While it is very easy for players to get caught up in the act of playing slots or scouring a sportsbook for a bet, a feature that often gets overlooked at online gambling sites is the amount of work that has gone into creating animations. These animations pop up everywhere, from bonus games on gambling machines to advertising banners, and they play a major role in making the overall gaming experience that much smoother.
The importance of animations on gambling sites, however, goes much deeper than just being there for visual engagement and entertainment. By tapping into and influencing people’s emotions and reactions to things, they can subtly shape the way someone plays at an online gambling platform. But how exactly does this happen, and why have skilled animators become behavioural architects in the world of digital gambling?
Behavioural Architects
The concept of behavioural design experts is fascinating and speaks volumes to how greatly animators are leaned upon for things like the design of slot machines. Good design is something that’s almost silently appreciated because it hits all the right notes. When looking at sign up offers for a casino or a sportsbook, there are many options to choose from. What can be enough to sway someone’s decision to select one in particular is how well-designed the promotional advertisement or banner is. That is crucial for a casino or sportsbook’s acquisition.
Why Animations Matter
Animations are attention grabbers, and that is exactly what online gambling sites want. Our brains are hardwired to latch onto something that moves, and our visual systems being primed to detect motion is a genuine neurological response. In reaction to movement, our focus will shift immediately to whatever is in motion, because it’s so hard to ignore.
But a deeper layer of that is how movement can also trigger a very powerful psychological response, one of feeling rewarded, which is why animations are used heavily in gambling. Even something as simple as having the animated element of a paytable on a slot machine pulsate and glow will tell the brain that the potential for something good is there.
Animation, therefore, is an extremely engaging, powerful feature that can satisfy a user’s experience, and this is why good animation can easily be linked back to behavioural architects.
All the Action
Animations can also act as a tool for positive reinforcement, and slot games at online casinos are a big area where the real power of this can be seen. There are a lot of animated micro-interactions that happen on them, from the initial hook of the welcome sequence loading to the spinning of the reels.
The motion of the spinning wheels, for example, is immediately engaging and has a very subtle element of delay about it, which in turn heightens the anticipation of the player. This helps to get players hyper-focused and locked into their actions, and the behaviour activation keeps them playing for longer.
Other in-game elements, then, like the flashing of winning pay lines, cells changing colour and shaking, showers of coins falling on the screen and celebratory explosions when a bonus feature has been triggered, all help to create a seamless, heavily engaging flow for the player.
Hooked on Routine
Animations can also help to reinforce a sense of routine. From the encouraging flashing and pulsating of a “spin” button to the motion of the reels and the stop animation after a spin of the roulette wheel, there are sequential steps to playing. Right through to when achievements are gained, animations link them together to encourage longer playing sessions.
Players’ choices can be reinforced a lot by animations that celebrate and hint at some kind of progress. That could be through things such as animated progress bars, moving boxes for a pick-and-win game, or tracking a digital playing piece around a game board, all of which will leave a player wanting more.
In sports betting, if a player gets a simple, gentle “pop” of a confirmation that the bet was successfully placed, that can encourage more bets, because it positively supports an action that’s been made. These subtle visual cues that appear every step of the way towards completing a task are heavily influenced by animations.
Visually Commanding
Imagine playing at an online casino without all of the expected animations. It wouldn’t be an engaging experience for the player, and it would do nothing for customer acquisition or retention. Static platforms not giving any immediate feedback through visual cues would not indicate to players whether a reward was potentially coming, and the entire online gambling experience would be greatly diminished. That is the importance of behavioural architects who craft the design elements we see.
