|
|
|
Games: Why Play?
By Brian A. Roddy
Games are old, very old, perhaps even primal. Tag
and Hide-and-Seek may have been played by children before
we had mastered fire. In nature, animals mock-wrestle, chase
each other for no apparent reason, and engage in swimming
games. Wolves even play king of the hill, with a lone defender
holding the high ground against several attackers. Some zoologists
believe animal play behavior is practice that sharpens survival
skills. Others believe simply "having fun" is vital
for the social development and well-being of animals. Is it
any different for humans?
|
Ancient games have been discovered in every area where early
civilizations arose, invented by our predecessors side-by-side with
weapons, literature, and agriculture. Some of today's favorite games
are over one thousand years old: Mancala, Go, Backgammon, Parcheesi,
Checkers, Chess. Dice and playing cards are also as venerable, although
it took both a few hundred years to settle into the standardized
forms familiar to modern players.
The widespread popularity of games is by no means a recent
development. Many 18th and 19th century novels feature or mention
games (Charles Dickens in particular was an avid gamefan), and in
the 1740's, games were so prevalent that Edmond Hoyle made a career
for himself by collecting, codifying, and publishing rules for them.
Hoyle's books were translated and circulated throughout Europe,
and According to Hoyle remains in print today. We must thank the
Victorians for party games, including Twenty Questions, Simon Says,
and Charades. At the same time, Europeans began learning and adapting
games from other countries: Snakes (later Chutes) and Ladders was
a morality game from India, and Dominos were borrowed from China.
The mass-production of the twentieth century led to the spread
of the modern board game classics, including Monopoly, Scrabble,
Risk, and Clue (Cluedo, to Europeans). At times, individual games
have had popularity explosions and become full-fledged fads. You
may have heard of the craze of Bridge, Mah Jongg, and Canasta; and
more recently, you the eras of Dungeons and Dragons, Trivial Pursuit,
and the Pokémon card game. These games are still played,
though all have declined from their peak popularity.
 |
Chess deserves special mention as the eternal endurer, from
the strict regulations of the tournament floor to the casual game
at the coffee house. More books have been written about chess than
any other game, and probably more than all other game books combined.
I've heard that, at any given moment, somewhere in the world, someone
is listening to a Beatles song. Can you imagine how many games of
chess are being played every day the world over? If you're reading
this online, and therefore in a place with electricity (and not,
say, adrift on a raft or lost in the Sahara), I'm positive
that there's a chess game in progress less than a mile from you
right now.
Chess is a favorite artistic metaphor, appearing in countless
novels, children's books, musicals, movies, paintings, and plays.
Most significant of all, we measure our very humanity by
chess when we see if a computer can beat a person. The brilliance
of chess is its simplicity. The rules are elegant, and the game
is entirely luck-free. Like the shark that reached its niche in
the bio-web several thousand years ago and had no need to evolve,
chess remains a masterpiece game.
In the most recent revolution in games, evolution runs rampant,
with technology accelerating exponentially. For this is the Electronic
Age, and it has heralded a revolution in gameplay. Asteroids and
Space Invaders led the way in the arcade, while Tetris and Myst
opened the doors in our home computers. Home console games are equally
impressive and addictive. And the Internet has literally provided
a new dimension in interactive gaming, connecting players all over
this world, drawing them into fully-realized alternate worlds.
With so many diverse activities beneath the umbrella term
"games," some factionalism has developed between groups
who enjoy certain game types over others. Video-game aficionados
rightly call themselves "gamers," as do board game enthusiasts,
roleplayers, and card players. Semi-derogatory nicknames have been
tossed around: dice chuckers (roleplayers), card floppers (collectible
card game players), vidiots (video-game players), wood pushers (chess
players). Within these groups are further divisions, such as gamers
who only play imported board games and shun family board games,
or people who only roleplay dark, serious games like Vampire and
Call of Cthulhu and wouldn't be caught dead trying a humorous system
like Toon or Paranoia, or those who play Type II Standard Tournament
Magic the Gathering vs. those who play Limited Extended Ante.
 |
What's more, "Playing games" is often used in
a disparaging sense ("Stop playing games with me," "are
you serious or just playing games"). This is because games
are fun, and most are either small-scale simulations of actual events/activities,
or are abstract activities that represent nothing at all. One could
just as easily say "Stop being in a movie with me," or
"are you serious or just painting pictures." It's an unfortunate
expression, and is no better than the stereotypes that all roleplayers
are antisocial demon worshippers, and all chess players dress like
1950's nerds.
We are living in a golden age of games, overflowing with
choice and possibility. There are more games, more kinds of games,
and (most importantly) more quality games than at any other point
in human history. Playing a game can be as simple as spending two
minutes slapping down cards in a game of Falling or Speed, or devoting
countless hours to building up your EverQuest character, or painstakingly
building a felt-and-foam tabletop recreation of the Battle of Lexington.
Games can cost anything from a free download to hundreds of dollars
or more. Video games alone are a multi-million dollar industry.
Add to that the number of playing cards and board games printed
each year, the number of dice and plastic tokens and wooden pieces...the
sheer amount of games boggles the mind. One would imagine, then,
that there must be some reason for them.
So why play? Are games merely something to waste time, a
guilty recreation created by our ancestors to bide the hours between
floods while they waited for the mammoths/Mongols/Hyksos to attack?
Well...
Multiplayer games force players to interact, in a context
that sets objectives and guidelines, and can be experienced differently
again and again. Games can be excellent icebreakers, and a good
way to introduce people. Since all but the worst games allow you
to make decisions, how someone plays can teach you worlds about
them. That noisy braggart might play chess with ultimate caution
and an intricate defensive network. That mild-mannered wallflower
might play with a flurry of devastating attacks. This transformation
is the most obvious in roleplaying games, where each participant
literally plays someone else. But it can be seen in all games, and
it is fascinating to observe.
Playing is essential for our spirits and an outlet for our
souls. Games let our competitive urges rise to the surface instead
of being bottled up and directed at the moron in the BMW that just
cut you off. Challenges build character, but facing problems in
life isn't fun. The difficult decisions we make while playing games
are lessons for situations we may face in life, with much higher
stakes. In the course of play we practice self-restraint and risk-taking,
frugality and sacrifice. When we triumph, our self-confidence is
made stronger. When we fail, we practice how to surrender gracefully.
Games develop perception, memory, planning skills,
social skills, and problem-solving. Most video games and physical
dexterity games also improve reflexes and hand-eye coordination.
Game activities have been used as therapy for adults and children
with brain injuries or mental disabilities. Actors know that the
processes by which they develop their acting abilites and forge
bonds of comfort and trust with each other are called theater games.
The MENSA organization is famous for its mind puzzlers and brain
teasers. This is not because they're so smart they feel they can
waste time on frivolous recreation. Games are excercise for your
brain, the mental equivalent of stretches and sit-ups that make
your mind stronger. Some of the hardest games are incredibly aggravating
— just like doing sit-ups.
There is even something wonderful about the physical/visual
production of a game itself. The elegance of a chess set. The fantasy
art of magic cards. The painted miniatures of a tabletop battle
game. The familiar layout of a Monopoly or Clue board, and the icons
of cards and dice. The finely crafted wooden pieces of a high-quality
European import game. Even the flimsy cards and one-color printing
of a game printed in someone's garage have their charm. And of course,
the visuals of today's high-end computer programs and console games
are simply breathtaking. Just watching the play of a game is seeing
a story unfold. It's almost like an interactive painting, or sculpture.
Finally, playing a game is about the process of the activity
itself. We all know the saying
It doesn't matter whether you
win or lose, it's how you play the game.
I would correct that to say, it doesn't matter who gets there first,
it's what happens on the journey there that matters. The victory
conditions, varied as they are from game to game, only exist as
a way to get players to interact, compete, and THINK. A game
is like a jigsaw puzzle: the end result is a pleasant reward, but
it's really about the process of getting there. If the point is
to have a complete picture, why cut it up into all of those pieces
to begin with?
To throw in another metaphor: if the best part of the movie is the
ending, why don't they just show the ending and save everyone lots
of time and money? Because the ending only works in context of everything
that's come before, and the rest of the movie was (hopefully) a
road to lead you to a satisfying (again, hopefully) conclusion.
The next time you finish a session of any game, whether you won,
came in a close second, were decimated, or are simply turning off
the computer or putting the game aside to be continued later, take
a moment to ask yourself:
Did I have fun playing?
Did I have to think in unfamiliar ways, or make any decisions that
surprised me?
What did I discover about my fellow players...
... and did I discover anything about myself?
Copyright ©1999-2010 My People
Connection, LLC. All rights Reserved.
|
