Presence experience in mobile gaming

As a growing number of people play computer games with small-screen mobile devices such as handheld computers, mobile phones and handheld game consoles, it is important to know whether the gaming experience is comparable to that for playing with a PC on a large screen. One important aspect of gaming experience is whether people feel themselves engaged in the game activity and whether they feel present in the game world. In the present study participants played a rally game either with a PC or with a PDA, and presence was measured by the MECSPQ presence questionnaire. The results showed that, even though there was no difference in attentional engagement between conditions, participants experienced significantly higher levels of presence in the PC condition. Some user characteristics, measured by the Witmer and Singer’s ITQ questionnaire, played a mediating role between device type and different aspects of presence.