Anyone who has played pinball understands the feeling of “just one more game” – everything about the scoring in a pinball game leads to the feeling of a near miss.
The rewards of flashing lights, sound effects and of course the score as well as endless opportunities to complete modes, win extra balls and collect bonuses.
Random ball physics, bad bounces and human error all create the condition that with a little more luck and a little more skill applied, one can beat this infernal machine.
The near-miss is a powerful psychological hook that draws players to one more game of just about any addictive game from slot machines to candy crush.
If only you had gotten one more strawberry, if only the dealer had dealt a face card, if only you had completed a row, if only you had saved the ball. If only’s lead to wanting to try again as long as your brain tells you it was possible. The farther from possible the less addictive but when you get just within an inch of success, you are totally hooked.
I think about a couple of nonaddictive games like Risk or Monopoly. In these games the leader pulls out ahead and then just crushes you for thirty agonizing minutes as their armies or bank account grows and yours slowly dwindles away. No near misses here.
Compare that to more modern games such as Ticket To Ride or Settlers of Catan where the outcomes is no determined into the very end and every player in the game seemingly has a shot at winning.
A study of players of the cell phone video game “Candy Crush” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5445157/ measured the Heart Rate, Skin Conductance Level, subjective arousal, frustration and urge to play recorded for three types of outcomes: wins (where they level up), losses (where they don’t come close to leveling up), and near-misses (where they just miss leveling up).
“Near-misses were more arousing than losses as indexed by increased heart rate and greater subjective arousal. Near-misses were also subjectively rated as the most frustrating of all outcomes. Most importantly, of any type of outcome, near-misses triggered the most substantial urge to continue play.”
This might as well be applied to pinball or arcade games where the idea of a near miss brings the player back for “one more game”.