Statistics and recognition

Taking a break from the cards, I've been pondering other game attributes that keep players keen. Games are naturally competitive, so participants enjoy beating or achieving more than fellow players. Without a direct interaction between players, they resort to rankings and statistics. It would therefore make sense to look into which numbers interest people and help push them to work at improving their position.

From my experiences with web games and various time-sink games, practically everything you do in a game can be recorded and proves a point of interest: number of enemies kills, total acquired currency, hours playing the game. I also learned it's a good idea to plan such records ahead, rather than retrofit your counters later - my case here would be when World of Warcraft added their achievement system. They couldn't back track counters, just milestones.

Without a full game specification in hand it would be difficult to produce an entire list of items to record, but many can be assumed or estimated. As mentioned above, kills, kills by type, acquisitions of items (gold), hours of play are all basic, core statistics.

For those who may not enjoy staring at collated numbers (perhaps their numbers are shamefully low!), enticement through bonuses and titles could help sway their mind. Achievement (dare I say cards?!) could help identify milestones in statistics - 100 kills - and encourage players to up or round off their stats for further reward.