Game difficulty is a crucial aspect of game design, that can be directly influenced by tweaking game mechanics. Perceived difficulty can however also be influenced by simply altering the graphics to something more threatening. Here, we present a study with 12 participants playing 4 different minigames with either altered graphics or mechanics to make the game more difficult. Using EEG bandpower analysis, we find that frontal lobe activity is heightened in all 4 of the mechanically challenging versions and 2/4 of the visually altered versions, all differences that do not emerge from the self-reported player experience. This suggests that EEG could aid researchers with a more sensitive tool for investigating challenge in games.

翻译：游戏难度是游戏设计的关键方面，可通过调整游戏机制直接受到影响。然而，感知难度也可能仅通过将图形改为更具威胁性而间接改变。本文报告了一项研究，12名参与者分别游玩4款不同的小游戏，通过修改图形或游戏机制来增加难度。基于脑电图频带能量分析，我们发现所有4种机械挑战版本以及4种视觉修改版本中的2种均出现额叶活动增强，而这些差异并未在玩家自述体验中体现。这表明脑电图可作为一种更灵敏的工具，帮助研究人员深入探究游戏中的挑战性。