If you’ve never heard of it, “Flower” is a game released on the PSN earlier this year. It has no bosses and no end goals but instead guides the player through a dreamy, zen-like experience of colour and movement. It received massive interest and rave reviews. Why? Well, it gives players “juicy feedback.”

Robin Hunicke from thatgamecompany (developers of Flower) talked about what juicy feedback means at Brighton’s dConstruct Conference earlier this month. Essentially, this is what happens when games are developed to give an emotional experience to the user. Highs and lows are carefully mapped out and can offer a positive and rich interactive experience, leaving the player feeling happy and relaxed.

This is incredibly exciting because it can in theory change how we think about games and even why we buy them – will they be for art, relaxation or old-school entertainment? There’s a real buzz around emotion + technology at the moment and another theme at dConstruct was emotional engagement in interface design. Or: how and why people invest in products because of the way they feel about them. Think about the success of the iPhone, there’s real love around the product because it looks cool and is so tactile.

This might be one of the most important factors to drive technology design in the near future and we can expect lots more new and ‘unconventional’ experiences to come. Things are looking juicy.

Tags: flower | dConstruct 2009 | flow | robin hunicke | august de los reyes | microsoft surface | juicy feedback | games