Cause, Effect, and Player-Centric Time

Abstract

INTRODUCTION A central aspect of playing video games is determining the causal connections between entities. To achieve their objectives, players need to set chains of events in motion that will yield the desired outcomes. But how do players detect these causal relations? Studies conducted by psychologist Albert Michotte in the 1940s showed that “we see causality just as directly as we see color” (Kahneman 2011: 76). Causal relations appear before us effortlessly, to the point that we are prone to perceive them where there are none—which is why statisticians insistently repeat that correlation does not imply causation.