Why People Continue to Play Online Games: In Search of Critical Design Factors to Increase Customer Loyalty to Online Contents DONGSEONG CHOI, Ph.D., and JINWOO KIM, M.S. ABSTRACT As people increasingly play online games, numerous new features have been proposed to in- crease players’ log-on time at online gaming sites. However, few studies have investigated why people continue to play certain online games or which design features are most closely related to the amount of time spent by players at particular online gaming sites. This study proposes a theoretical model using the concepts of customer loyalty, flow, personal interac- tion, and social interaction to explain why people continue to play online network games. The study then conducts a large-scale survey to validate the model. Finally, it analyzes cur- rent online games to identify design features that are closely related to the theoretical con- cepts. The results indicate that people continue to play online games if they have optimal experiences while playing the games. This optimal experience can be attained if the player has effective personal interaction with the system or pleasant social interactions with other people connected to the Internet. Personal interaction can be facilitated by providing appro- priate goals, operators and feedback; social interaction can be facilitated through appropriate communication places and tools. This paper ends with the implications of applying the study results to other domains such as e-commerce and cyber communities. 11 CYBERPSYCHOLOGY &BEHAVIOR Volume 7, Number 1, 2004 © Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. INTRODUCTION A S THE INTERNET has spread into our society on a broad scale, it has been used to trade various kinds of contents. 1 One of the most popular online contents is the game, in which a person can play not only with the computer, but also with other people connected via the Internet. 2,3 For example, a recent study on the use of the Internet showed that PC owners spent an average of 20 h per week on the internet for personal use, 48% of which was to play online games. 4 Accordingly, the market for on- line gaming has rapidly expanded from $770 mil- lion in 1988 to $2.06 billion in 2001. 5 Because the online game market goes up and people usually pay fees to play online games ac- cording to game playing time, developers try to in- crease the duration of online game playing time by making a new online game using new techniques. Numerous techniques and features have been sug- gested to make gamers want to return to the online games repeatedly. 5 For example, several studies are being conducted to determine the effect of improv- ing the graphics used in the games on game play- HCI Laboratory, Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea.