Notes from 2/2/09

Through the anthropological study of games, Huizinga (1938) brought forth the notion that the salient feature of playing is that it is a voluntary and ‘needless’ activity. A consequence of this is the requirement of play that players must be able to defer or suspend playing at any time. Another requirement is that playing to a certain extent always is viewed as less ‘real’ than other human activities.From these basic requirements, Huizinga identified a set of properties of playing that are necessary for the play to be perceived as such by the players. Play is selfsufficient in the sense that it is satisfying in itself and that the activity ends when that satisfaction has been reached. Play is set apart from ordinary life both in locality and duration – it is played out within given limits of time and space – playing occurs within an arena, a playground, wherein a particular order is imposed. Play is governed by rules and challenges that are different from those of ordinary life. Thus, the participants must agree that the activities within the ‘circle’ are interpreted playfully as a part of the game, and not of ordinary life. Quoting Johan Huizinga’s (1938) definition – or rather description – of play:[A] free activity standing quite consciously outside “ordinary” life as being “not serious”, but at the same time absorbing the players intensely and utterly. It is an activity connected with no material interest, and no profit can be gained by it. It proceeds within its own proper boundaries of time and space according to fixed rules and in an orderly manner. It promotes the formation of social groupings, which tend to surround themselves with secrecy and to stress their difference from the common world by disguise or other means.Salen and Zimmerman use Huizinga’s concept of play as their base for defining a concept of a ’magic circle of gameplay’ (Salen and Zimmerman 2004, pp. 9399); it is a metaphor describing the activity perceived by participants as being voluntary and selfsufficient, set apart from ordinary life in locality and duration, and with rules that differ from ordinary life. Quoting Katie Salen’s and Eric Zimmerman’s (2004) definition of game:A game is a system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome.Jesper Juul’s (2003) definition of classic game goes along the same lines, although the artificiality and nonseriousness goes here under optionality and negotiability. Quoting Juul:A game is a rulebased system with a variable and quantifiable outcome, where different outcomes are assigned different values, the player exerts effort in order to influence the outcome, the player feels attached to the outcome and the consequences of the activity are optional and negotiable.Pervasive games consciously exploit the ambiguity of expanding beyond the basic boundaries of the contractual magic circle. This often leads to the point where the game interface is completely ambiguous: Any action could be a game action, and any sensory observation by any participant could be seen as part of the game.1. Spatial Expansion2. Temporal Expansion3. Social ExpansionPervasive game is a game that has one or more salient features that expand the contractual magic circle of play socially, spatially or temporally.PERVASIVE GAME TYPESAlternate reality games include The A.I. Game, I Love Bees, Perplex City et cetera. These are massive puzzle games usually requiring collaboration of at least hundreds of players to be completed. They pretend to hide their gamic nature by denying their gameness aloud. The puzzle structures to be overcome exist typically on WWW sites and in physical space. Alternate reality games draw their main ludic experience from the deliberate ambiguity of the magic circle. Real world events and information becomes part of the game. The most rewarding game experiences are often freak coincidences; events where everyday life and real world events interact with the in game content.Massively multiplayer mobile games, such as Botfighters and Botfighters II, as well as unpublished Supafly and prototype games such as Songs of North. The basic mechanic is moving around in physical space, encountering virtual objects and other players, and interacting with them using a mobile phone. Massively mobile games typically feature a persistent game world. Much of the game experience is generated by the challenge of mixing and overlaying ingame activity with ordinary life. Massively multiplayer mobile games typically provide a more immersive game experience than online multiplayer games – even without relying on highend graphics that have become standard in the PC and console gameworld.Pervasive larp is a genre of larp that features the expansions. The more prominent examples include Prosopopeia and Isle of Saints, although many of these games have been played in various places, typically using the World of Darkness mythos. Epidemic Menace also is rather close to being a pervasive larp, through its use of ingame actors and fictive video – though the players are not assigned any specific characters in Epidemic Menace. The distinctive feature of pervasive larp is the high amount of immersion into the game that is achieved through the players’ immersion into a game character. This feature is shared with ordinary larp, but pervasive larp offers design novel options to larp in particular through the possibility to introduce conceptual expansions of the game space. Social expansion is typically perceived as highly engaging in pervasive larp.Onlineonstreet games are games that are played simultaneously in virtual environments and in physical space. IPerG demonstrators Epidemic Menace and Garden of Earthly Delights, as well as earlier games like Can You See Me Now feature virtual/physical collaboration and competition. Onlineonstreet games typically feature two different player roles, where online players take a ‘control room’ or guidance role due to their larger overview and simpler access to virtual game content, whereas on street players take a performative role, carrying out tasksin the real world.Proximity games are a subgenre that has been born from looking for possibilities of gaming with Bluetooth and RFID technologies. Some proximity games, like Hot Potato and Yum Yum Sheep are based on applying the Bluetooth ID:s of nonplayers to insert ludic content to ordinary social world, while Pirates! is a proximity game that stays dormant until the players reach each other’s detection range. A multitude of other proximity games is likely to emerge, as people carry an increasing amount of Bluetooth devices around.Event games are pervasive games that solve the problems of gameplay ambiguity and game world persistency by lasting only a short, defined duration. Business model could be structured on event participation rather than monthly subscription, and these games might be once in a lifetime experiences to most of their players. Players are willing to pay surprising sums for laser tag games (Megazone) and paintball matches. Event games might include Epidemic Menace and Can You See Me Now.Crossmedia games are more or less pervasive games, playable with multiple devices simultaneously. Although Epidemic Menace only used devices commonly used for gaming, other crossmedia games might include mass media (TV, radio) or phenomena like street lights, contributing thus to the ambiguity of gameplay. Crossmedia games must play on the relative strengths of the different media and devices that are part of the game. Typically, the game content and interaction options vary between the different media and devices. A suitable approach might be to offer different types of game roles through different devices.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_GamesAmong the terms essential to understand discussions about ARGs are:* Puppetmaster - A puppetmaster or "PM" is an individual involved in designing and/or running an ARG. Puppetmasters are simultaneously allies and adversaries to the player base, creating obstacles and providing resources for overcoming them in the course of telling the game's story. Puppetmasters generally remain behind the curtain while a game is running. The real identity of puppet masters may or may not be known ahead of time.* The Curtain - The curtain is generally a metaphor for the separation between the puppetmasters and the players. This can take the traditional form of absolute secrecy regarding the puppetmasters' identities and involvement with the production, or refer merely to the convention that puppetmasters do not communicate directly with players through the game, interacting instead through the characters and the game's design.* Rabbithole - Also known as a Trailhead. A Rabbithole marks the first website, contact, or puzzle that starts off the ARG.* Trailhead - A deliberate clue which enables a player to discover a way into the game. Most ARGs employ a number of trailheads in several media, to maximise the probability of people discovering the game. Some trailheads may be covert, others may be thinly-disguised adverts.* This Is Not A Game (TINAG) - Setting the ARG form apart from other games is the This Is Not A Game aesthetic, which dictates that the game not behave like a game: phone numbers mentioned in the ARG, for example, should actually work, and the game should not provide an overtly-designated playspace or ruleset to the players.Basic design principles of ARGsARGs are sometimes described as the first narrative art form native to the internet, because their storytelling relies on the two main activities conducted there: searching for information, and sharing information.* Storytelling as archaeology. Instead of presenting a chronologically unified, coherent narrative, the designers scattered pieces of the story across the Internet and other media, allowing players to reassemble it, supply connective tissue and determine what it meant.* Platformless narrative. The story was not bound to a single medium, but existed independently and used whatever media were available to make itself heard.* Designing for a hive mind. While it might be possible to follow the game individually, the design was directed at a collective of players that shared information and solutions almost instantly, and incorporated individuals possessing almost every conceivable area of expertise. While the game might initially attract a small group of participants, as they came across new challenges, they would reach out and draw in others with the knowledge they needed to overcome the obstacles.* A whisper is sometimes louder than a shout. Rather than openly promoting the game and trying to attract participation by "pushing" it toward potential players, the designers attempted to "pull" players to the story by engaging in over-the-top secrecy (e.g. Microsoft did not acknowledge any connection between the company or the movie and the game, the game did not acknowledge any connection to Microsoft or A.I., the identities of the designers were a closely-guarded secret even from other Microsoft employees, etc.), having elements of the game "warn" players away from them, and eschewing traditional marketing channels. Designers did not communicate about the game with players or press while it was in play.* The "this is not a game" (TINAG) aesthetic. The game itself did not acknowledge that it was a game. It did not have an acknowledged ruleset for players; as in real-life, they determined the "rules" either through trial and error or by setting their own boundaries. The narrative presented a fully-realized world: any phone number or email address that was mentioned actually worked, and any website acknowledged actually existed. The game took place in real-time and was not replayable. Characters functioned like real people, not game pieces, responded authentically, and were controlled by real people, not by computer AI. Some events involved meetings or live phone calls between players and actors.* Real life as a medium. The game used players' lives as a platform. Players were not required to build a character or role-play being someone other than themselves. They might unexpectedly overcome a challenge for the community simply because of the real-life knowledge and background they possessed. Participants were constantly on the lookout for clues embedded in everyday life.* Collaborative storytelling. While the puppetmasters controlled most of the story, they incorporated player content and responded to players' actions, analysis and speculation by adapting the narrative and intentionally left "white space" for the players to fill in.* Not a hoax. While the TINAG aesthetic might seem on the surface to be an attempt to make something indistinguishable from real life, there were both subtle and overt metacommunications in place to reveal the game's framework and most of its boundaries. The most obvious was that the story itself took place in the year 2142, and the websites ostensibly existed in the future (visitors to some of the sites would trigger a pop up warning that their browser was obsolete and unrecognized). The designers also limned the borders of the game more subtly, e.g. through the names on the site registrations.



The above information is presented on Dr. Trader's blog... where I decided to kindly add it to my blog for study purposes.