Opinion - Why Games? II

All right, we're back. Welcome back.

I felt like the last blog left a little bit to be desired. I want a little more focus, I want a little more coverage, and I like to be a little bit funnier.

But really, who doesn't?

So last time I covered a couple definitions of game. The idea was to gain some common ground upon which to discuss, what else, games. Now I'd like to cover a few short definitions that I feel add a lot toa comprehensive understanding of what a game actually is.

First let's review what we learned two days ago:

1. Games generally involve opposing parties.
2. Games have actions they allow and actions they don't allow.
3. Games have a goal or purpose.
4. Games are recreational.

Let's look at a few short, but elucidating definitions:

"A game is a form of art in which participants, termed players, make decisions in order to manage resources through game tokens in the pursuit of a goal."  - Greg Costikyan, I Have No Words & I Must Design

Here we see a couple of things not present in our previous definitions. A game is a form of art. Decisions must be made and resources are tracked. I like this a lot because I think it's very consistent. I think any activity which involves choice, specifically choices which can be advantageous or disadvantageous, can be defined as an art especially when that activity involves a highly variable process or outcome. I'm not saying all games are art, but I think that many can be defined as such. I also think that resource management is key to almost every day, almost any game can be thought of as a miniature economy. I'd go so far to say every game can be thought this way.

So what do we get from this? Games can be art. Decisions must be involved. Resource management is central to achieving a goal; by corollary this means there is a "game economy" of some sort.

Next.

"At its most elementary level then we can define game as an exercise of voluntary control systems in which there is an opposition between forces, confined by a procedure and rules in order to produce a disequilibrial outcome."  Elliot Avedon/Brian Sutton-Smith, The Study of Games

There is one different factor in this definition that we haven't seen any of the other ones: Games are designed to produce an unequal outcome. Now we can all immediately think of a couple of ways in which very common games can bring about an "equal" outcome. But in all but the simplest of games (I'm looking at you tic-tac-toe) these kinds of outcomes are not the most common. In fact they are often the rarest outcomes, usually associated with games which have a small degree of granularity.

I define the granularity of a game as the number of opportunities presented in the game's current state. The more possibilities available to a player the more granular their position or game state. The less possibilities open to a player the less granular their game state.

Let's take a look at an example: Chess is a great game to look at with what I would term a highly variable degree of granularity. There are 64 positions and 6 unique modes of movement spread among the playing pieces. That's a lot of granularity at the beginning of the game when you've got 32 pieces interacting across the board with all of their varying movement types. Things aren't exactly equal, but they at least seem fair. As most of the pieces have been captured and removed from the board only a restricted set of actions can be taken. Modes of movement are lost, and numbers of pieces are reduced. Now you've reached a very low degree of granularity and ending the game in a stalemate, a draw where there is no winner, becomes a very real possibility.

So what's the take home? My definition of granularity is a good thing to know, but more importantly games are almost universally designed to produce a clear victor.

So there's a fun game I'd like to take a moment to try, a meta-game if you will. Let's try seeing what kinds of activities we can create using only a subset of the four above aspects of what we call games.

Let's list them again with the newer additions from today:

1. Games generally involve opposing parties.
2. Games have actions they allow and actions they don't allow.
3. Games have a goal or purpose.
4. Games are recreational.
5. Games require decisions by the participants.
6. Games have an economy.
7. Games are designed to produce a winner.


Here's my top five. I'll list the numbers of the items above and then the activity I feel they define.

Note: Some aspects are questionable in my definitions and I'm willing to put those numbers in parenthesis for greater clarity on what I mean.

1, 3, 5, 6 - War
2, 3 (1, 5) - Laws
1, 2, 3, 6 (5) - Work
4, 6 - Drugs
2, 3, 4, 6 (7) - (Consensual) Bondage

You may now psychoanalyze to your hearts content. I however, am going to wrap up this post. Feel free to common your own top five list or even your own aspects of a game, I'd love to see them.

So we've at least managed to capture some important aspects of games. We've establish some common ground between games and other activities that we directly or indirectly participate in. So let me leave you with what I think is one of the most important associations between games and the reality that, via their recreational nature, people tend to divorce games from.

A game is one of the best preparations a human being can make for an intended undertaking or an unforeseen circumstance. Considered in a broad scope, the act of playing a game and making decisions which have consequences sharpens our ability to deal with our rather unpredictable wives.

Dragon, that was unnecessary. You know I meant lives. Where's your root directory at anyway... I've got a mean right-click I'd like to introduce you to.

Thanks for reading! See you next time ;)