Agent-Based Modelling of Emotional Goals in Digital Media Design Projects

The authors promote agent-oriented models to identify, represent and evaluate high-level abstractions of digital media design projects. A major aspect is the introduction of emotional goals, in addition to functional goals and quality goals to describe feelings such as having fun, being engaged and feeling cared for. To establish emotional goals, digital media design methods and processes were employed including the development of emotional scripts, user profiles, mood boards and following an iterative participatory design process. This approach proved to be highly successful, not only to represent emotional goals such as fun, tension and empathy, but also to facilitate the ideation, creation and progressive evaluation of projects. The process supports communication between designers, developers and other stakeholders in large multidisciplinary development teams by providing a shared language and common artefact. The process is demonstrated in the development of a Multiplayer Online Role Play Game (MORPG) called Aspergion that promotes respect for people with Asperger’s Syndrome. Agent-Based Modelling of Emotional Goals in Digital Media Design Projects