cconway22Blog

When I began reading through all of the definitions that were listed off in Ian Schrieber’s game design course I was to say the least, overwhelmed. I wasn’t aware that in order for something to be a game it had to possess many if not all of the characteristics he listed. However there were many points he made in which I agreed with. The fact that he pointed out that a game is an activity involving player decisions and that there is always an objective, set of rules, and conflict is obvious. However the fact that they are voluntary totally threw me for a loop. Growing up, I thought the ritual of my brother pinning me down on the ground and dangling a lougy over me from his mouth was a normal procedure when asking a little brother to play a game with him. I’m thankful that he never actually held a gun to my head. I would have definitely thought something was wrong then. I’m not really sure what he means by games having an uncertain outcome. To me, it seems like games have a pretty certain outcome, somebody wins and somebody loses. I’m usually the guy standing above the loser pumping my fist in the air. All in all, it seems pretty safe to say that games all have a few of the same characteristics. Games have conflict. Games have an end objective or goal. Finally, games have a set of rules, even if those rules annoyingly change throughout the game.

There are those instances when the lines blur a bit. Schrieber listed puzzles, role-playing games, stories, and choose-your-own-adventure books as types of games that don’t necessarily fit all the rules, or at least his definition of a game. A puzzle seems to be the only item in the list that seems most like a game to me. Take the Rubik’s cube for example, which is a puzzle he brings up. A Rubik’s cube is an activity, it has a set of rules per se, there is definitely a goal, it has a lot of decision making, and I’m not sure how anybody else feels about it but I feel pretty conflicted when the damn thing is in my hand. I normally just chew on it for a while until all of the pieces fall apart, ultimately making it easier to put together. And if I can’t do it myself, I’ll just hand it to someone else to try, making it multi-player.