Games are meant to be fun.

[AppleQueso]

The notion that "hey, I've got this great game, but the fun parts are ruining the art of it" should be a HUGE cause for the developers to take a step back and consider what the hell they're doing. Games are one of those things that is defined by its purpose moreso than its form. A game, video or otherwise, is traditionally defined as an organized activity with rules and goals that people do for fun and enjoyment. Hopscotch isn't played for the atmosphere, chess isn't played for the story, and circle of death is seldom a thoughtful and culturally enriching exploration of political or philosophical topics.

Schindler's list doesn't have to be fun because it is not a game. It is something different. It is a film. Fun and recreation were never a fundamental or defining quality of what a film is. A news reel is also a film. A film communicates something through moving pictures. If one wants to be technical, it is recorded on strips of celluloid film from which the name of the medium is derived. 2001: A Space Odyssey can be as boring as all f**k and still be a good film, because film does not need to be enjoyable.

Now, there's nothing stopping a game from incorporating things that are not part of its definition. Just like a film can be fun and enjoyable, a game can also be a vessel for communication, art, education, or whatever else you can manage to work into it. But when you've got this game that creates a conflict between the fun and the story/atmosphere/message/whatever, developers and gamers should both be asking whether this is supposed to be a game, or whether it is supposed to be something else.

See, that fun stuff that's evidently getting in the way of whatever the developers have decided is more important? That part is the game. If you took it out, the work might stand on its own as art, but it would be something else. Something that is not a game. If you have what would be a first person shooter that is so focused on realism in its physics, graphics, and depction of war that it ceases to be fun, you do not have a war game anymore. You have a war simulator. If you have what would be an adventure game that is so focussed on storytelling and artistic expression that the fun all gets sucked out, it stops being an adventure game. It becomes a work of interactive fiction. These things completely miss the point of being a game, and substitute some other purpose in its place. That doesn't mean that they're bad, as long as we acknowledge them for what they are and not try to pretend they are something else.

I don't know how many times I have to hammer it home before I am satisfied, but this is something I feel strongly about. Schindler's List is a very good movie--it would be a terrible game. A good movie is not a good game. A good door is not necessarily a good window (but it could be). A good forklift is not a good sports car (but using it as one might be a good game). A good dog is not a good cat. A good grenade is not a good hackey sack. A good toilet brush is not a good tooth brush. You had better think long and hard about how well crossing from one to the other is going to work out before you try to do it. There are many things that if you don't know what the point of them is, they're--to state the obvious--pointless. And possibly disastrous. If the art and the story can't be done properly as a fun game, you're better off making a movie.

Basically, in many many more words, "Slowslow is correct."

Pretty much summed up what I was wanting to say but was too lazy to say it.

[fastbilly1]

This is why I like Bubble Bobble

[AppleQueso]

This is why I like Bubble Bobble

I've always preferred Puzzle Bobble/Bust-A-Move to the main Bubble Bobble series actually.

[GSZX1337]

If you have what would be a first person shooter that is so focused on realism in its physics, graphics, and depction of war that it ceases to be fun, you do not have a war game anymore. You have a war simulator.

Simulators can be fun.
*points at Flight Simulator*

[flamepanther]

If you have what would be a first person shooter that is so focused on realism in its physics, graphics, and depction of war that it ceases to be fun, you do not have a war game anymore. You have a war simulator.

Simulators can be fun.
*points at Flight Simulator*

I never meant to imply that they can't be fun. But simulators don't necessarily have to be made with fun and recreation as their main purpose. Simulators also don't need to have any sort of winnable objective like a game does. Obviously a combat simulator probably would have winnable objectives, but the point isn't to have fun and enjoy it--usually it's for training. Similarly, Flight Simulator is frequently used in training actual pilots. Flying a plane around on your computer can be fun, but so can flying a real plane. That doesn't mean piloting a plane is a game.

Now, I seem to remember most versions of MS Flight Simulator including one or more games that can be played within the simulator engine, so obviously there is some cross-over, and the line between a game and a simulator can definitely be blurred quite a lot.

[Limewater]

and the line between a game and a simulator can definitely be blurred quite a lot.

EXCEPT ON THE ISSUE OF FUN, OBV!!!!!111111 THEN THERE IS ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY, NO BLUR AT ALL!!!1111!1!!!!1

[dsheinem]

threads are meant to be fun

this one is not

[Limewater]

threads are meant to be fun

this one is not

Then it's obviously not a thread, duh.

[J T]

That's a well thought out post flamepanther and I appreciate your opinion, but I still disagree. I think if a game wants to be fun, then the story should be in service of making it fun; but if a game wants to tell a serious story, then the gameplay should be in service of the story. I completely think it is possible to do either.

I recently finished playing the game Amnesia: The Dark Descent. It is a fantastic game, but "fun" is not a word I would use to describe it. "Terrifying" is a better word. The game had me in a cold sweat most of the time with my heart beating out of my chest. It wasn't fun, but it was damn thrilling.

Now, even if a game deals with emotions that are not fun (fear, sadness, anger, etc.), it should still avoid being boring. I'm making a distinction between being fun and being engaging. Eliciting emotions is not the exclusive domain of movies, art, and books. Gameplay can actually really add to experiencing emotions as well. In "Every Day the Same Dream", which I posted earlier, the game play is not really fun, but without the gameplay you don't get the same sense of personal responsibility and exploration for breaking from routine. Someone actually made a movie based on the game and in my opinion it is terrible in comparison to the game, and it's not really due to poor film making. The reason the movie version fails is because you don't break the routine yourself. You watch someone else do it. The final scene of the game is powerful because you came to realize the importance of noticing the little details in life through direct experience, and then it is ripped away from you. You need to have the experience of playing the game for that to really work so well.

[flamepanther]

That's a well thought out post flamepanther and I appreciate your opinion, but I still disagree. I think if a game wants to be fun, then the story should be in service of making it fun; but if a game wants to tell a serious story, then the gameplay should be in service of the story. I completely think it is possible to do either.

I recently finished playing the game Amnesia: The Dark Descent. It is a fantastic game, but "fun" is not a word I would use to describe it. "Terrifying" is a better word. The game had me in a cold sweat most of the time with my heart beating out of my chest. It wasn't fun, but it was damn thrilling.

Now, even if a game deals with emotions that are not fun (fear, sadness, anger, etc.), it should still avoid being boring. I'm making a distinction between being fun and being engaging. Eliciting emotions is not the exclusive domain of movies, art, and books. Gameplay can actually really add to experiencing emotions as well. In "Every Day the Same Dream", which I posted earlier, the game play is not really fun, but without the gameplay you don't get the same sense of personal responsibility and exploration for breaking from routine. Someone actually made a movie based on the game and in my opinion it is terrible in comparison to the game, and it's not really due to poor film making. The reason the movie version fails is because you don't break the routine yourself. You watch someone else do it. The final scene of the game is powerful because you came to realize the importance of noticing the little details in life through direct experience, and then it is ripped away from you. You need to have the experience of playing the game for that to really work so well.

I'l break this into key points and try to be more brief than my last post...

-A serious story can have fun game play. Plenty of people have fun playing Max Payne and Metal Gear Solid with no conflict between the fun game play and serious stories.

-Scary can be fun, depending on what type of fun you're into. People go to "haunted houses" and watch scary movies because they have fun being frightened when they know deep down that it's not real. I have a lot of fun playing the older Silent Hill games. In an extreme example, "Russian roulette" and "chicken" are both very frightening real life activities that a few mentally unbalanced people will do for fun. They qualify as "games" unquestionably, even as horrifying as they are.

-I haven't experienced "Every Day The Same Dream", but you're describing something that sounds like it succeeds as a work of interactive art--which is a very valid thing to be--but fails as a game. A work of art that appropriates formal aspects of a video game should not be mistaken for a game--by any conventional definition, it ceases to be one. It is something wholly new and distinct, and that should be embraced rather than denied. Confusion over this is the most likely reason that experiments of this sort generally don't meet with any mainstream popularity or commercial success.

The general public understands on a basic level that games are supposed to be fun, and when they encounter what purports to be a game but is clearly not meant to be fun, they are confused and they reject the anomaly. If such works were not described as games, this confusion would not arise.


Here is a challenge. Find an example of a NON-video game that is not played for fun. I can't think of any. Even story-centered tabletop and LARP role playing games are played for fun.