Sixty avid Candy Crush players were recruited to play the game for 30 min while having their Heart Rate, Skin Conductance Level, subjective arousal, frustration and urge to play recorded for three types of outcomes: wins (where they level up), losses (where they don’t come close to levelling up), and near-misses (where they just miss levelling up).

Because near-misses in gambling games have consistently been shown to invigorate play despite being frustrating outcomes, the goal of the present study was to examine whether such near-misses trigger increases in player arousal, frustration and urge to continue play in Candy Crush.

In Candy Crush, the game signals when you just miss getting to the next level by one or two moves. In slot machines, a near-miss involves getting two of the needed three high-paying symbols on the pay-line (i.e., just missing the big win). Like many gambling games, the exceedingly popular and lucrative smartphone game “Candy Crush” features near-miss outcomes.

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