Psychology at play: Empathy and Character Relatability

This thesis focuses on the psychology of empathy in character design. The objective is to open and discuss the way a player relates to and feels empathy towards playable and non-playable characters (NPC’s) in video games, and why does the phenomenon exist. The purpose of this thesis is to understand and apply the scientific studies on human psychology of empathy to the process of creating relationships with fictional characters in a video game environment. The thesis aims to explore the foundation of empathy, how it works, and how it is developed in humans, as well as what enables players to get emotional about characters. While focusing on emotional responsiveness and communication, the thesis in addition briefly addresses some basics of visual character creation and development. Lastly, the thesis proceeds to examine results of a conducted survey in which participants were asked to describe their emotional experiences with a specific game character of their choosing