Design for Serious Games

Or: Why do so many suck?And How Do We Make Ones That

Don’t?

Greg Costikyan

CEO, Manifesto Games

My Bona Fides

• Reputation as game design theorist• 30 commercially published games• Worked on 100+ in some capacity

What is a Serious Game?

• Primary goal other than entertainment– Generally either didactic or persuasive

• But that doesn’t mean they don’t have to entertain:“To be entertaining is the minimal

requirement of a story... If that’s all it is, it isn’t much of a story.” – Harlan Ellison

• Entertainment doesn’t have to mean “fun fun fun” – Naked Lunch?

What is a Game?

• Not a “medium”, just as “story” is not a medium

• The cultural elaboration of play

• Many story media: the short story, the novel, theater, etc.

• May game media: boardgames, tabletop RPGs, the videogame, etc.

What is a Game? [2]

• Interactive construct

• Player motivation

• Decision making

• Fictive construct (Huizinga’s “Magic Circle”)

Serious Games?

Tewa Kiva Altar at Hano Showing Gaming Reeds; Tewa Indians, Arizona

Games of the North American Indians,Stewart Culin, Smithsonian Institution,1907

Serious Games? [2]

The von Reisswitz Kriegsspiel, 1824

Serious Games have Co-Evolved with Games-as-

Entertainment• Religious usage in the ‘folk game’ era

• Military use since the 18th century

• Improv as theatrical training tool

• Roleplaying as tools in psychotherapy and corporate training

• So not that new – what’s new(er) is using digital games for serious purposes

What Can Games Do?

• Teach– Ask any Pokemon player about

Pokemons’ different powers

• Persuade– “America’s Army is our most cost-effective

recruitment tool” – Lt. Gen. Timothy J. Maude

But so Can Other Media

• Unless you’re going to take advantage of the unique characteristics of games, don’t make one.

• Write a book, film a documentary, make a speech – they all can teach, and persuade.

What’s Unique About Games?

• Players complicit in the action– Identification with player tokens– Emotional response to events and

outcomes– Participation in struggle– Responsibility for decisions

What’s Unique? [2]

• Games are systems– Mutable and exploratory, not baldly

representative– Demonstrate the complexity of the

situation– Show the constraints of different actors– Inculcate rational problem-solving

ICED (I Can End Deportation)

Why Does This Suck?

• NO use of use of systems

• Just exposes you to didactic nuggets

• No sense of complexity

• No understanding of actors’ motivations

• Decisions utterly irrelevant

• No difficult choices

• Heavy-handed

Why Does This Suck [2]?

• Actual gameplay has nothing to do with the subject– Gameplay is actually about navigating a

3D space and collecting ‘dots’ while avoiding enemies

– It’s Pac-Man with an immigration theme

• It’s “Screedware.”– Don’t make a game, then – make a

speech.

PeaceMaker

Why Does This Not Suck?

• Player complicit in the action

• Difficult choices with moral implications

• Playable from both sides – might actually make people think about the other side’s difficultues

• Not a deep simulation – but enough to represent the complexities of the problem

Why Does This Not Suck? [2]

• Gameplay intimately connected to the actual situation

• Emotionally impactful

• Repeat playability

• Strong sense of player engagement

McDonald’s Game Doesn’t Suck

• Essentially a “sim/tycoon” game

• Player complicit in morally dubious decision-making

• Gameplay initimately tied to theme

• Quite replayable

• Not heavy-handed

The Redistricting Game

• Redistrict to benefit your party

• Faced with same concerns as real world actors

• Gameplay initimately tied to theme

• Players come away with better understanding of issues..

• But not screedware

September 12th: Sorta Sucks

• Ostensible lesson: violence breeds more violence

• Gamer’s lesson: Only way to solve the problem is to kill them all.

“The Goal is Publicity”

• ICED’s developers say their game is “successful” because of the publicity it garnered

• This strategy works today –– Because the media still finds games on

serious subjects novel– Wouldn’t work for any other medium– Won’t work for games in future– The novelty will be gone

Why do Advertisers Like Advergames?

• People pay scant attention to most ads

• People spend minutes or hours engaged with a game– Long period of exposure to the brand– Superior audience retention of the brand– In some cases (e.g., driving games), sells

the brand’s unique characteristics – more than simple exposure

You’re Selling Something, Too

• Not a product – ideas, facts, procedures, understanding

• You will be more effective if your foster long, repeat engagement

• A one-off publicity hit only gets you so far

• Engage the player

• “Show, don’t tell”

How to Do It?

• Involve people who understand game design, not just development

• Let content specialists inform, but never control the design– And for god’s sake don’t let focus groups

control it either

• Understand what games do better than other forms

Thanks

Serious game reviews:

http://playthisthing.com/serious