Analysis of gameplay data is an important component of the game design process. Playtesting helps game designers know what players are doing in the game and whether or not this behavior is expected [9]. These insights help game designers evaluate design decisions and iteratively improve the game. However, thorough evaluation of a game's structure is challenging because it often requires finding patterns in high-dimensional data from many players. Game companies spend a lot of time and money on playtesting, resulting in a need for data analysis methods that are efficient, powerful, and easy to use.
Recently, methods for automatic logging and game instrumentation have seen a surge in popularity [16]. These methods have made it feasible to collect detailed gameplay data Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. To copy otherwise, to republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee.