Especially in knowledge societies, creativity is becoming an ever more important trait. In order to uphold progress and innovation, it is essential to nurture this trait. Playing (video) games has been found to promote creative thinking. However, there is yet a lack of understanding regarding which processes within games cause this effect. In order to effectively use games to train or use as a catalyst for creative potential, it is of relevance to uncover the influence of individual game components. This research takes an approach in investigating the influence of game components on creativity tests. We conducted an online user study with four conditions (control, levels, scarcity and theme), where creativity was assessed as a construct of cognitive abilities. Our results show that the inclusion of individual game components impacted the creative performance of participants regarding fluency, originality and elaboration.
