Why do we play games and why do we play them on computers? The contributors of »Games and Rules« take a closer look at the core of each game and the motivational system that is the game mechanics. Games are control circuits that organize the game world with their (joint) players and establish motivations in a dedicated space, a »Magic Circle«, whereas game mechanics are constructs of rules designed for interactions that provide gameplay. Those rules form the base for all the excitement and frustration we experience in games. This anthology contains individual essays by authors with backgrounds in Game Design and Game Studies, who lead the discourse to get to the bottom of game mechanics in video games and the real world.
Why do we play games and why do we play them on computers? The contributors of "Games and Rules" take a closer look at the core of each game and the motivational system that is the game mechanics. Games are control circuits that organize the game world with their (joint) players and establish motivations in a dedicated space, a "Magic Circle", whereas game mechanics are constructs of rules designed for interactions that provide gameplay. Those rules form the base for all the excitement and frustration we experience in games. This anthology contains individual essays by experts and authors with backgrounds in Game Design and Game Studies, who lead the discourse to get to the bottom of game mechanics in video games and the real world - among them Miguel Sicart and Carlo Fabricatore.
"What do Foursquare, Zynga, Nike+, and Groupon have in common? These and many other brands use gamification to deliver a sticky, viral and engaging experience to their customers. This book provides the design strategy and tactics you need to integrate game mechanics into any kind of consumer-facing website or mobile app. You'll learn how to use core game concepts, design patterns, and meaningful code samples to create a fun and captivating social environment"--P. [4] of cover
Emerging research has suggested that digital games can generate entertainment experiences beyond hedonic enjoyment towards eudaimonic experiences: Being emotionally moved, stimulated to reflect on one's self or a sense of elevation. Studies in this area have mainly focused on individual game characteristics that elicit singular and static eudaimonic game moments. However, such a focus neglects the interplay of multiple game aspects as well as the dynamic nature of eudaimonic experiences. The current study takes a novel approach to eudaimonic game research by conducting a qualitative game analysis of three games (Assassin's Creed Odyssey, Detroit: Become Human, and God of War) and taking systematic notes on game experiences shortly after playing. Results reveal that emotionally moving, reflective, and elevating eudaimonic experiences were elicited when gameplay notes suggested a strong involvement with the game's narrative and characters (i.e., narrative engagement) and, in some cases, narrative-impacting choices. These key aspects, in turn, are enhanced by clean player interfaces, graphically realistic characters, close camera perspectives, tone-appropriate soundtrack scores, and both narrative-enhancing (e.g., God of War's health mechanic) and choice-enhancing mechanics (e.g., Detroit: Become Human's flowchart). Eudaimonic experiences were also found to evolve throughout the game, with more powerful experiences occurring near the end of the game and some narrative themes fueling the eudaimonic flow of experiences throughout the overall game narrative. This study adds to academic research studying digital games by suggesting an innovative methodological approach that provides a detailed, integrative, and dynamic perspective on eudaimonic game experiences.
Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Gamification as winning strategy -- The revolution will be gamified : how gamification has changed the world, and will again -- Video (games) killed the car : gamification as a winning corporate strategy -- The gamification of strategy -- Engaging your team & driving results -- Title TK -- Igniting employee innovation -- Reimagining recruitment, training & development -- Propelling personnel to health and wellness -- Connecting, engaging and leveraging your customer base -- Cutting through the consumer noise -- Sustaining long term customer engagement -- Innovating with customers : crowdsourcing and behavior change -- In conclusion
The primary aim of this article is to provide a comprehensive review and elaboration of model matching and its theoretical propositions. Model matching explains and predicts individuals' outcomes related to gameplay by focusing on the interrelationships among games' systems of mechanics, relevant situations external to the game, and players' mental models. Formalizing model matching theory in this way provides researchers a unified explanation for game-based learning, game performance, and related gameplay outcomes while also providing a theory-based direction for advancing the study of games more broadly. The propositions explicated in this article are intended to serve as the primary tenets of model matching theory. Considerations for how these propositions may be tested in future games studies research are discussed.
Existing systems for online civic engagement and public consultation need a better architecture if they are to realize the aspirations of deliberative democracy. To improve the design of such systems, we develop an empirical model of online civic engagement that connects common game mechanics to four key democratic processes and outcomes—inclusion, deliberative engagement, sound and influential public input, and long-term civic impacts. We then link game mechanics and deliberation with theories of motivation to show how these mechanics can leverage people's drives to fulfill basic needs, forge social connections, and gain status. To illustrate our model in more concrete terms, we show how game mechanics could motivate both participants and policymakers in an online participatory budgeting system. We conclude by describing a multi-stage experimental approach to testing this model within an existing system of online participatory budgeting.
With the increasing interest of local governments in civic participation, it becomes important to address inherent asymmetries in existing public participation processes, such as inclusion, time availability and long-term commitment, and knowledge and power differentials. Game-based participation has the potential to enhance public participation processes and lead to civic learning. At the same time, games tend to reproduce and even reinforce existing assumptions about stakeholder roles, procedures and political agency and social dynamics. We argue that urban planners will be able to improve the coherence and overall experience of participatory processes by thinking in terms of separate game mechanics, which when used in balance, create a successful player/participant experience. In doing so, some of the asymmetries observed in the existing participatory framework can be addressed. The potentials and challenges of game elements' applications are discussed in the framework of three case studies in the Netherlands, Austria and Belgium.
Serious games are starting to attain a higher role as tools for learning in various contexts, but in particular in areas such as education and training. Due to its characteristics, such as rules, behavior simulation and feedback to the player's actions, serious games provide a favorable learning environment where errors can occur without real life penalty and students get instant feedback from challenges. These challenges are in accordance with the intended objectives and will self-adapt and repeat according to the student's difficulty level. Through motivating and engaging environments, which serve as base for problem solving and simulation of different situations and contexts, serious games have a great potential to aid players developing professional skills. But, how do we certify the acquired knowledge and skills? With this work we intend to propose a methodology to establish a relationship between the game mechanics of serious games and an array of competences for certification, evaluating the applicability of various aspects in the design and development of games such as the user interfaces and the gameplay, obtaining learning outcomes within the game itself. Through the definition of game mechanics combined with the necessary pedagogical elements, the game will ensure the certification. This paper will present a matrix of generic skills, based on the European Framework of Qualifications, and the definition of the game mechanics necessary for certification on tour guide training context. The certification matrix has as reference axes: skills, knowledge and competencies, which describe what the students should learn, understand and be able to do after they complete the learning process. The guides-interpreters welcome and accompany tourists on trips and visits to places of tourist interest and cultural heritage such as museums, palaces and national monuments, where they provide various information. Tour guide certification requirements include skills and specific knowledge about foreign languages and in the areas of History, Ethnology, Politics, Religion, Geography and Art of the territory where it is inserted. These skills are communication, interpersonal relationships, motivation, organization and management. This certification process aims to validate the skills to plan and conduct guided tours on the territory, demonstrate knowledge appropriate to the context and finally match a good group leader. After defining which competences are to be certified, the next step is to delineate the expected learning outcomes, as well as identify the game mechanics associated with it. The game mechanics, as methods invoked by agents for interaction with the game world, in combination with game elements/objects allows multiple paths through which to explore the game environment and its educational process. Mechanics as achievements, appointments, progression, reward schedules or status, describe how game can be designed to affect players in unprecedented ways. In order for the game to be able to certify tour guides, the design of the training game will incorporate a set of theoretical and practical tasks to acquire skills and knowledge of various transversal themes. For this end, patterns of skills and abilities in acquiring different knowledge will be identified.
What do stories in games have in common with political narratives? This book identifies narrative strategies as mechanisms for meaning and manipulation in games and real life. It shows that the narrative mechanics so clearly identifiable in games are increasingly used (and abused) in politics and social life. They have »many faces«, displays and interfaces. They occur as texts, recipes, stories, dramas in three acts, movies, videos, tweets, journeys of heroes, but also as rewarding stories in games and as narratives in society – such as a career from rags to riches, the concept of modernity or market economy. Below their surface, however, narrative mechanics are a particular type of motivational design – of game mechanics. ; + ID: 585466 + Reihentitel: Media Studies
What do stories in games have in common with political narratives? This book identifies narrative strategies as mechanisms for meaning and manipulation in games and real life. It shows that the narrative mechanics so clearly identifiable in games are increasingly used (and abused) in politics and social life. They have "many faces", displays and interfaces. They occur as texts, recipes, stories, dramas in three acts, movies, videos, tweets, journeys of heroes, but also as rewarding stories in games and as narratives in society - such as a career from rags to riches, the concept of modernity or market economy. Below their surface, however, narrative mechanics are a particular type of motivational design - of game mechanics.
Many games touch upon issues that are related to the postcolonial culture we live in. Be it in the shape of referring to how it has generated ethnic differences, subscribing to (post) capitalist values of winning and gaining, or by employing militarist strategies that have been partly shaped our colonial histories, cultural notions that are related to our colonial past are often resonant in games. However, one particular strand of strategy games takes the notions of colonialism as its most central focus. Games like Age Of Empires (AOE), Civilization and Rise of Nations, may differ greatly in certain ludological aspects, but all share a strong fascination with colonial history. Through employing colonial techniques of domination like exploring, trading, map-making and military manoeuvring, players create their personal colonial pasts and futures. Even though it is evident that such games share an explicit fascination with colonial history, it remains less clear in what way they may be called postcolonial. In this article I will shed light on why and how such games can be called postcolonial and should even be conceived as one of the most significant arenas to express the tensions and frictions that are part of the postcolonial culture we live in. As postcolonial playgrounds they offer the perfect means to play with and make sense of how colonial spatial practices have shaped contemporary culture. I will argue that the very character of digital games as well as the specific game mechanisms of historical strategy games makes them postcolonial playgrounds par excellence.
Survivance as a legal concept names the right to inheritance and more specifically the condition of being qualified to inherit a legacy. In an interview Jöelle Rostkowski, Vizenor explains: "[s]urvivance . is the heritable right of succession or reversion of an estate." This aspect of survivance is overlooked by those scholars of Vizenor's work who focus primarily on the conjunction of the terms "survival" and "resistance," terms that are important most fundamentally as they intersect with the capacity to transmit and to accept the inheritance of the past that is itself the intersection of survival and resistance. Survivance is not a static object or method but a dynamic condition of historical and cultural survival and also of political resistance, practiced in the continual readiness of Indigenous communities to accept and continue the inheritance passed on by elders and ancestors. In this sense, claims made by recent Indigenous video-game developers to speak to youth through digital media by providing games that transmit tribal legacies of language, stories, ontologies, and ways of knowing and being in the world, speak to the practice of survivance. Indeed, the particular capacity of video games to engage oral storytelling and active participation in the making of stories offers a powerful means to encourage and sustain survivance. This essay focuses on the analysis of video-game mechanics: the rules of the game that determine the opportunities made possible for, and the limitations imposed upon, player interactivity. Vizenor's concept of survivance enhances understanding of the powerful decolonizing potential of mechanics in Indigenous video games and these game mechanics illustrate in particularly clear ways the workings of survivance as an active engagement in the politics of what Vizenor calls "native presence." In the interview with Jöelle Rostkowski referenced above, Vizenor remarks: "The character of survivance creates a sense of native presence, a critical, active presence and resistance, over absence, historical and cultural absence, nihility and victimry." I argue that a sense of a critical, active Indigenous presence is created by Indigenously-determined game mechanics, as I show through the analysis of two very different digital games. Resistance to "historical and cultural absence, nihility and victimry" is explored through the 2-D fixed shooter arcade game Invaders (2015 Steven Paul Judd, Elizabeth LaPensée, Trevino Brings Plenty). The Iñupiat puzzle platformer video game Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna, 2014 Upper One Games) enacts survivance as the epistemological practice of a living, tribal presence past, present, and future. In these digital games, mechanics are designed to compel players to enact survivance. Understanding this relationship underlines the importance of the decolonizing potential of Indigenous video games.
