How does Head Mounted Displays affect users' expressed sense of in-game enjoyment

In recent years, the rapid development of new head-mounted display technology (HMDs) for gaming provides usage opportunities for the mass market. A kickstarter project initiated by a well-known HMD developer Oculus Rift inspired our study. The main purpose of this study was to find out how a HMD will affect user’s expressed level of enjoyment. The method utilized in this study was a quantitative research method based on a research experiment. The thesis reports on a comparative study, in which the same game is played both with and without a HMD. Based on the analysis of our collected data, the results showed that playing games with a HMD does really give a boost in user’s enjoyment level. This may seem as a reasonable conclusion because the HMDs can provide the user with a more realistic and completely immersive in-game environment. Unfortunately there were some limitations in our study, one of the most crucial one was that the hardware was outdated, which significantly affected the reliability of the test results. For future prospects, it is recommended to use a more modern setup to acquire more reliable results, as well as optimizing the experience for the users