Jonathan blow on games that are consiously addicting

[Thomas]

Check here:
http://the-witness.net/news/?p=650

I only checked the abstract and slides so far, but seems to be pretty much the same as:
http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html

so far good stuff though. Includes this quote by Alan Moore which is food for thought:

It is not the job of artists to give the audience what the audience want. If the audience knew what they needed, then they wouldn't be the audience; they would be the artists. It is the job of artists to give the audience what they need

We have talked about this before and I think it is a really important topic.

[Michaël Samyn]

Thanks. Hard to resist an introduction like

It’s about “best practices” of modern game design that I find unsettling, and the way in which “social games” and “gamification” are destructive.

Happy to hear someone is speaking out against this. Someone with the authority of Jonathan Blow, especially. I'll have a look...

[Utforska]

Saw this a while back. I think it's really interesting but it's extremely difficult to find a distinction between something that is addicting and something that is just enthralling. In some sense, all games that are competitive in any way "use" that psychological force to make people keep playing. Maybe what we need is, quite simply, notgames.

[Michaël Samyn]

I found the distinction he made between games that abuse you while you're playing them (World of Warcraft) and games that even abuse you when you're not playing (FarmVille) interesting.

I think it's very easy to distinguish games that are abusive from those that are not. If the answer to the question "Does playing this game make my life better?" is not "Yes!" then the game is abusive.

[Utforska]

But that question is not simple, since what makes your life better is an extremely complicated question. Is eating candy making my life better? Yes, because it tastes good and leaves me with a momentary satisfaction. No, because it's not good for my teeth, the sugar can affect my mood, etc. At almost any given moment, most of us could probably spend our time at something morally better or something of greater impact on our life quality than what we choose to do. Art is important, but only occasionally does it really change your life in any important way.

Here's another idea though... If I chose to try and play some game, there must be something about it that is interesting to me. If the game lets me experience that, without demanding more of my time than necessary, then it can't really be very abusive, can it? If that's the time it takes to really experience whatever it is I want to experience, then that's my choice, whether the experience actually turns out to be valueble or not. The game is offering me an experience, but it can't really predict how I as an individual is going to respond to it.

However, if the game starts to waste my time without really contributing to the central interesting experience, then it is almost by definition using or abusing me for its own purposes.

Is writing this post making my life better? Probably not. 

[Michaël Samyn]

Reading a blog post by a designer of such games, I noticed that the people who make these Social Games are exclusively driven by greed. The only reason why these games exist is to exploit their players. The only design norm optimization of replayability. They want the player to come back to the game, again and again. In other words these games are designed to be addictive. It's quite disgusting. If Social Games were made of chemicals, they would be illegal.

There's absolutely no need to be nuanced about this trash.

[Thomas]

This is relevant:
http://robertoconcerto.blogspot.com/2010/11/social-game-developers-trying-convince.html

Quote from a comment:

Yes, they are definitely similar, but MMOs don't go for your contacts, and use your own, and your contact's guilt against you. Farmville and similar games grow because they tell you your friends need something from you. That you are somehow *obligated* to play this game because your friends will fair worse if you do. That's a whole other level.

What is also disturbing about this is that it seems like the "general public" views games as either shooters or social games. Which is kind of like viewing films like porn and commercials.

[Michaël Samyn]

What is also disturbing about this is that it seems like the "general public" views games as either shooters or social games. Which is kind of like viewing films like porn and commercials.

To be fair, the part and relevance of shooters and social games in the games offer is much larger than the part and relevance of porn and commercials in film.

But that shouldn't stop us from defining a superior class of videogames. I just don't think that these superior titles should be an excuse for all the others, or even justify their existence. This work is clearly different. And people should recognize this.

It may be difficult for the general public to do that when this work is presented within the context of games. At this point in time, most people don't play videogames. As a result, they lump them all together. This doesn't happen with cinema or literature. Nobody can get away with making statements about those as a whole. Because everybody has their own favourite film or book.

We could sit around and wait for videogames to offer the same variety that other media do. But that could be a very long wait. And if the "pro-gameplay mob" has its way, it will never happen. It will never happen if videogames continue to be games. Because then you can lump them all together.

Instead, I'd suggest to differentiate ourselves from videogames. We need to have the courage to be proud of our work and to claim superiority. The courage to stand out and point out how different our work is.

[Jeroen D. Stout]

We could sit around and wait for videogames to offer the same variety that other media do. But that could be a very long wait. And if the "pro-gameplay mob" has its way, it will never happen. It will never happen if videogames continue to be games. Because then you can lump them all together.

Instead, I'd suggest to differentiate ourselves from videogames. We need to have the courage to be proud of our work and to claim superiority. The courage to stand out and point out how different our work is.

I already passionately object to the narrow view of games so I feel a bit scared about forsaking it and letting it mean what it now means - whereas a century ago a game in many languages would be anything from a frivolous activity children do to playing a piano concerto to a serious sport. It has narrowed so much that social games are closer to the genus 'game' than our games but that is a terrible fate for the word game. Achievements can now even be said to be pure shots of game within something which somewhat of an impure game. Computer games and their related terms have really wrought havoc within a far more easy-going sociology. For instance, the outcome of a game could be spiritual or aesthetic not too long ago, but now is often regarded (Salen & Zimmerman, Juul) to require a quantifiable outcome.

In other words, we exchange the soft, malleable notion that one may play the game of pretension in theatre (which is a specific form of game -or play- but a form nonetheless) for a form in which a Skinner box is the purest form of game.

It seems tempting to separate as a group (or at least word) but you also mentioned that if we call our games art people can disregard them easily and that goes for every word. The debate over reinstating the old definition of game as a very broad and, in my view, a soft definition would be met with quite some hostility also. The option of shoehorning a sub-concept within games and thus expanding it without attacking the word 'game' nor with remaining outside and being left behind seems viable.

Probably the prefix 'not' is not as easily accepted as the terms 'action-' and 'first person shooter-' are to game. The problem seems to me to be that even if we have a category, I am not sure our games will belong to a single one (unless you pick a word like 'arthouse-', which says too little about content) and that there are not enough games. This will be a problem for some 20 years, surely.

I think I am quite attached the game as a wide concept, so hence my reluctance to let go of it and even making it a more difficult social shift.

[Thomas]

Regarding communication about games that are different from the common notion of games:

My approach to this has been to focus on immersion and to be very upfront with that the main goal of the game is to become part of its world and story. I feel that this can be quite successful in both luring people that are and are not used to games. For normal "gamers" (I really do not like this word, is there a good alternative I am missing?) it is something that most can relate too as many games now days have some small parts where the game is not about winning. I have seen examples big sellers like BioShock and Modern Warfare where the sections is obviously meant to be be something different than the normal action-game style. So normal "gamers" can relate to these section and at least humor the thought that a full game only consisting of that might be worth trying out. For non-gamers it can make them interested in trying the game out, since many people are put off by stuff that are common (or even omni-present) in all normal games. Then they might be interested in a game that removes those elements.

For our next project I want to be even more focused on this, both in PR and in actual game content. So, far it seems to be working and I hope that cranking the level up will work too

Of course this not the only way to go about, and I think the best thing is if we all approach the communication from different directions.  That way it is more likely that more people change their views of what games can be.

[Utforska]

There's a swedish tv programme ("Lyxfällan") where they help people in debt get their personal finances straight - in a recent episode they helped a couple where the unemployed wife spent more than 40 hours / week playing Farmville and some other Facebook games. She called this activity "unnecessary but a lot of fun". It had clearly ruined her life and, I suspect, put a lot of strain on their relationship.

I wonder how common that is in adults?

EDIT: An interesting note here is that this is a reeaally bad show, which exploits both its participants and its viewers by building up fake suspense, drama, etc. In some sense, it's just like Farmville. Maybe these strategies for "hooking" the audience are prevalent in all commercial media and art - tv, games, music, news...

[Michaël Samyn]

I have a feeling that the marketing of games often focuses on the non-game aspects. They talk about adventures to be had, places to visit, being a hero, etc. Gamers and non-gamers alike read straight through these lies and know that the game is in fact about hitting things over the head hundreds of times in order for a set of numbers to change. Some people like doing this, others don't.

When a game would actually deliver on the promise on the box, it would be rejected. Outright by non-gamers because they didn't believe the box in the first place. And also by gamers, unless there still is a clear "hitting things over the head" element present.

That being said, I am a big believer in things being different, rather than just being presented as such. This means we need to have the courage and the alertness required to really allow our work to be as good as it can be. This is what "notgames" means to me: to not be seduced by the conventions of video games (both in terms of interaction and of story) and to work hard in order to figure out how we can deliver our expression in its strongest, purest form. I believe it is the muddling of designed game structure and artistic expression that prevents video games from finding its place within real cultural media.

That being said, with Jeroen, I do mourn the loss of the many meanings of the word game -let alone the idea of "playing" which seems to have been lost completely. I just don't feel that getting all those meanings back in the consciousness of society is an easy task. And trying to do that while simultaneously inventing a brand new medium seems like spreading one's resources thin. I think we should focus on the thing, not on what it's called.

[QXD-me]

Reading a blog post by a designer of such games, I noticed that the people who make these Social Games are exclusively driven by greed. The only reason why these games exist is to exploit their players.

I've noticed this too, if they're not talking about monetisation, they're talking about metrics. In my opinion that's a pretty poor way to go about making games. I don't see how they could possibly be proud of their creations (there again, I don't really understand the allure of business).

EDIT: An interesting note here is that this is a reeaally bad show, which exploits both its participants and its viewers by building up fake suspense, drama, etc. In some sense, it's just like Farmville. Maybe these strategies for "hooking" the audience are prevalent in all commercial media and art - tv, games, music, news...

I'm not sure this is quite the same. One would hope that the people received at least a bit of tangible help from their participation in the program. Whereas the farmville players are left with nothing (positive) to show for it.