time of the birth of the theory, the “Generation Y” (or Milleniales) was just being formed: people born from 1983 to 2003.
   
2. It was shown that the basis for the formation of the "human generation" are the events of the first phase (childhood). At generation Y, the collapse of the USSR, the “dashing 90s”, the development of information technologies, and free access to any information fell on this time.
   
3. Selected historical cycles of four generations. So, the first generation in the current cycle is called the “Greatest Generation” : these were born in the period 1903-1923.
   
4. They proved that generational cycles are superimposed on economic ones: each generation has its own crisis phase. “Millennials” and “Greatest Generation” correspond to the archetype of “Generation of Heroes”: they meet the crisis in their active phase, and all its burden falls on them. The first went to the "Great Depression" and the Second World War. The games are just starting to overcome the crisis.
   

The works of Strauss and Howe explained what caused the differences in the cultural values ​​of generations, what unites them, how they interact, made it possible to draw historical analogies and reveal the individual features of each generation. Due to this, by the beginning of the 2000s, when the first representatives of generation Y had matured, they had already managed to form a number of techniques that help them understand the Millenial motivation and find an approach to them. For example, young people who grew up on video games, with pleasure perceived the introduction of game mechanics in everyday life. And the world began to change under the generation of Y.
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Generation Y Features

In general, there are several characteristic features inherent in the Millennials, which became the very fertile ground for the introduction of gamification in everyday processes:

• Internetization. The Millennials are the “network generation” that grew with the Internet: communication, shopping, learning — everything happens online.
  
• The desire to be realized. Someone is chasing fashionable things, someone is constantly changing jobs, someone is eager to win everything he can reach. This is alien to older generations, but works for the good where there is an element of the game.
  
• Curiosity and constant search for new. Due to this, players can be blamed for superficial perception, inability to concentrate and inconstancy, but in fact they only adapt to the uncertainty and instability characteristic of a crisis. It is this feature that gave impetus to the development of various MEP-projects and added a headache to HRs.
  
• Individualism. He is sometimes blamed for egocentrism (“But we were pioneers!”), But it was they who were driven by a desire for freedom, a preference for partnership, and not submission.
  

In many sources one can find the expression “Peter Pena generation” : this is the name for Y for wanting to stay longer in childhood. And childhood is a game. The kids have grown up. But the games themselves “matured”: over the past decade they have become much better, and a new market for services has been formed: quests, board games, interactive performances.

Basics of gamification

Technology gamification represent a series of techniques aimed at the formation of patterns of behavior. They are based on basic psychological principles that were used in various forms in ancient Greece, in the USA, and in the USSR. With respect to the players, these principles can be described as follows:

• The principle of motivation: for generation Y, the desire for psychological comfort has become a powerful factor.
  
• The principle of status: due to the fact that the basic needs are met, for generation Y, respect, achievement, victory gain much more weight. Points, titles, badges - the popularity of all this is due just to this principle.
  
• The principle of remuneration: the final moment of any game is a reward. That is, the emphasis should be on the result, and not on the process itself. At the same time, the prize can be either physical or emotional (Just for lulz).
  
• The principle of unexpected discoveries and rewards: an important factor for generation Y was the need for a new one. And the novelty should not be decorative, but qualitative. This point is interesting because it explains why many of the gamification techniques described 3-5 years ago have lost their effectiveness: they have become boring.
  
• The principle of feedback: it is important for the players to see that their actions have a result, and the wishes are taken into account. Often representatives of older generations do not understand and ignore this fact, which leads to sad consequences.
  

Gamification is a natural process.

The main economically active generation now is the Millennials, so it is not surprising that it is up to their requests that the reference point be kept. This is perfectly illustrated by the board game companies: they were created by representatives of generation Y, they fulfill the needs of generation Y, and they do it effectively.


Of course, the receptions in which the element of the game was originally incorporated work well:

• When the item indicates the status of the owner, and buying in the front row is a difficult task. The reward is the fact of purchase - “made”, “bought”, “achieved”, “hero”. This is a typical game scenario that the Millennials catch up very well.
  
• Purchase-quest: the process of choosing furniture is a fascinating walk with the ability to find a lot of funny and necessary things, and the reward is that the purchased chaotic set of elements turns into something stylish and functional after a couple of hours of hard assembly!
  
• Titles and “achivki”: for example, an information site, filled by the users themselves, whose activity is stimulated by “titles” and “ratings”. In this case, the game scenario is implemented, in which initially it is necessary to pass a barrier, after which the fact of publication is an achievement, and then it is “pumped over”, typing in ratings by publications.
  

Shopping is also a quest

Modern shopping centers are not just a set of shops, but unified complexes that become points of attraction: numerous cafes where you can eat and socialize, a variety of shops (from anchor tenants to small ones opened by Millennials), game zones, cinemas. Purchase becomes only an addition to communication. And here, too, a game so close to the heart of representatives of generation Y will be involved, which will help to further entice and interest them.

The most obvious technique that can be found in the mall: the use of familiar images and gaming moments in marketing campaigns. Due to the fact that it is used by a large number of stores, a general visual background is formed, which is positively perceived by the Millennials.

As an example, a game of Pokemon Go format held in MEGA centers last year, where buyers had to look for special tags in stores, galleries and food court, having scanned them to get a chance to win MEGA gift cards or a super prize - shopping for 100,000 rubles in the company of TV host Regina Todorenko.


The sheer number of stores, regular promotions and events create a dynamic similar to the dynamics of computer games. If you imagine the buyer as a character who has mana (money) and health (fatigue): the shopping center acts as a location, where the raid takes place, and shops - as potential sources of loot.


When several stores simultaneously announced discounts

The search for beautiful and unusual things creates sensations similar to the sensations of passing games. So a boring shopping trip acquires the features familiar and loved by the Millennials. The layout and distribution of stores in the mall is almost completely identical to the construction of locations in computer games:

• first weak mobs (small shops at entrances),
  
• identical mobs are collected in groups (a similar method of grouping stores is used in the shopping and entertainment center),
  
• different mobs in the group (large stores attract customers for smaller ones, and the neighborhood with elite brands is beneficial for the budget),
  
• there are bosses, but the path to them lies through a lot of simple mobs (popular stores are usually located in the depths),
  
• locations must be difficult (navigation in the mall is specially complicated to delay the buyer).
  

The main thing: to hold out to the checkpoint, where you can sit, drink coffee and relax.
As for high technology, it is still much more interesting. We partially covered this topic in our previous post about high-tech shopping . And this is just the beginning.

What's next?

• Gamification technologies will actively develop over the next 10-15 years, until the next generation of people is formed. Then all this will have to transform into something new - something that will attract the very generation Z.
  
• Most of the techniques developed at the moment will be replaced by less explicit, more personalized, but based on the same basic principles and qualities.
  
• To remain effective, entire industries will be forced to rebuild.
  
• Millennials will increasingly change the world: their values ​​will be decisive.
  
• Those who decide to start their business, will face the fact that most of the developed technologies and techniques will quickly lose their effectiveness, so they will have to constantly improve and look for something new.
  
• The number of companies created by Millennials will increase. And we in MEGA Accelerator will actively contribute to this: where they ask, we will help, where we want, we will teach, and where necessary we will stimulate.