Games, Design and Play: Elements – Grace

1. Identify the basic elements in a game of your choice (actions, goals, rules, objects, playspace, players).

• Game: Go
• Actions: placing pawns onto the board; eating the components’ pawns by circling them.
• Rules: if you enclose pawns, you get to “eat” them; if you have more territory by the end of the game, you win; The players take turn in making moves.
• Goals: trying to take over as many territories as possible.
• Objects: pawns (black or white), board.
• Playspace: Board.
• Players: 2 people that are playing competitively.

2. As a thought experiment, swap one element between two games: a single rule, one action, the goal, or the playspace. For example, what if you applied the playspace of chess to basketball? Imagine how the play experience would change based on this swap.

• If I were to switch the turn-taking rule in go and basketball, the strategies would be a lot different. Go will now be a game of speed, trying to place as many pawns onto the board as possible before the other player. Basketball will now be a game of taking turns. Basketball players will now have less techniques for “stealing” the ball. Instead, There will probably be a strong focus (stronger than current basketball games) on getting the rebounds and only shooting when it is likely to score points.

3. Pick a simple game you played as a child. Try to map out its space of possibility, taking into account the goals, actions, objects, rules, and playspace as the parameters inside of which you played the game. The map might be a visual flowchart or a drawing trying to show the space of possibility on a single screen or a moment in the game.

• This game is a variation of tag.
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4. Pick a real-time game and a turn-based game. Observe people playing each. Make a log of all the game states for each game. After you have created the game state logs, review them to see how they show the game’s space of possibility and how the basic elements interact.

• Basketball:
  • Throwing ball into actionable space
    • Space of possibility:
      • Offensive:
        • Passing the ball to a teammate (player to player)
        • Grabbing the ball from a teammate (player to player)
        • Running down the court so that future passes can be possible (player with space)
      • Defensive:
        • “Stealing” the ball before the other team catches it (player with ball)
        • Standing in front of the ball to distract/avoid passing (player to player)
        • Running down the court to set up defensive strategies (player with space)
  • In-action
    • Space of possibility:
      • Offensive:
        • Passing the ball to a teammate (player to player)
        • Dribbling the ball to move around (player with ball)
        • Running around as strategies (player with space)
        • Shooting the ball to attempt scoring (player with basket)
        • Rebounding for the ball if the ball is shot (player with ball)
      • Defensive:
        • “Stealing” the ball before the other team catches it (player with ball)
        • Blocking the ball before it can be shot (player with ball)
        • Reaching for the ball (player with ball)
        • Rebounding for the ball if the ball is shot (player with basket)
• Go:
  • Space of possibility:
    • Putting a pawn at an empty space (pawn with board)
    • Putting a pawn next to an existing pawn (pawn with pawn)

• ⁃ Enclosing on a pawn to “eat” it (pawn with pawn)