What drives players to play a game?

What makes a game fun for me is obviously the emersive experience, but, viewed more abstractly, it's the sense of having my choice of action constrained, and still struggling toward a given goal. I suppose that's why I've been designing so many abstract games in recent years, since they are like an invisible filter that only allows certain very limited action to become reality, and yet they remain hugely enjoyable.

The idea of limits to what you can do being fun is grasped very early. "Make believe", for all its early charms, soon palls, since kids learn early to declare "You can't do that!", and get answers of "Yes I can!" in return. The idea of a moderator occurs, someone who really has the authority to say "Well, no, you can't." This is the point at which kids start to play games with set rules, so that when they say something isn't allowed, they are backed up by some authority.

So, for me, the emmersion doesn't have to come from a theme, but from a clear set of boundaries on my actions. Hazy rules writing lessens the fun factor because the clear filter of action dissappears. Complexity beyond a certain point does the same, since the rules may be black and white, but at a level of detail that becomes like the fractal coastline of Britain: present, but always yeilding to greater complexity, and creating a zone of unintentional gray.

So, at the most basic level, I'd say that players play games so that they can do more with less. Even ASL, with its phonebook of rules, is satisfying in this way, since players are continually trying to set up situations where most of the considerations go in their favor, and need not be considered or calculated in order to achieve some objective. This is the reason that heavy grognards love detail: so that they can let the hurricane of numbers hit their opponants, while they stay safely in the eye of a storm they themselves have arranged.

And this would be one of the reason why we as designers need to mold an *experence* for our players. Games are about entertainment, and entertainment does not have to involve winning, though winning is fun too! Think of all the games you have played, and think about those where you *lose* and still want to play again.

Human nature of many people is the desire to win, but if you keep losing a game, what makes people want to play it again? The experience! People will not want to play a game where they lose and found the game *boring*, but will continue to play a game that gave them a fun experience. Again it is the experience and enterainment value that designers add to the game that can people coming back for more.

And beyond that, having an abstract game versus a themed game is no different than having a drama movie or action movie. They are both different forms of an experience and entertainment, and both have a different audience to which they appeal.

Personally, I think a more apt question would be, "why do players play games?" The difference in the two questions may not be apparent, but it is different.

Some do it for the pleasure of winning, plain and simple. They want to be the best at something. It's similar to the need to "conquer," only on the player's own grounds.

Some people like to play games in expression of their creativity (my personal quirk). Games like Magic, D&D, and other games that require a heavy dose of imagination to be good at.

Others find joy in practicing critical thinking. Whether it be Chess, Go, or what have you, some people just like to contemplate the perfect moves for minutes, even hours on end.

Chance is also a heavy influence on gaming preferences. Those who like to take risks are often very serious players as well. Texas Hold 'em is an extremely popular game that mostly involves chance (as well as analysis).

Then there are those who like combinations of those games. There are probably also other categories I may have left out. Basically, I'm just saying that games (and the way you play them) tell a lot about the kind of person you are. It's not so important what it is that gets people playing, as it is why they play the games they do. That's what really counts, IMO.

That's why there is no "magic formula" to games. Sometimes they are successful, while others are total flops. If it doesn't cater strongly (not necessarily "done to death," but in a well-tuned manner) to one of these categories, then most likely it will never really "take off," since it won't cater to any of the winners, or artistics, or brainiacs, or the risk-takers. And I'm pretty sure most of the people you know fall into at least one or two of those categories.

Would you be willing to explain this further? I'd like to see why you think the questions "Why do players play games" and "what drives players to play games" (the title of the thread) are different?

Like I said, the difference may not be apparent. :)

It's not so much that the answers are different per se, but that the way you ask yourself this question can affect the way you approach your answer. But, like anything psychological, it affects different people in different ways (including not at all).

Personally, I think all of your example can be summed up with the word Fun. People experience pleasure (or fun) in different ways. Each of the examples you provided give reasons why people have fun. Some have fun problem solving, others have fun winning, and yet others have fun taking risks.

Yes, but what is "fun?" It means different things to different people, so it is utterly meaningless until one defines it for himself or herself. The categories I listed were merely for demonstration purposes - to show that there is no "philosopher's stone" of game design.

The pursuit of the game design "philosopher's stone" is your bag, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that (it would be a problem however if you spent every day saying, "meh, I think I'll make a lackluster clone of someone else's game" :P). But the pursuit of such a thing requires constant reminders of the basics (which I wrote), else they will be taken for granted, followed by forgotten. The key to succeeding at anything is discipline. Anyone who asks, "What will make people play my game," rather than, "Why will people play my game," reeks of a lack of discipline (that statement is based purely on my own perception, so please don't take offense!). I think anyone who has to ask the question in the first place has gotten lax in his or her discipline (unless they were out to "research" other's thoughts, in which case they were practicing their discipline well).

Do I sound corny or what? o_O

I have been training in martial arts since junior high,
the last 10 yrs. my training has been in MMA (mixed martial arts)
a new sport that allows competitors to fight standing, or
close against each other in the clinch, or on the ground, which
allows people from various styles to compete in a unified testing
ground.

Basically we spar a lot. More than 50% of our training is
under full resistance, rather than demonstrating and mimic.

I can say that for me, this has allowed me to really control and
improve my temper.
what is a person cutting me off and giving me the finger in traffic
compared to a guy trying to break my arm or choke me unconscious?
The little things don't bother me as much any more.

People who don't know what it's like to be in a real fight, to have
someone trying to knock your head off, to be smothered on the
ground after your dead tired, to go home bruised and sore on
a regular basis, regular people hold so much inside,

you can call my sport brutal, but it has made me more civil,
many times we say, Brazilian Jiu-jitsu is like Chess with your
whole body. And if you loose......... you don't just loose, you
get your booty handed to you.

But none of the less it is a game. In it there is fantasy of winning
and being undefeated champ or the greatest ever, whatever,

but the main thing is our human need, so I agree with the original
post. If we don't have games, we become internally sick.

I think Mark Rosewater (senior designer on Magic:the Gathering) has been mentioned before, but he often talks about how Magic players come in three types: Timmys, Spikes and Johnnies. Timmys just enjoy beating people around the head with big creatures. Johnnies enjoy making absurd combos and clever decks that win when they work and lose when they don't. And Spikes just care about winning. And he talks often about the challenge of designing a game that keeps all three of these types of player happy, which is not an easy job (as the old joke goes: when everyone complains to you, you must be doing something right!) So yeah, I tend to agree that settling for just one of these aspects is a good place to start.

I am often surprised by the reactions of my testers - I usually think I can predict which of them will like a game and which of them won't, but sometimes it just won't work that way (admittedly often it's because none of them like it :-) But as a result there can be a danger of considering the market-testing to be more important than the actual product...

I agree with this. I approach game design by finding something I enjoy and building on it. I really enjoy risk taking (in fact, gambling games are my favourite... no I'm not an addicted gambler... but that's what all the addicts say right? lol)

The next step I look for is finding a unique (or slightly unique) mechanic and build around it. I never start with a theme and rarely do I have a goal in mind. I say to myself "I want this to be a risk taking game. Now I need a mechanic that is based around risk." and I get to work on building a mechanic.

I think the best way to learn how to build games is to disect existing games. Take them apart and see what makes them tick. There should be more of that on these boards. We should have a weekly lecture (not spoken, but written... in essay form) about a game that we disect. I would be willing to start this if there is enough interest and it opens discussions and debates.

Rob

The reson I think that people play games; is that they are human.

The reson for this is that humans are social animals and the game environment is a tool that we use to explore the social landscape and we can try out different actions that may be considered unacceptable in an environment that the conciquences are limited to the game situation. We have evolved this as a method of learning and it has an associatede emotion (which has also evolved and is available to other activities as well) which is FUN.

Games have their main place in childhood (and children are avid game players), however we have retained this ability to have fun (and the desire to play games) into adulthood. This has been a big advantage to us as it has allowed the formation of large and complex social structures. As adults we can seperate "Normal" life and "Play" life (well most can, there are some that cannot) and use it to build social bonds, test out potential social connections (see how they react to various situations) and test others social fittness compared to our own without sparking real conflict.

The fact that we can do this and that so few can't is a demonstration of the effectiveness of this evolutionary pressure. This trype of behaviour can be seen in other animals as well. Dog (who share a large chunk of evolutionary history with humans) also love to play as well.

Animals that play have even evolved signals that indicate that they are at play. We smile, laugh and have more open gestures, Dogs wag their tail and make particualr noises, apes also have particular noises that they use to indicat play (in fact it is similar to our own behaviours to indicat play).

We play games because they are fun. We find games fun because we have evolved to be attracted to theis behaviour.

So therefore, we paly games because we are Human.

I agree that it's a different question; in fact, I think it's so different that it deserves a different thread, because it has veered this discussion completely away from the original question and into a vague, nebulous land where we vainly attempt to quantify "fun".

The original question, I think, seemed to pertain more to what causes players to select a specific game. Lor introduced the idea that it was "need", ie, that there are certain actions we "need" to take at some level, and a game that lets us imitate those actions will appeal to us. I think the discussion accepted as a given that people play games, that games are fun, etc.

The question of why people play games in the first place is interesting, but different. Perhaps I'll use my admin abilities to separate this into two different threads so both subjects can get equal treatment, because they are quite different.

-Jeff

Your game will express its philosophy whether you like it or not! IMHO, better to understand and control its shape. For me, that's what design is about.

Again-- who said anything about "pretending"? Being able to perform these actions on a harmless model scale is extraordinarily liberating. I don't buy a game to "pretend"-- I don't go to a movie to pretend. I pay to "be there." I go to lose myself for a while. You yourself celebrate immersion as a sell value, and I agree with it.

The whole pretend attraction of a "game" is a given, along with generic need for fun and escapism potential. We're drilling deeper here. Not easy, but it's happening-- and thank you for segregating the thread!

What interests me, and explains the investigation I brought up here among you big brains at this excellent forum site -- are the "need buttons" that are *really* being pushed in games in general, and specifically in the wildly popular games.

If I understand the underlying "strange attractors" of those more completely I know better how to fashion my themes, my rules and of course the visual design. The quest to identify Player Need is partially selfish, partially sharing, hopefully a win-win.

My hope is eventually the moderators assemble everybody's input here into a downloadable PDF branching list or outline from general to specific need.

You betcha! LOL. William Golding and "Lord of the Flies." Why is it that our high school teachers need to remind us of our essemtially animal nature? Gaming pulls us out of our conventional environments just like a travel accident exiles a group on a desert island: the premise of Gilligan's Island, Lost, and Golding's novel. Very rich lode. IMHO, "Flies" tromps them all with its complex social structure driven by need to survive and to rewrite-- I almost said "recreate"-- the society they were pulled from.
(Hm! No match found in my search for a "Flies" game at BoardGeekGames. Could that have been overlooked?)

The UMWELT of the game-- the world around one. Absolutely! I need to know what buttons do they push in you? As you say, these design elements are not things unto themselves. They derive from an artist in touch knowingly or unconsciously with primitive needs and they stimulate in a very uncanny way, depending upon the skill and wisdom of the designer. We can and do leverage these and build themes upon them in every successful game. We're attempting to CAN them here, for foundation inspiration.

I read that thread and it's thoughtful. My problem is that you gloss over Sources of Tension-- the example you give is: player struggling against a machine. A couple folks began filling in "player interaction" which is crucial. Not what-- WHO. From individuals to armies, it's other people! Many games are inspired by real-world you-against-them tension-- historic events, social misunderstandings or suspicion, conflicting goals. That's a mother lode! It can be peer pressure, injustice or some modern day irony foisted by other people-- the so-called German style games come to mind. It's the same rich vein mined by screenwriters and novelists to tell stories about us.

Anybody remember the Steve Jackson game "Ogre"? I played the computer version. It was basically you against a killer supertank. I remember I wanted to try and humanize this so much I contacted him about a spinoff screenplay. He wasn't interested. Meanwhile I outgrew it.

The list is good. I worry about being seduced by game mechanics, look and feel. I would approach your list from the reverse: Goal, Tension/Interaction, Visual and Mechanical Representation. Mechanics ring false unless they emerge from the theme, which comes from the game object, which ultimately emerges from some address in the unconscious.

I just need the street number.

Another rich generic drive -- Infernal's NEST! This needs to be celebrated:

Beautiful. It's so obvious when you think about it. This works on two or three levels one of which Infernal covered-- it's a survival mechanism. Model reality and learn how to cope before hitting the outside world-- "the Game of Life," remember that? Big seller.

Another is the warm cozy feeling you get when *contained* by the borders of a game. Jeff speaks of immersion in the play. Crucial attraction! You're definitely going to be immersed in a game with a hundred or more pieces to be deployed-- if not overrun. But the underlying need I think he describes deals with the enjoyment of being within a complex contained world, and by the "borders" of a game I mean not only the physical borders but the orderly rules of play, movement, card value points, and even the constrained ability to be devious, which every wise designer builds in.

So the Nest concept for me is a very real generic need, and the more violent the potential, the greater the need for containment.

Last element to celebrate, nicely brought up by one of you and please forgive me, I cannot find it (please identify-- it may be from another thread)--

"Why do I play if I keep losing? What's the attraction?"

But the answer somehow didn't satisfy me. I think it's two or three things:

First, the need to apply yourself, to strive, to push out, to stretch. That's a really primitive need I don't fully understand-- even though I experience it myself-- but I guess every now and then we get very dissatisfied with ourselves and decide to change things. I've seen marriages break up over this need because one or both felt trapped and stagnant. I have one friend who needed to change his office layout every week-- a harmless game he played with himself. He has a form of ADHD. But we seem to get itchy and need to move, and usually to a better state of existence with new choices. We take unusual or seemingly unnecessary risk, so I call it need to GROW. "I just need my own space, I'm suffocating here."

Another is to make an impact on others-- to be significant--- the need to tell 'em you EXIST. Like a lot of these needs, they aren't on equivalent planes, (I would charge to figure that out) it's all a matter of degree and volume level. Some players insist upon telling you they're here by utterly stomping you. "Well, yeah, somebody has to win!" Good excuse!

Related, but different, the need to discourse with others-- to BELONG. " I like getting out, hanging with the guys." (Oh, boy, here come the group descriptors-- a troup of baboons, a flock of geese, a pride of lions...a cult of gamers? lol.)

These needs well addressed will carry many a losing gamer to the utter end-- including me! "I just like to play 'cause it's fun." So the game mechanic is crucial because it is the set of tools that keeps us busy satisfying the need even while losing atrociously, and of course we need to express it over and over again or we ain't alive...

.. or as Dete indicates, we get sick.

Keep 'em coming...!

Jeff-

What's your point? It's based on his knowledge of human behavior and is dispensed to millions of high school students throughout the world for SOME reason. And that is not fiction.

Well, I'm giving the wrong impression then. You're treating "need" as two things: first, a dark villainous puppet-string control over us which we cannot shake, which is garbage.Throw that out. We control need every day, and use it creatively. Second, as though as it's some cinematic adolescent destructo wolf-like urge of puberty with a chainsaw in one hand and a laser blaster in the other. Nonsense. Only PART of the story. Needs can also be very subtle, very reasonable, and they're with us our entire lives, and they're mostly quiet, profound and simmering and ongoing. Also, you're viewing them as ALL BAD! Needs got us to where we are on the planet, which is mostly GOOD. They aren't always loud and abject and fearful. They are often like background radiatiion-- they are a fact of the universe but are easily hidden.

It's the dark fearful ones we bring out to play at night with our friends in the game parlor... heheh.

Documentary evidence?? Holy cow, just Google "human need." Maslow comes up second! (The Barbara Taylor site again.) Security, Adventure, Freedom, Exchange, Power, Expansion, Acceptance, Community, Expression. A lot of the discussion goes about subdividing these general areas with regard to specific popular games, which is really valuable, in my view.

I don't want to upset you or anyone else digging into human need, player need or anything which uncovers private stuff they don't want to express. Personally, I roll my eyes when I hear about therapy-- I had it as a kid because my dad's a psych. Hm! I'll ask him what he recommends for game design and theory and share that here.

Just try to view need as it really is, a part of life. And games.

And I'm also saying that the really successful complex games call upon satisfying core needs to carry one through hours of play.

And here's your bombshell-- this floored me.

A Lord of the Flies board game?? Are you putting me on? Run, don't walk to the feather duster. It could be massive hit.

You will have to acquire the rights from the Golding estate but how could they resist anything which enhances future sales of the classic? Show them the finest prototype you can exactly how it would be produced.

And put me on the test team!! I'll play my Jack card against your Piggy, but I get the conch.

Be aware, the TV show LOST board game is probably on store shelves. The Gilligan's Island game came out, I'm sure I remember that. But a LOTF game properly done would tromp it into the sand-- it's got a presell going back just as far and far more depth.

Since ideas cannot be copyrighted, I guess you could adapt the premise and put your own sand timer on it. But that's neither here nor there.

I will give you every encouragement I can. Some notions, grab 'em for what they're worth:

You say you'll have "Boy cards." It brings up the interesting dynamic of girls playing the boys, especially *with* boys in junior high class. Could be quite a genderbender!

"Strong suit" gives me an idea. Consider making a card deck which belongs specifically to each character- the Ralph pack, the Piggy pack,the Jack pack, etc to be deployed only by each throughout the adventure. Make the capabilities generic enough to be played anytime but true to character values.

For instance, Ralph, the moral center of the group, has in his deck a Call to Meeting action he can play anytime to cope with a given event, say, Jack seceding. Piggy the beaurocrat/accountant, and Jack the hunter, and the twins and all the rest. Allowing the holder to "play" his charactter "strong suit" -- you've already identified some of them succinctly-- gives players that decisionmaking power which allows one to make an impact. Otherwise, there seems to be a lot of reacting to drawn cards and none of that "DO" something that makes games exciting. I think that would be pretty cool. And nothing precludes one player hijacking another player's capabilities, to move power to him or her.

Love the "civilized to wild" scale, it's right on theme. This could get extremely expressive around the table. And "health" as a winning element, I chuckled. Don't forget Sunstroke! and Sand Blindness! cards.

You gotta have a board for this. It can't be all cards. In one lagoon is the half sunk airliner. In the rocky uplands is a dead parachutist. At the far end is a Marine officer waiting in dress whites-- "Finish." Paths are rough but trackable. Stations represent story points from the novel.

The dead center of the island is a small clearing with the Lord himself, of course, on a stick. Very special thing happen here. When a token lands there the player gets some special kind of hallucinatory wisdom card, or perhaps is forced to wander off track or miss a turn-- or both! And trinkets, necklaces, spears for the pawns. And the Conch. It might just help to sketch out the bones of the novel's real estate if you haven't. I would think of it as a dark verdant fun house ride.

Not certain how to quantify that without distracting bookeeping, but the balance you describe seems elegant. Maybe throw an additional neck ring around your pawn? You arrive at a certain island station, you acquire a "savage index" ring (a necklace made of pebbles and shells and real tiny animal teeth-- hello, Draconious!), everything color coded. Yellow necklace and you lose your clothes. Blue necklace and you could kill something. Maybe they should be full-size-- maybe the players should wear them as they get wilder!

They always get wilder, don't they? How do you guarantee that progression? Do you give folks any chance of holding onto civility even if you don't score by it?

Amazing how the novel inspires. I have to re-read it! Simple goal, getting there is all the fun!

IMHO, game players today are not afraid of complexity if there's strong coherence to it, and I am certain you (and your playtesters like me) will see to that. I think complexity is IN. You're tackling a game built on so many different character types that I can see the headache you went through. But this seems very worthwhile and I commend your effort.

Think of it as a real blessing that , having adapted existing characters, there is a boundary to it. If the game supports up to 6 or 8 players, develop packages for each major character and put the smaller ones on cards so at least they appear as cameos. Somethng like that.

Keep us informed, this is a true design challenge. It's just like I said a few posts ago, not ALL need is a dark urge-- excuse me, I've just been impaled by a crude spear.

I wanted to say earlier, like the idea, but I thought Tom Vasel's Game Reviews posts are pretty good and they're like analytical monographs. But why don;t you start one in there to set the form?