Effects of pre-game stories on feelings of presence and evaluation of computer games

Two experiments examined the effects of exposure to a pre-game story prior to playing a computer game. In Experiment 1, participants played a computer game after watching a 5 min pre-game story video about the main character of the game. Prior exposure to the pre-game story positively influenced participants’ feelings of presence and their game evaluation. The effect of pre-game story exposure on game evaluation was mediated by participants’ feelings of presence. When a comparison between participants who watched the pre-game story and those who watched a non-story video was conducted, no mediating role of feelings of presence was found. In Experiment 2, participants read a movie script before playing the game. Its results partially replicated those of Experiment 1 with no significant mediating role of feelings of presence. The implications of the current study were discussed with respect to (1) studies on stories in computer games, (2) presence research, and (3) the design of computer games.