Gamification - What makes a game a game?

[Zesher]

Hey everyone! It's been a while, but life has been keeping me busy

Most of you are passionate about gaming, and so I consider this community experts on games. In your opinion, what are the key elements of a game? Many sources state that a game differs from a toy in that a game has a set of rules, a goal or winning condition to strive for, and a feedback loop that lets the player know how they're progressing to achieving their goal or winning condition. Personally, I think that definition is lacking and a good addictive game requires something more. So what do you think?

To be completely transparent, I have alliterative motives :p First off, it would be great feedback for the game/game engine I'm working on. On top of that, the company I work for (NCR) wants to gamify banking/financial interactions. On the bright side, there is a decent chance that if anyone is passionate about their viewpoints and are willing to do a phone interview with my company, we could give you a $75 amazon gift card.

[Zoltar]

Mondo deep question. Dragonbro...Games to big Z are a fun experience, a break from life and slightly more functional than a book or movie. They are also a way of story telling and artistic expression. Then again maybe I'm not the guy to ask. I find most modern games boriiiiiiinnnng and too interested in my moolah than my enjoyment.

[Archem]

I don't think an end-goal is enough to define a game. In my opinion, a game requires interactivity from the user. Now, a choose-your-own-adventure book has user interactivity, but the results are very pre-determined. Some element of randomness is necessary to make user interactions more interesting (AI randomness in a game), as predictability can detract from the fun factor. Having an explorable environment, whether it be a huge, open world (GTA) or just some extra platforms (Mario) can make the game feel less on-rails, thus, more of a product for players to interact with.

[Prpl_Mage]

I'd say there are two different types of game. Competitive games and single games.

In a competitive game you try to be better than everyone else, this is true even in a cooperative mode. You still try to be the best. This is a motivation on its own and works well on most people. So the actual goal is pretty meaningless because they will always get a reward whether its a "you win" message or being the top of a DPS meter.

The contents of a competitive game can't be too random but still have elements of randomness. If it becomes too random (like yahtzee) you can't really feel that you win because you are the best, it's more about being the most lucky guy in the room. So dices are okay as long as you can affect things in a different way as well. Look at mario party. Sure you roll your dice to move, but you can also use items to increase the number of die to roll. And then you break the pattern of moving with minigames.

Which brings us to the next part: Variation. Variation is important in a competitive game and gives the players options. If you only shoot people in the same map it's gonna get dull. You will do the exact same thing over and over again. But if you add maps with different objectives or different maps alone you get a lot more variation. This is pretty much the only reason i prefer heroes of the storm over dota2 nowdays. To increase the variation further you add weapons that differs in how they function or special powers and things like that. Gimmicks or different kinds like special bonuses.

For singleplayer games it's quite different. Until the inclusion of achievements the only motivation people got was from the game itself. Nowdays people play SP games to earn achievements to show off, so that's an extrinsic motivation. But the motivation from the game itself is much more important, people can tell when they are winning in multiplayer, they get driven when the others are driven.

One motivation is reaching the end. This is true for a lot of players/games especially the ones with a focus on story. Playing a final fantasy you follow a bunch of characters, they do their thing, you like them(most of them at lest) and they add something to the story (except xii). And even if the game itself isn't that much fun; you still want to reach the end. It's like going to the movie, even if the movie sucks you will sit there and watch it to the end. So part of the motivation is the end goal, and the end goal is mostly the end of the story, it could also be to reach a score screen like in roguelikes and such. I loathed the gameplay and the characters of FFXII but I still played it to the end.

Gameplay is what I would say is the second largest motivation. The largest if a game lacks story of course. The gameplay is what you as a player will actually do during the game. There are active games and strategy games. When you got a kid at home you're gonna want some strategy games. This involves anything turn based to be honest so it doesn't matter if you get distracted. So even an rpg like Bravely Default or Heartstone counts. Another good thing about these is that you probably know the scenario and can therefore enter with a plan, execute the plan and take care of the problems that appears during your plans. So you know where the enemies will spawn, you die and have to retry the map, but it's okay because you are now prepared for it.

But when you don't have to care about anything else you can play more active games that demands your entire concentration. Games like F zero, Bayonetta and such where your reflexes needs to be on top. And to be honest, if the gameplay feels sluggish you will feel less in control. And being in control is what a game is all about.
Being able to affect gameplay is another important thing for me, sure you can add character customization but that's really unnecessary. It's more important to me that I can assign skills or change fighting styles or things like that in a game that will do the same thing over and over for 20 hours. i liked xeoblades chronicles more than Xenoblade chronicles X because I could change control of the characters. Of course you can change the class in X but then you need to assign skills and equipment and everything. Having minigames and sidequests is a good way to deal with this as well, just having a break from rpg battles to play chocobo hot and cold in FFIX was a blast.

Creativity, not really important in itself but it helps. I mentioned customization above and that fits in here. It's pretty pointless in itself but it allows the player to be the owner of something. You create your character, you name it. You buy a house, decorate it, decide what car to drive, build a castle out of explosive barrels. Anything that allows the player to create - will also make the player think more about the game than they usually would.

This is also true for less creative games where creativity is instead changed for hoarding. In terraria I build a lot of crap, decorate buildings, make fancy bridges and such. But then I also stack chests full with crap. And getting all that crap is a motivation in itself. The gathering to complete a collection, the struggle to find every last piece of something. This is also part of my motivation in monster hunter, there are tons of different weapons to make and armor sets to put together. But to make them I need to challenge myself to more difficult tasks.

Challenge is the last point and the most important one for me. A game where I just breeze to the end and receive a "good job" and an achievement feels empty to me. I can't take that sort of feedback unless I feel like I earned it. But if reaching the end was a struggle then the message will appear at a time that I actually feel good about my performance. This is why I even bother with monster hunter, the game is very challenging. Not so much on Low rank but on G rank. You can only die 3 times each mission so there is no brickwalling either. Most of the final quests are insane as well and so it feels good to complete them. Unlike diablo 2 and 3 where getting the right gear means that monsters are pushovers. So it's important to me that I am challenged.

[Fisherson]

To me Games are a complex notion. In real life it probably is that stale little description but you gotta realize I'm a weird dude who has 'misplaced' passion in games because I grew up with them. My first system was a playstation 1 when it first rolled off the line. My favorite from that era is a three way tie between Brave Fencer Musashi, Spyro the Dragon (series) or Final Fantasy 8. First you must get straight I loved all of them for their gameplay, but that's not why I still adore them. I adore them because they were magical portals that opened into a strange and wonderous place that I weirdly felt at home at. See I have Aspergers and ADD. To say I had a hard time processing RL? Understatement.

I was always busy day dreaming and making up stories in my head without much purpose. Mostly non-original stuff based on some crap I saw on TV...until my mom and dad surprised me with the PS1 and a demo disc. That was how I met both Spyro and FF8. Totally different things gameplay wise but both were otherwordly and so different from anything I saw. Especially Final Fantasy it was like what I thought the world was supposed to be. Magic, monster, car chases, super weapons but also it was the first game where I asked "How does that work?" Refering to the ATB. Not how the function worked but how the system itself worked. It wouldn't be till high school when I was given a free period and access to the internet again for the first time in years that I'd find out by stumbling onto what is now my favorite game making engine: RPG maker 2003. Finally I could not only understand but I could replicate those games I played re-create them as I saw fit and even improve on them! It was a great time for me, especially because DLing the old pirated RPG maker 2003 lead me to this wondrous flying island that I adore so much now.

I'd love to say this means that video games will forever be in my life but...as I get older I find myself less interested in new games. Undertale is the first one I've bought since Skyrim. ^^; Mostly cause I don't like the way games are going. I mean I know the turn based era is nearly at an end, which saddens me so deeply, but that's only one thing. Now all games are interested faster-than-life battle systems, DLCs and other greedy dark paths I want no part of. Games aren't about fun anymore, at least not mine it seems! It seems all the want is our money and zombie-like dedication with very little return given. =/ It's just FPS and these action RPGs with their hack and slash but ALL GAMING is getting to where it's just not any fun anymore. O course before you raise your banner know that i have almost no online capabilities. It's possible I would feel different if I did right? Wrong. Wasn't even a fan of the WoW types back in the day. I crave immersion into a game. I want to see a world I can stride across and slay monsters, or just hang out enjoying how beautiful the level design is or laugh out loud so hard when Al Gore comes striding down a catwalk decked out like a shiny Darth Vader preaching on about some crazy talk that the universe needs recycled to bring about the new epoch. I want fun and adventure to live again.