Meaningful Play - ROP Ch 3

ROP - Meaningful Play

 Johann Huizinga:"play has a sense to it", "at play", "all play means something" 

The questions Huizinga raised with what he says above, can be addressed by "meaningful play". 
Meaningful play emerges from the interaction between players and the system of the game as well as from the context in which game is played. 


Playing a game is making choices and taking actions. 

An action a player takes in a game results in the creation of new meanings within the system.


There are two ways to describe meaningful play :

1- Descriptive

 - meaningful in a game emerges from the relationship between player action and system outcome. 

 - meaningful play =  what happens in a game. 

 - game actions result in game outcomes to create meaning. 


2- Evaluative: 

  - the goal of successful game design. 

  - meaningful play  =  occurs when relationship between action and outcomes in a game are both discernable and integrated into the larger context of the game. 

Discernable: the result of the game in action is communicated to the player in a perceivable way. If you don't receive feedback that indicates you are on the right track, the action you took will have a very little meaning. If you don't know the meaning of your action then the result of that action was not discernable. Hence the meaningful play is difficult or impossible to achieve.

Integrated: the action the player takes not only has immediate significance in the game, but also affects the play at a later point in the game. This lets the players know how it will affect the rest of the game. 

Both ways of the meaningful play definition are closely related and designing successful game requires understanding of both.