A Unified Gaming Theory: Can We Turn Game Design Into Baking?

I am back from my Ghana vacation. It was inspiring, relaxing, and wonderful but it is time to get back to the real world (so to speak). I had planned to sleep in and then catch up on all of my work later in the day but I woke up early and found something interesting on the Internet. So here I am writing this post. This post has been brought to you by our sponsor, Jetlag. Use Jetlag for all your productivity needs!

What I found was this interesting article on Game Jar by Mr. Geoff Hankes. I suggest that you read it before moving ahead with the rest of the post. However here are the highlights.

"Mostly, it’s because I feel that the majority of stories in video games are just plain bad compared to other mediums. Characters are little more than arch-types and cliches to me. They’re generally flat, boring, underdeveloped shadows of actual characters that I cannot even begin to relate to in any way, shape, or form. Plots are often non-nonsensical roller coaster rides that move you from one set piece to the next, so you can shoot another army guy or alien in the face without any real consequence to the greater context of the world that you’re in.".

          ...

That’s why I’ve mostly consumed games as a set of mechanics, and how those mechanics are entertaining. In doing so, I’ve approached games as an academic critic. I’ve been reading my reviews lately and come to realize they’re written more as papers, and are often dry, technical. Which is what they should be if I’m only focusing on mechanics.

          ...

 For those of you that don’t know, Crusader Kings II is a game that puts you into the role of a medieval ruler – a simulation at its core, but has many “gamey” parts to it as well. As you play a character, you gain prestige and piety which contribute to your dynastic score when your current playable character dies. The only clear cut goal in the game is to have someone bearing your dynasty’s name by the year 1453. Other than that, players are on their own to create their own goals and achievements. It is one of the hardest games I’ve ever played. And its the only one in a long time to make me engage with it on an emotional level.

...

So why did Crusader Kings II touch me on such an emotional level? How did this game which is ostensibly a collection of menus and hidden background calculations get through to me in such a powerful way? It’s because through those systems that we can become exposed to those important aspects of characterization. I experienced [my character's] life during his triumphs, his losses, and his frustrations. Of course, there is an amount of role-playing going on here, but don’t we role-play in every game?

First off let me just say that Crusader Kings 2 is AMAZING!

Ahem. Well anyways, as i read through the article I thought about the research I have seen in the past year. The concepts in the research provided a perfect framework for understanding the feelings of the author; specifically the discussion of mechanics vs. aesthetics. Story-telling in certain games did not engage him because they lacked a particular aesthetic but Crusader Kings 2 filled that need because its mechanics were used in service to creating a player driven story rather than the story being an excuse for the game's mechanics. But the last sentence I highlighted is really intriguing to me. The author assumes that every other gamer will feel and play as he does ("don't we role-play in every game?"). Some people probably do not.

The discussion of aesthetics and mechanics does not focus on the player, only the reasons for the affinity that players have for particular games. However, several researchers have identified player profiles that have specific preferences based on their style. Here is an article that tries to merge all of this research. From the article, and based on the profile found in the link, I would say that Geoff is a Idealist/Socialiser who is interested in the interplay between people and characters. The shallowness of these relationships in most video games stories is what makes them so frustrating to him. Crusader Kings 2 allows him to "play" with complex relationships, but rather than just present them as a set of numbers, the game turns these interactions into a coherent story that the player can control. 

What is really exciting is what this all means for research. If we can determine the types of mechanics that create a specific aesthetic and the aesthetics that appeals to particular player profiles then we have created a Unified Gaming Theory. Even more excitingly, we can transform Game Design from a messy art-form into a more manageable process. This does not mean that game design becomes, "by the book", or uncreative but manageable. I would say that it is akin to baking.

In the 21st century we are very good at making a basic chocolate cake. We even have recipes that tell us how to do it. However, if all chocolate cakes tasted the same then it would be a sad, sad world. People take these recipes and change them for specific tastes. For instance, if we know that a person does not like sweet things we can make the cake with dark chocolate instead of milk chocolate. By understanding the interplay between mechanics (the difference between milk and dark chocolate), aesthetics (sweet vs. bitter taste), and player profiles (non sweet tooth), we will be able to tell that Geoff would have loved Crusader Kings 2 before he even played it. And we would be able to make a similar game for people who are more interested in rational management instead of relationships. Making everyone happy. Hmm, looks like this might be next year's project!

Riding Slots and Crushing Candies: Game Design Aesthetics

I was planning on doing an in-depth analysis of Europa Universalis to show that any classroom using Civilization to teach history should uninstall it and load up EU instead. However a semi-spontaneous trip to Las Vegas changed my plans and I feel the need to talk about Candy Crush.

I have a few gaming prejudices. They include: thinking that everyone who competitively plays Counterstrike is a psychopath, that people who play Vampire: The Masquerade are weirdos, and that  people who play Candy Crush are idiots. I am working on this.
 

 
In Las Vegas though I saw something that put me back to square one with Candy Crush players. I saw a grown man put $900 into a slot machine. Nine-Hundred-DOLLARS. He was going to spend, at most, 3 hours at the thing before he lost all his money. This guy could have bought everything on the Steam Sale for $900 and he would be entertained until he died.

But no, he spent $900 on inferior entertainment. This then reminded me of Candy Crush and the fact that people could be spending their time (and MONEY!) on vastly superior games. It is so frustrating!

But it is not so much the causal nature of Candy Crush that annoys me. It is the fact that the game shifts away from being casual that makes the game so frustrating. And thankfully there is theory to explain my unease. Robin Hunicke and company put together a really interesting paper discussing the mechanics, dynamics, and aesthetics of game design. In a previous post I defined game mechanics as the components of a game. Dynamics is what happens when these mechanics are put together in a game. For instance, a hail-mary pass in football is a dynamic of the rules, game elements and space of the game of football. Aesthetics though is the concept that helps us understand why Candy Crush is so deceptive. Aesthetics describe what the player gets out of the game; the experience that is created when the dynamics come together. In the paper, the authors list several aesthetics. Here is a brief overview.

1. sensation (providing sights and sounds never seen before)
2. fantasy (make-believe and wish fulfillment), 
3. narrative (story and drama), 
4. challenge (including competition), 
5. fellowship (within social activities), 
6. discovery (exploring uncharted territory and learning), 
7. expression (self-discovery)
8. submission (filling downtime)

The key for gamers to understand the appeal of Candy Crush is to realise that submission is a valid aesthetic. This is hard for gamers to accept and it is telling that it is the last on the list. "Filthy casual" is a shield we use to protect ourselves against troubling thoughts. "How can anyone play a game that only takes up 5 minutes of their time when I play for 2 hour sessions each day? Can I be so out of touch? No, it is the filthy casuals who are wrong."

Of course it is much easier to call someone names than to own up to the fact that many people feel perfectly comfortable getting their drama, challenge, fellowship and other psychological needs from somewhere other than games. However this doesn't let Candy Crush off the hook.

One of the reasons why I feel Candy Crush is exploitative is not that it is a "submission" game but that it switches to a challenge game and therefore takes fun as a hostage. What do I mean? Well the first couple of levels of Candy Crush are relatively easy. Easy enough that you can play the game as a pass-time. No need to put in a lot of time and effort. Then they crank up the difficulty and all of a sudden it is a challenge game. But the player didn't want a challenge game; they wanted a pass-time. So Candy Crush provides its players with an out. "Just pay me a little bit of money and I will make the game easier for you. It will be that fun pass-time again. And besides it is not like you spent money on the game before, right?"

Well this has been extremely successful for the company. Currently Candy Crush is making $633,000 a day. Of course this could go the other way, where the player vows to never spend a cent on the game. However since it is now a challenge game, the player must spend time and effort to continue playing. But they most likely started playing Candy Crush to get away from challenge games. In fact they may have thought it was stupid that people would spend hours playing a game. But now...

A friend of a friend literally has her iPad by her bed. She plays Candy Crush before she goes to bed and when she wakes up she rolls over, turns on the iPad, and starts playing. So what can you do to avoid situations like this? Understand what is the appeal of the game that you are playing and then determine whether the game is fulfilling that appeal. Why should I keep playing an RPG with a terrible story if I play those games for the narrative? Why should I play Candy Crush as a pass-time when it is frustrating or when there are better challenge games out there? This will lead you to have more fun with your casual gaming. 

 

Also even though Candy Crush is doing well now, it will not last. Years ago Farmville tried to do the same thing and Zynga, the company that made Farmville was the darling of the Wall Street tech funds. Now the company is not doing so well. People moved on. That's what you get when your customer base are filthy casuals. Ooops, silly me, there I go again. Those casuals are alright!

What Makes the Measure of a Game?

I mentioned in the last post that I would be talking about games that were inadvertently purposeful. Specifically, taking a look at geography and history. However it ended up being too long so instead I will lay the theoretical ground work for the analysis and talk about the games later.

First off, I mentioned in the last post that Civilization was not a purposeful game about history because it did not actually teach history, it just exposed players to history. A good purposeful game will be directly related to its purpose. But what are the things that make up the core of a game? It isn't back story or cut-scenes because if they were then Civ would be a good history game. To help us here is a little gedankenexperiment.

 
Imagine that there is a far-away planet called Rigel VII, where war has never occurred but has recently received transmissions from another planet, Tatooine, that details the nuclear destruction of their planet.  On Tatooine, there were two great nations that were fighting a 100 year war; a group of neutral scientists left the nations to conduct their own research. Unwittingly, they created a device known only as: The Bomb. Each nation fought to acquire The Bomb and learn how to use it. Finally, one of the nations captured the scientists and used the device to devastating effect. The other side then put all their resources into acquiring the scientists and built another bomb and used it.The message then cut out.

The aliens on Rigel VII, not understanding the tragic nature of the messages, think that the message is detailing a new game and simulate it on their planet. The game is called: The Bomb.  There are two sides that are trying to acquire the Bomb and use it on the other side. Each side as a team of "soldiers" that must acquire the "Bomb" and move it to the opposing team's side. To use the Bomb and score a victory, a soldier must drop the Bomb into the "base". But each base has a defender who can acquire the bomb and turn it against the other side. Soldiers must find a way to get past the defender and the opposing side's soldiers to score a victory. This goes on for approximately 100 minutes (to simulate the 100 years of war) and the side with the most victories wins. Sound familiar?
  

Or hockey. But either way, we understand that even with the convoluted backstory that it is essentially the same game. What is it about the games that make them similar? What do we intuitively analyse when we understand that The Bomb is essentially soccer? In short this is what makes up a game. These are called game mechanics, and luckily one book has identified the general mechanics of a game.

The first mechanic is Space. Games must exist in a particular space or area in the world. It can be a virtual area, like a computer, or in your head. It can be a physical area like a field, a table or a gym. Space can constrain and define your game. For instance, you can have a fantasy role-playing game that takes place at a coffee table or one that is played in a field. Each space has its strengths and weaknesses.

The second mechanic is Game Elements. This is my catch-all phrase for what Schell calls objects, attributes and states. This mechanic includes game pieces, the board, virtual weapons, non-playing characters (NPCs), etc. Each of these things have attributes like colour, game statistics, life points, and so on. And these attributes can change via an event and gain a different state. For instance, a NPC monster (object) in a video game has life points (attributes), which when at 0 means that the NPC monster is dead (state).

The third mechanic is Player Actions. All games must have actions that the player performs. These actions usually interact with the game elements. Actions are the way in which a player has a game experience. It is also what the player will remember the most about a game. So if a player's actions in a purposeful game are directly related to a skill the designer wants to teach or an action she wants performed then she has done her job as a designer. Designers must also remember that when they create their fancy system that there must be a place for the player. A game that plays itself is not really a game.

The fourth mechanic are rules. Rules identify the laws of the game and how the player, game elements and space can interact. In many ways rules are the most important part of a game since by learning and accepting the rules a player is sucked into the fiction of the game. Also since rules are integral to winning or losing a game, making them a common point of contention with players. 

The last mechanic is challenge. I derived this from Schell's mechanic called skill. He states that a good game will allow the skill of the player to be challenged. I changed the mechanic to "challenge" since I wanted all the of the mechanics to be related to the game. The types of challenges are discussed in this amazing Gamasutra article and are directly related to learning, since it posits that challenges force players to learn and use certain "intelligences" to overcome a problem. All games require a certain level of skill to beat a certain level of challenge.

Once we understand game mechanics, we can analyse how a game fits a particular purpose. As mentioned in the last post, there is no mechanic in Civ that is related to learning history. You manage a city, send out units for warfare and choose technologies to research. The events that occur in the game are set in a historical context but do not relate to specific points in history; and the challenges in the game can be overcome without understanding history.  On the other hand there is one game where the mechnics are directly tied to learning about the world. "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?"


Carmen Sandiego is the greatest edutainment success story EVAR but it did not start out as an educational game. Instead it was just a project for two guys in a small company who wanted to make a cool game. For those of you who have never played the game, shame on you, but here is a great rundown of the game. As you can see, it is very basic. Crime. Chase. Catch. However, the challenges in the game are directly related to knowing (or memorizing from the game) information about specific countries. You also learn the valuable lesson that you need evidence before someone can be convicted.

Even though it was very educational, the game was fun because it never overtly tried to teach you about geography (or history in the case of Where in Time..). When I was 9, I swore to remember that the kroner was the currency of Denmark so that next time the clue came up I didn't waste time and let the thief get away.. again. If Carmen Sandiego's mechanics were not directly related to these learning goals than I probably never would commit these facts to memory.

What is interesting though is that all games are teaching us something. For instance, all players must remember the game rules to do well in a game. There is even evidence that some gamers are being trained to do system analysis on a daily basis. Therefore, it is always good to layout the mechanics of a game and ask: What is this teaching me? What am I learning? You might be surprised how much it is teaching you. Or how little.