Team Leader
Evan Aldrich
Texas A&M University
Economics
evanjaldrich@tamu.edu
Project Type
Research
Who Can Join
Faculty, Staff/Postdoctoral Scholars, Graduate Students, Masters Students, Undergraduate Students
Project Description
This project explores the design and implementation of in-game marketplaces to better understand how players make decisions, how markets evolve, and how platform policies shape outcomes. Platforms and developers design their economies using mechanisms such as fixed-price shops, auctions, randomized loot systems, transaction fees, and disclosure rules. However, little is known about how players update their beliefs about value in these environments or how different designs affect efficiency and long-term engagement.
The goal is to develop experimental marketplaces that mimic MMO-style economies, allowing for the study of player decision-making, market design, and platform interventions. Beyond research, the project seeks to inform the design of more sustainable and engaging virtual economies for academic and entertainment contexts.
Example research questions may include:
How do players update beliefs about item value when information is structured by different market designs?
How do different mechanisms (auctions, fixed-price shops, randomized loot) shape efficiency and/or player satisfaction?
How does the disclosure of information (odds, rarity categories, historical price data) affect player choices, and can framing influence demand?
What role does matchmaking play in shaping economic interactions and outcomes?
To what extent can a marketplace incentivize participants to engage more deeply in other parts of an environment?
Team Needs
Game Development
Experience with prototyping, multiplayer setup, and matchmaking to create functional and engaging experimental environments.
UI/UX Design
Expertise to ensure that players have intuitive and meaningful interactions with the game economy.
Data Engineering & Analytics
Ability to design backend data storage systems, process player activity logs, and conduct behavioral and statistical analysis.
Art & Visual Design
2D/3D art capabilities to enhance engagement and provide visual clarity in the experimental environment.
Economy Design
Background or interest in market structures, virtual goods, and incentive mechanisms.
Experimental Research
Skills or interest in in running controlled experiments, collecting data, and applying social science methods.
Requirements for Participation
Completion of CITI Training in Group 2: Social and Behavioral Research Investigators and Key Personnel (required for work involving human subjects).
Curiosity about how virtual economies function, interest in contributing to publishable research, and a desire to build skills relevant to academia and the game industry.
Commitment to collaborative work, openness to interdisciplinary approaches, and willingness to learn new tools and methods.
Special Opportunities
Research Experience
Team members will work on the frontier of virtual economies, an area of interest across economics, data science, and game development. This project offers the opportunity to contribute to publishable research in economics, behavioral science, and human-computer interaction.
Portfolio Growth
Developers, designers, and analysts will gain practical experience in prototyping multiplayer systems, matchmaking, economy design, backend engineering, art, and analytics pipelines that can be highlighted in portfolios, conference presentations, and research publications.
Creative Freedom
This project allows participants to co-design an experimental platform with agency over design decisions. The outcomes could potentially shape new approaches to market design in games and platform policy.
Additional Skill Development
In addition to coding or design, team members can gain experience in running experiments, analyzing user data, and presenting findings.