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A Theory of Fun for Game Design
Mr. Koster kindly agreed to answer questions when I was preparing this review. When asked about the audience of the book, he said "The book was intended in large part as something I could give to my parents, or to other relatives, or to non-industry friends, as a way to explain what it is that my profession is all about." As such, the comics and plain-spoken writing bring design concepts into focus for readers who may not want to spend the rest of their lives on these topics.
The chapters of Theory of Fun are not organized formally, but the book seems to fall into three sections. The first section sets the stage by discussing what exactly a game is. "Games are puzzles to solve, just like everything else we encounter in life." Koster's thesis is, essentially, that games are learning puzzles. In his experience, simple games are created by children to teach themselves useful skills. More formal games have similar goals, but modern games exist almost entirely to provide the elusive substance of fun to the player. This assertion resulted in a brisk discussion on the site Terra Nova. Exactly what people want when they pick up a joystick is very much in debate even by industry professionals.
The central portion of Koster's theory ruminates on the roles games play, why games are designed the way they are, and what matters in a game. The meat of the book is here, in discussions about why gamers cast aside the ethical quandaries brought up by games like Grand Theft Auto (they're playing the game mechanics, not the fiction surrounding the mechanics) and in the observation that the destiny of all games is to become boring. An amusingly astute statement about cheaters caps off a discussion of the tendencies players have to finding the optimal solution to a game: "When a player cheats in a game, they are choosing a battlefield that is broader in context than the game itself."
At the end of the midsection, the eternal discussion of games as art makes an appearance. Instead of equivocating, Mr. Koster makes his opinion very clear. "Art, to me, is just taking craft seriously. It's about communication (as I have said many times, in the book and elsewhere). Taking what we do seriously, *even if for frivolous ends,* just leads to better work. Considering what you are doing to be art tends to emphasize high standards, experimentation, expression, thoughtfulness, and discipline -- even if your goal is to make a gag-a-day newspaper strip or macrame hangings for your window."
To close his discussion on games and to provide a larger context against which to examine them, Mr. Koster steps outside the bounds of game design and makes some fairly dramatic statements about what games should be. While other media portrays the human condition almost as a matter of course, he argues, games rarely connect with the most basic aspects of our lives. To his mind, in order to truly achieve respect alongside the novel or the musical composition, games should "illuminate aspects of ourselves that we did not fully understand."
In his epilogue, Koster goes even further, arguing that -- as authors of art -- game designers should take responsibility for their creations. "I have little patience for those who hide behind the statement that 'it's just entertainment.' To deny our influence while simultaneously crowing about our financial success is at best naïve, and at worst irresponsible."
The book itself is well laid out, with the thoughtfully edited and often humorous text set amid plenty of whitespace on the right and the usually well-drawn comics on the left. The comics set the tone for the whole book, which in format resembles more of a collection of Far Side strips than it does a technical guide. The back of the book contains an extensive commentary section where offhand references and asides are explained in depth.
If you're planning on entering the field of game design, A Theory of Fun won't help you to storyboard a plot, model a texture, or develop a code base: if you're looking for the technical aspects of game design or deep academic consideration of the field, other titles will hold more for you. The intended audience of this book is quite wide, and Koster does an excellent job of making everyone feel included in the conversation that occurs between the pages. While game players and professionals new to the field alike can get a lot from what he discusses, the reader who may benefit the most from Theory of Fun is the seasoned game industry worker.
With the endless rehashing of game and design concepts currently in circulation and parent groups growing ever more shrill at the release of morally ambiguous titles, Raph Koster's book is a refreshing read. The book is an unpretentious examination of what it is that makes a game a game. He steps beyond the dehumanizing aspects of game mechanics to look at games and their designers in a broader societal context. If for no other reason that that, Theory of Fun is worth a look to read the opinion of someone who gives a damn.
You can purchase A Theory of Fun for Game Design from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
If Raph Koster is an expert on anything, as many Star Wars Galaxies players can attest to, it's making a game NOT fun.
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All staff working on a game product should have training like this book gives; a designer's perspective should pervade the entire project, and the concept and goal of "fun" needs to be in every part of the product. Often, the goal of 1/2 the team is making the interface or some part of the game compatible with how the game engine does rendering to ensure we get an extra 5 fps here and there.
--Bwaaaahaha*cough, splutter*, oh, God. No more. *wheeze* Make it stop. You're killin' me. Can't read another line.
Raph Koster, the man most directly associated with shitting out Star Wars Galaxies from between his Goatse-like buttcheeks, is lecturing us on what makes a fun game.
And for our next articles, an interview with the guy who invented the Edsel on his new book about his theory of automotive design, to be followed up by the guy who invented the :Cue:Cat about his theory of digital convergence, Jack Valenti's Theory of Digital Rights, George W. Bush's theory of fiscal conservatism, and a book on portfolio management theory co-authored by FDR and Charles Ponzi.
Sheesh.
This is the man who many would argue ruined Ultima Online and then went on to helm the disaster that is Star Wars Galaxies. The same man who, on his personal website, proclaimed that when it comes to design, the player (customer) is wrong and should be ignored. Now he's releasing a book? I'll pass.
I browse Slashdot at +3, Funny
The problem is that too many people who try to design games get really, really serious about "doing it right" while ignoring playability. Having an "accurate" game or a fast-playing one isn't nearly as important as the replay urge. Look at the recent re-release of classic games (fer chrissake, they're putting out Atari 2600 systems again!).
Playtesting is deeply important, and if your testers aren't finishing their sessions with a lot of "that's a lot of fun," you need to start again.
Every game-design disaster I've seen has been easy to predict well in advance.
"When a player cheats in a game, they are choosing a battlefield that is broader in context than the game itself."
This is totally false. The context of the game is the restrictions that make the game challenging. How hard you have to work to acquire a certain weapon, how careful you have to be to conserve ammo... how many enemies you have to kill to get to level 20.
Those challenges are really the only things separating 'playing a video game' from 'pressing buttons on a controller'. That's probably why whenever I've cheated in a game in the past, it's gotten really boring really fast. The value of the goal becomes diminished along with the challenge.
I don't think is necessarily limited to gaming, either. I think it's built into human nature.
I've done much thinking on the subject, and I contend that there are 4 main elements that lead to a game being fun:
#1) Storyline. This is the most basic element; a computer game can be looked at as a form of interactive movie. However, storyline is not essential since games have elements that movies cannot provide. An example of a game the excels at storyline without the other elements is Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. It basically immerses the player in the Star Wars universe without requiring too much in the way of critical thought or reflexes.
#2) Hand-eye coordination. At it's most basic level, a game requires the player to learn how to interact with the environment via some input device, whether it's a mouse, keyboard, joystick, or what have you. An example of a game that does this without the other elements is the original Space Invaders. Not much thought is needed to perform in that game, but learning how to press the fire button and move quickly is important.
#3) Tactics. Forcing the player to make a decision that has both benefits and weaknesses. Forcing players to make real-time decisions in a fantasy world leads to a sense of immersion. It's hard to think of a game that is purely tactical-based, but for an example of what I'm talking about, let's look at Contra. The game takes the basic shooter hand-eye coordination premise that a game like Space Invaders has, and adds the requirement that the user be smart enough to figure out what weapon to use for a given scenario. There are of course better examples, but this particular example gives you the basics of how tactics can be used to enhance a game.
#4) Strategy. Forcing the user to come up with an overall plan for how to do things. An example of a game that excels in this area is Civilization. Provoking critical thought from the user in order to solve a detailed problem (albeit a fictional one) involves the user on a higher level that can be appreciated. I find that the games with the most longevity tend to feature a lot of strategy.
The most successful of games will combine all 4 of these elements. My favorite game is Starcraft, and it is clear to see how all of these elements are used. The storyline is okay, the hand-eye coordination required is immense, the tactics involved are complex, and the strategy level is great. Other games can be broken down similarly. For example, Counter-Strike has no storyline, but there's hand-eye coordination required for aiming the weapon, tactics for deciding what equipment to use, and strategy for deciding how to approach the level with your team.
Think about it, and I bet you'll be hard-pressed to find another way to evaluate gameplay. I only wish there was a game review magazine that took these factors into account!
There's a bad habit among some game designers. They use friends and "nice" people to playtest their games.
You have to include idiots and assholes in your test sequence. You need to have That Guy - the rules lawyer, the "I didn't mean to do that" fellow, the "I don't understand this" twit. And you need to build your system to shut them out when it's done. For MMORPGs, you need the sort who will get a medium-powered character and hunt down the newbies. You need a complete lunatic for driving games ("why can't I drive across the river here?"). You need a tactical asshole, who will camp on a resurrection point in a shootemup.
(The idea of "idiot testing" was laid out quite nicely by Steve Jackson about 25 years ago, in "Game Design: Theory and Practice"). It was about board games, but the concept holds even more for online games.
The point of a game (for most people) is to escape the realities of life. To exist in a world where you make a difference, or at least feel like you are accomplishing something grand. /AFK and macro their way to stardom.
What's the risk/reward ratio for adventuring in real life?
That's why people play games, so they can take risks they otherwise never would, and gain the feeling of greatness they could never experience. Not too many people single handedly have saved the world in real life, but being "the one", the hero who saves the galaxy/kingdom/world is the premise of most games; that's what people want out of a game.
In real life as well, you use what works. Not every situation calls for bleeding edge technology.
People want to work towards something bigger and better. You don't wanna save up 100k to buy a Porsche and find out it runs like a Gremlin.
You try being a professional entertainer in real life. It's not as glamorous as Viacom makes it out to be on MTV
Besides Milli Vanilli and Ashlee Simpson, not many entertainers can go
In each of these cases, the plausibility of the scenario increases the immersion factor. If you want a game heavy on adventuring, go play a smaller-scale multiplayer RPG such as NWN.
This is why I would call SWG more of an online social experiment than a game. I think it's interesting what sorts of decisions they made to make it feel like living in a world; but ultimately they failed to be "fun."
How much fun would NFL2k be if you had to spend 30 hours before each game doing repititious drills. Most people don't want reality, they want an entertaining "reality-lite" all the fun stuff with everything else taken out.
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