Visby Treasure Haunt : An Evaluation of Impactful Design Patterns in a Pervasive Horror Game

Sammanfattning: Treasure hunts are one of the earliest forms of pervasive games, and there are documentationsof them since the mid 19th century. In this study, the work by Björk & Pietz on design patternsin pervasive games are used as a base for analysing the impact of design patterns in a horrorthemed treasure hunt, a so called Treasure haunt. Through focus group interviews andtheoretical thematic analysis, 16 different patterns were analysed. The most prominent themes found were Player-player proximity which was expressedthrough the teams' interest in each other's activities and whereabouts, and Commonexperience which was evident in the interviews when the participants excitedly helped eachother retelling their experience of the Treasure haunt. It is also strongly suggested that theexecution of game design patterns affect how impactful players perceive the individualpatterns, and the methods used in this study could be useful to test out game prototypes bygame designers who want to create more impactful pervasive games. Still it could be useful toconsider Player-player proximity as a useful tool to create suspenseful pervasive games, andto consider the value of a shared experience between players.