With the increasing popularity of intelligent pianos in music education, enhancing students" self-regulated learning intention through gamification design has become an urgent issue to explore. Although many factors influencing learning motivation through gamification have been studied, the comprehensive mechanism of gamification affordance and student factors in the intelligent piano context remains unclear. This study constructs a theoretical model of "gamification affordance-learning intention-self-regulated learning intention" to uncover how gamification affordance affects students" self-regulated learning intention in the intelligent piano context. A questionnaire survey was conducted using both online and offline methods in June 2024, and a total of 351 valid responses were obtained from piano students aged 18 to 60. The data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) with AMOS. Results show that the reward affordance of intelligent pianos positively influences students" learning intention, while the influence of competition affordance is not significant. Furthermore, learning intention positively affects self-regulated learning intention and mediates the relationship between reward affordance and self-regulated learning intention, but not between competition affordance and self-regulated learning intention. These findings enrich the antecedent research on self-regulated learning intention, reveal the internal mechanisms of how gamification affordance influences self-regulated learning, and offer new perspectives for optimizing intelligent piano teaching. The study suggests focusing on enhancing the reward mechanisms in intelligent piano teaching and adjusting competitive elements based on individual needs to better stimulate students" learning intention and self-regulated learning.