a game design and criticism notebook
Karl
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Homepage: http://www.designrobot.ca
Posts by Karl
Creating Socially Sustainable Games, pt 2
Mar 30th
In the last post, we looked at the definition of social sustainability as it relates to urban planning. But…
How does it work when applied to games?
Creating Socially Sustainable Games, pt 1
Mar 26th
Games train us to behave in a certain way. Like complex Skinner boxes, video games reward certain behaviours and discourage others. This is pretty much common sense at this point: the persuasiveness of games has been debated hotly in the mass media for the last thirty years. I’ll accept that games train their players in certain ways; however, I also subscribe to Miguel Sicart’s theory of the “virtuous player.”
The concept of the virtuous player comes from Aristotlean virtue ethics, which sounds intimidating but is really just a theory of how to react to the world. The virtuous player is someone who recognizes that games influence us in certain ways through their game mechanics, and examines them even as she participates in them. Gamers aren’t moral robots. We are completely capable of self-reflection and thinking about our actions.
As part of a game culture of the kind that Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins are trying to create at PAX East this weekend, all of us – consumers and creators alike – need to keep in mind what kind of behaviours we’re encouraging and why.
Gendering Toys and Games
Mar 26th
I’m a big fan of Mike Abbott’s blog The Brainy Gamer, and yesterday he posted an interesting story about Happy Meals at McDonald’s.
So I’m at the counter, I order Zoe a Happy Meal, and the woman says to me “Would you like a girl or a boy toy?” I didn’t know we had a choice. I look at Zoe who’s wearing a hat and jacket, and I realize this woman can’t make out Zoe’s sex, so I ask her “What’s the difference?” She tells me that girls get an iCarly Happy Meal and boys get a Star Wars Happy Meal. I ask Zoe, “Would you like Star Wars or iCarly?” She stares at me clueless and then says “Carly,” and I immediately kick myself for listing it second. Zoe always chooses the last item offered if she doesn’t know what you’re talking about.
When we opened the box we found an iCarly “Lip Gloss Phone,” a purple and silver flip phone that opens to a makeup mirror and container of lip gloss.
There are obviously huge implications about the gendering of these toys, but they’re so huge they’re beyond the scope of this post. People have literally written books about that, so I’m going to focus just on what Happy Meals are really about: marketing.