Simon Egenfeldt Nielsen, Jonas Heide Smith, and Susana Pajares Tosca, "What is a Game?"

(In Understanding Video Games)

- Half Life 2 vs poker (both games, so different)
- Importance of specific definitions (not a question of correctness)
- Political dimension to definition
- Wittgenstein: family resemblances (does not actively seek a common feature, uses arbitrary examples, problem of formal/informal games)
- Huizinga: magic circle (ideological agenda to protect play as valuable)
- As special context were specific rules apply, games are not unique (but does Huizinga ever say they are? Why does a definition have to identify specific, unique features? -> exemplification structure?)
- Different to say they are separate than to say they are unique in their separateness
- Castronova: maintain separation or else play will lose its appeal
- Ways games extend into the real world and are not separate: time investment, moods, communication of ideas and values, behaviour, direct impact such as buying in-game items
- Callois: play is voluntary, uncertain, unproductive and make-believe
- Agon/competition, alea/chance, mimicry/imitation, Illinx/vertigo (and many hybrid combinations)
- Paidia vs ludus (not entirely distinct)
- Arbitrary categories? Too blurry?
- What about open-ended/free-form play within rules (SimCity example)
- McLuhan: games are tied to and reveal the nature of culture, and release tention (but can also create tension)
- Bateson: games as meta-communication, communication about communication, play is not taken at face value, communicates its un-reality (link to fiction)
- Sutton-Smith: multifaceted nature of games, definition is determined by purpose
- Games emerge as societies develop
- Finite, fixed, goal-oriented
- "An excercise of voluntary control systems in which there is an opposition between force, confined by a procedure and rules in order to produce a disequilibrial outcome."
- Meade: make-believe as part of the genesis of the self
- Adopt temporary selves (different from animal play)
- Rules enable/require consciousness of other palyer's roles, integration into a group
- Internalize the generalized other
- Jenkins: game as popular/lively art, popular aesthetics, emotional impact (parallels to earlier popular media)
- Infancy argument, still banal, formulaic, but have potential
- Player control, feedback are central
- Parlett: games have ends and means (requires a winner)
- Suits: restrictive rules to inhibit progress towards a goal (ie: inefficient means)
- Crawford: representation, interaction, conflict, safety
- Representation and safety are debateable (abstract games, indirect consequences)
- Formal definitions of digital games...
- Salen and Zimmerman: system, artificial conflict, rules, quantifiable outcome
- Juul: rule-based formal system, variable and quantifiable outcome, different outcomes have different values, players exert effort, influence and are attached to the outcome, optional/negotiable consequences
- Attitude towards the activity
- Digital games do not always match the classical definition
- Formal definitions help identify biases in our understanding of games, clarify whether observations are unique to video games (again, why do they have to be unique? Surely games share many, many features with other things and phenomena, why should a definition have to entail uniqe features?)
- Pragmatic definitions, "tools for action" (not so much pragmatic definitions as game design philosophies... aren't there also pragmatic definitions that scholars use?)
- Meier's "series of interesting choices" is an aesthetic stipulation or personal philosophy, not so much a definition
- Hunicke, LeBlanc and Zubek: mechanics, dynamics, aesthetics (rules/code, gameplay, response); sensation, fantasy, narrative, challenge, fellowship, discovery, expression, submission
- Design tools, not an actual account
- Genre
- Wolf's ridiculous list
- Aarseth's series of genre variables that apply to all games to varying degrees (questionably useful)
- Genres are arbitrary, but create expectations, financial function of genre
- Some systems of genre are more consistent (based on one clear criterion)
- Nielsen et al suggest categorization based on a game's success criteria
- Problem: games without explicit goals -> special category, process-oriented games
- Action games: motor skill, hand-eye coordination
- Adventure games: thinking, solving, patience
- Strategy games: between action and adventure, distant role of the general/god (turn based is closer to adventure, real-time is closer to action)
- Process-oriented games: system to play with for entertainment (toy), player character within (closer to action/adventure), or control over the system (closer to strategy)
- Process-oriented games may still encourage certain types of play over others
- Simulation games (sub-category of process-orienteD) mimic concrete, real-world experiences, so SimCity and SimEarth don't count (uh...)
- Nielsen et al's system of genre is just as problematic as any other system, and is hardly consistent (what exactly is the clear, single criterion? Successful gameplay actions? Then why aren't Strategy games simply divided up between action and adventure? It seems like the categories are also defined by whether the player controls one singular character or commands multiple characters)
- Additionally, the categories are confusing because they use familiar generic language ("action game," "simulation game") but disregard some colloquial understandings of those terms
- As with virtually all other approaches to genre in digital games, Nielsen et al miss the point that genre is a meaning-making discursive construct, not an objective tool and should be approached as such