A Peek Into the Minds of Game Developers and Neuroscience Researchers Collaborating on Cognition Assessing Games

Cognition-assessing games (CAGs) are an evolving area of research, with collaboration between game developers and neuroscience researchers playing a critical role in their development. Game developers bring valuable expertise in game design and development, while neuroscience researchers contribute their knowledge of cognitive assessment. However, CAGs differ from both mainstream entertainment games (game developers' expertise) and the traditional neuropsychological assessments (neuroscience researchers' expertise). Given this context, it is essential to address the ideological challenges and conflicts that may arise between game developers and neuroscience researchers as they collaborate on CAG development. In this viewpoint, we present the perspectives of both game developers and neuroscience researchers on ten key themes relevant to CAGs: game intent, game tutorial, game art style and user interface, learning effects, ecological validity, game scoring, game realism, game testing, commercialization, and game platform. These themes are identified based on our over four years of collaborative work and are further supported by existing literature on CAGs. Our viewpoint is grounded in practical examples, offering concrete insights to facilitate impactful development of CAGs. The ten themes provide a structured framework for decision-making in CAGs emphasizing the importance of a systematic approach to CAG development. Finally, we hope that the findings from our viewpoint will assist game developers and neuroscience researchers in creating successful, translatable CAGs.