Reminder: Choose Game for Design Analysis Project

1. Reminder: Choose Game for Design Analysis Project • Games Chosen so far: • Super Mario • FIFA • Dark Souls • Super Mario • Borderlands 2 • Mass Effect 3 • Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas • Final Fantasy IX • Game on any digital medium is fine: mobile device, gaming console, PC etc • Deadline to select a game: September 30th

2. Meaningful Play and Game Design • Assigned readings: • Chapters 3 & 4 (Rules of Play Book) Dr. Héctor Muñoz-Avila Disclaimer: I use these notes as a guide rather than a comprehensive coverage of the topic. They are neither a substitute for attending the lectures nor for reading the assigned material

3. How important is it to play? • Yes, we play to have “fun”, but • By playing games we learn a number of skills: • Social • Mechanical skills • Communication skills • Follow (or break) rules • We learn that there is something at play • Direct: winning a game • Direct/indirect: reward or impress someone

4. Meaning and Play • Key goal of successful game design: • Examples of meaningful play: Create gaming experience of the player that have a meaning and are meaningful (“meaningful play”) • Chess: intellectual dueling • Basketball: Improvisational, team-based tactics • MMOs: dynamic shifting of individual and community identities What makes a game meaningful are not the rules of the game alone but the experiences of players playing the game (this is why iterative design is so crucial in designing a game)

5. Descriptive Definition of Meaningful Play • Descriptive: • meaningful play emerges from the relation between player action and system outcome • Player: action  System: responds • Meaning of an action is the relation between action and outcome • Is there meaningful play in a game like this? Of course, player execute moves/combos with an intended outcome This definition reflects an operational level

6. Evaluative Definition of Meaningful Play • Evaluative: • Meaningful play occurs when relation between actions and outcomes are discernable and integrated into the larger context of the game • This definition relates to the experience of the player • Therefore the evaluative definition is the one we use in our analysis

7. Discernable • The outcome of an action is communicated in a perceivable way. • Good examples? • Where the outcome was communicated • Other two examples: one and two • Bad examples? • Where the outcome was not communicated • Designers learn hard lessons from early games (Stonkers)

8. Integrated • Actions taken by player have not only immediate significance but affects player experience later on. • Good examples? • Where the outcomehas significance later on • How about chess? • Here is a typical example (consequences 1 and 2) • What about games with linear storylines, are they integrated? • Bad examples? • Where the outcome has significance no later on • What about minigames?

9. Side Track: Massive Multiplayer Online RPGs (MMOs) • Persistent world • RPG: players take role • Priest: heal other players • Warrior: draws attention of the MOB towards him/her • Mage: deal damage • “dude wutsur DPS?” • … (as many as 20 other roles in modern games) • Character advances “levels” and gains new skills that facilitates its role. Example • Fundamental that each player master their avatar’s role to defeat some encounters • 10+ avatars following a plan

10. So What is Discernable and Integrated in MMOs? • Discernable • Integrated

11. Design • As with “game” there are multiple definitions of what this means • Design is making sense of things • Devising courses of action aimed at changing existing situations (Herbert Simon) • The conception of visual form • … • So there are multiple elements: understanding, action, visual appearance, …

12. Design: A Definition (the “official”) • Design is a process by which a designer creates a context to be encountered by a participant from which meaning emerges • Designer: person who creates the game • Context: rules, spaces, objects, narratives (lore) • Participants: players • Meaning: meaningful play • Crucial point of this definition: connect design and meaningful play • When creating games we are crafting experiences • Classical example: RPG games

13. Meaningful Play and Design (1) • Carefully crafted difficulty levels so game becomes more challenging as player skill increase From here to there Source: http://austega.com/gifted/16-gifted/articles/24-flow-and-mihaly-csikszentmihalyi.html (Flow Theory by MihalyCsikszentmihalyi)

14. Meaningful Play and Design (2) • Forms of improvement: • Player skill improves over time: • Avatar skill improves over time • Player and Avatar skill • Linear quest storyline: RTS games • Increasing challenge on racing games • RPG games • FPS games (improve loot + improved skill)

15. Non Meaningful Play by Design Examples? In a linear game, player might get back to early zones. But then it will be too easy • RPG game designer disincentive players by not awarding experience • no XP  player action kill monsters is not integrated!

16. Controversy: Morrowind • Design decision: • Monsters level as you level • A monster encountered later in the game is tougher than same monster encountered early in the game • In fact you can beat the game at very low level! • Paradox: can beat at level 20 but not at level 40 Is the outcome of actions integrated? A “funny” note: http://www.sacredwiki.org/index.php/Sacred_2:Combat_and_Game_Basics

17. Design and Meaning • Meaning in context of game design: assess the value or significance of play • Meaning is crucial because the design results in a system of interactions people object meaning context