There's a kind of near-paradox about motivation in games.
Work and play are different from each other. One of the most important contrasts between work and play is in how one treats costs like time and effort.
Work tends to aim at some real objective, and the worker generally prefers this to happen efficiently (whether in an employer's terms, or in their own terms). If you're working for a living and there's a much faster, easier method of doing a job task without any major tradeoff or cost, you'll probably prefer that method. In work, the result is the point, means can be chosen or truncated accordingly. We want to take the shortcuts.
By contrast, the point of play is often explicitly to take time on something that has no "real life" purpose apart from the relaxation, interest, or enjoyment of the game itself. This purpose is realized entirely in the activity of play itself. Where we go out of our way to perform work more efficiently, we intentionally linger over a game. We want something to do, even if it is objectively pointless apart from our enjoyment of it. We do not want to be cheated of our game time. The game frequently describes a "long way around." For example, it's easy to seize your opponent's Queen piece in chess, and someone somewhere might be happy to do only this; but instead, the chess player is more likely to work through an elaborate plan involving pawns. The true purpose is not simply to take the Queen, but to engage in the activity of chess - for example, for the engaging resistance of playing against a responsive opponent who is also doing their best.
In many but not all games, that activity takes the form of seeking a virtual goal under virtual constraints. Many games are structured so that players pretend to seek something - the virtual goal. For example, they might pretend (by way of discussion and maps on a table) to try to steal the Mona Lisa from the Louvre. In other words, players accept the givens and rules or constraints (a virtual Louvre, certain probabilities of being noticed by guard dogs) and then virtually compose and execute their plans. The likely intention behind the rules is to make this activity more interesting. The intention of the goal is simply to provide something to do - specifically, something which causes one to consider how to get past the guard dogs and so on.
In reality, this is play; it is something more or less casual or luxurious, time intentionally "wasted" that we don't want to be cheated of. Virtually, it is work - and the player's purpose within the game is to pursue the goal as well or efficiently as possible. When I am a player, my behavior is likely to suggest with the same apparent dichotomy. The surface form of my activity may be that I am goal-seeking, as efficient as possible, trying to win at all costs, groaning about setbacks, etc. In reality, I don't necessarily want all this just to go away, as it is part of the game - for example, breaking the rules to cheat in a game based on resistance may sabotage the source of enjoyment intended by the game's design. If I want to play enjoyably, it's probably better for me to take the long way around.
People sometimes get confused, when they are analyzing games, and sometimes even when they are playing games. We all understand clearly that a virtual painting is not a real painting, and does not have the value of a real painting. Any value that a virtual Mona Lisa has is really virtual. So far, so good. But here is where the confusion really begins. If I play Virtual Art Thief, I may report that I greatly enjoy the moment of securing the Mona Lisa. If I am an avid repeated player, and I learn that certain tactics tend to get me a score, I may repeat these tactics. Both by my report of my own feelings and by the testimony of my actual behavior, it seems just like the virtual Mona Lisa is some kind of reward or goodie.
Virtually, it is. But in reality, it is not. To the virtual art thief, it's a great prize which may provide retirement in some tropical paradise. To the real player, this simply achieves the goal of the game - and the game may end in a victory or go on to something else.
The virtual Mona Lisa is a virtual goal, not the actual point of anything. It is a device to help generate gameplay. It is something to pursue so that you have something to do in the game, hopefully something interesting to do. It defines an activity and a sort of scoring scheme, without necessarily defining precisely the steps the player should take.
The typical virtual goodie is not a "true" reward in a psychological sense. It does not have the relatively straightforward, direct, natural, or relatively reliable psychological value of a dollar, a snack, the embrace of a loved one, etc. Nor is it really in any clear or direct way a "conditioned reinforcer."
I propose instead that if it has motivational value, that value probably depends on something else - on the representations constructed by a game, or in the course of playing a game. In real world terms, this virtual painting's value is relative to playing the game in which it is a goal. If you do not have any desire or need to play the game, that virtual painting has no real value. If we don't really get any interest or enjoyment out of the real-world activity of playing the game, the game is really a waste of our time, and so is pursuing its virtual goals. By contrast, a game where you instantly receive an unlimited quantity of virtual paintings is probably a failure as an interesting activity. It immediately short-circuits itself, the virtual paintings are immediately devalued. Virtual rewards are neither necessary nor sufficient to make a game enjoyable.
Virtual goals in a game are not really rewards. The difference is in the player's motivation. Unlike rewards that act powerfully upon us in the real world, a virtual goal has no inherent value or influence on the player's behavior outside of the game. It can be chosen pretty much arbitrarily - in principle, any condition in the game - and it is simply adopted as part of playing. Again, it matters to the player no more than the game itself does. Again, it does not require any incentive or reward outside the opportunity to play. Players are motivated to play insofar as they enjoy the activity; this enjoyment does not consist in simply obtaining virtual rewards that have no inherent value to the player outside of the game, and no inherent power to make a game interesting or enjoyable.
