  Very few details about point systems used in games for health are reported in
scientific literature. To shed some light on this topic a bibliometric study,
analyzing the papers containing terms related to games for health and point
systems was performed and a mini taxonomy was derived. The search string game*
AND health AND (point* OR score) AND system* in a Scopus bibliographic database
was used to produce the corpus. We limited the search to articles, reviews and
conference papers written in English and to topics related to medical, health
and social subjects. The corpus papers abstracts and titles were analysed by
VOSviewer and a scientific landscape was generated. The search resulted in a
corpus consisting of 354 papers. The derived taxonomy contains three objects;
video games, serious games and educational games. The biblimetric mapping and
taxonomy revealed some interesting conclusions: (1) the video games have mostly
negative effects on health, (2) the serious games might have both a direct
positive health effects on users and also indirect effects by improved
competencies of health professionals, and (3) the research is concerned not
only to computer based educational games, but also to traditional table games
and sporting games. Based on the derived taxonomy we can conclude that point
systems should reward physical activity and healthy living style and punish
sedentary activities.

Computers and Society;Digital Libraries