Unworkable Concepts

[SrGrvsaLot]

The definition isn't subjective, it's social. It's like the supreme court justice who said about pornography "I can't define it, but I know it when I see it." To define "playable" empirically and eternally is an impossible task. The definition changes with time and social context, and many games that seem acceptable today would have been deemed "unplayable" in other eras (for instance, Call of Cthulu, a game that posits a universe with no Christian God would have been unthinkable in 16th century Spain).

The point of the post is speculative. What ideas for games are just plain bad? What ideas seem like they might be able to work with the right slant, and which are absolutely irredeemable? Where does the border lie? Is it possible to create a well-written (or even perfectly written) game that nobody, with a few aberrant exceptions, will like? Let's not get too caught up with terminology here. If people have different opinions on what constitutes "unplayable" that's fine by me, because really, exploring those opinions is part of the point too.

[Gelasma]

To me, none of the mentioned games is unplayable. "Rock" is a great gamist game, we often played games like that as chrildren. And also "Rape" or "Concentration Camp sim" are playable, even by non-deviant ppl, since they raise deep questions that could be worked into great narrative permises about the nature of being human and about what makes us leave the commonly accpeted road of humanity. And "indescriminate slaughter machine" sounds to me like a dungeon-crawl :)

I think there is no such a thing as a unplayable game concept, since the game is only one part, the other is the group - and if a group is willingly to play a game, this game becomes playable.

[SrGrvsaLot]

And "indescriminate slaughter machine" sounds to me like a dungeon-crawl :)

Except that dungeon crawls usually involve some measure of strategy or discretion (even if it's no more than "frag the mage first").  "Indescriminate slaughter machine" requires the characters to kill NPC in order of proximity, regardless of other factors involved.

I think there is no such a thing as a unplayable game concept, since the game is only one part, the other is the group - and if a group is willingly to play a game, this game becomes playable.

So by your definition, a game is playable so long as at least one group would want to play it? I'm not sure how useful such a definition is though. I'm fairly certain that if I went to the Indie Game design boards (or to any group of reasonable people) with the following pitch, I'd be justifiably scorned.

The game is Concentration Camp. The characters are high ranking SS officers at Auschwitz, and their mission is to ensure the racial purity of the German people, by any means necessary. Players will have to think of new and creative ways to humiliate the Jewish people (and assorted sundry undesirables) while simultaneously overcoming problems that might hinder "the final solution."

The very idea is monstrous. I feel dirty just writing it. I think there are some concepts that are obviously unworkable. By extension there must be some that are not obviously unworkable (and therefore possibly workable, but with effort). Those, I think, are the interesting ones, and the ones that would help pin down the definition of what exactly is "playable."

[Andrew Cooper]

So by your definition, a game is playable so long as at least one group would want to play it? I'm not sure how useful such a definition is though. I'm fairly certain that if I went to the Indie Game design boards (or to any group of reasonable people) with the following pitch, I'd be justifiably scorned.

Yes, by her definition that would be playable, since there hasn't been a good definition for "playable" presented.  Also, the concepts you've present such as Concentration Camp and Rape aren't significantly worse than Kill Puppies For Satan, which is a completely playable game.

I have a proposed definition for the term unplayable or unworkable.  I propose that they mean any game whose mechanics explicitly or implicitly prohibit the players from achieving the stated goal of the game.

For example, if the stated goal in Great Ork Gods is "Get the most Oog." and the mechanics somehow made it impossible for anyone to get any Oog at all, then the game is unplayable.  Or if the goal of the game was to "Address the premise (insert premise here)" but the mechanics of the game prevented the addressing of any premise (not sure how you could even do that) then the game is unplayable.

Please, note that I am only suggesting this as a definition here at the Forge and in this Thread.  It is a specific definition for a specific topic and does not reflect the dictionary definition or the definition in any other context.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

I'm not satisfied. Shreyas hit it on the head:

... you're only asking, "Is it possible to design a game that some people won't like?" To which the answer is yes.

So I'm not seeing much point in keeping this thread open as currently founded, as it merely becomes an ongoing Rorschach test of "I'll present Concept Z, see who says yea or nay," repeated.

However, there's meat here, and I trust you, SirGrvsaLot, to tease it out into a stronger foundation for this thread to keep going. You did fine with defining "Concept" for us - now it's "unworkable" that needs more. Does it mean ...

- unplayable, mechanically speaking?
- unsaleable?
- too offensive? for whom?

I'd like to see a definition that doesn't simply call for obvious and "to me" answers. If, for instance, someone provides an example that is supposed to show that X is too boring to play, then it's no trouble to get all post-modern and tweak it to make it interesting, at least to the tweaker.

And don't forget, Gamist play is mighty imaginative: Tetris is killingly "boring" when considered on any level except for casual hand-eye coordination ... but on that level, it's been known to kill many hours enjoyably. And if you take that idea to the much richer context of any role-playing situation, then it's pretty hard to remove any aspect that can't be Gamist'd.

Best,
Ron

[SrGrvsaLot]

About "unworkable," at first it seemed obvious, but the more I think about, the more I don't know what it is.  I think perhaps I was hoping to get a grasp on it by seeing specific examples of what people considered to be bad ideas for games. So far, I've seen things that seem pretty strong indicators

Offensiveness
Potential for Boredom
Inept Mechanics
Too much work involved
Nothing for players to do

Here's a tenative definition for unplayable:
A game is unplayable if some facet of its rules, setting, theme, etc is such that a sizable majority (at least 75-80%) of its potential audience would choose to play any (not some) other game. I.e. a game is unplayable if it is destined to become most people's least favorite game (excluding other unplayable games). Also: "I wouldn't play this if they paid me."

An unworkable concept is one that can in no way be made into a playable game.

So, I repeat my question. Is there any such thing as an unworkable concept? And, more to the point, is it possible to draw up a list of criteria that would weed out unworkable concepts?

[Ron Edwards]

Hi John,

Yeeks ... the trouble is, you didn't meet my request.

such that a sizable majority (at least 75-80%) of its potential audience would choose to play any (not some) other game.

That can't be done! No person can evaluate that criterion; hell, I'd hate to see "potential audience" get used as a variable in the first place. Using this criterion would merely devolve into "I like it" or "I don't like it," projecting one's own preferences onto 75-80% of some nebulous quantity of undefined other people.

Sorry man, it's not working. I'm calling for something quite specific. Again, the goal is not to cover any and every possible unworkability, but to focus on something we can agree upon identifying. The "pornography" concept won't fly.

Best,
Ron

[Mark Johnson]

I once proposed a class of games, called antigames or concept games ( and their close cousins "gedanken games" or "statement games") that exist for a purpose other than simply to be played in this thread.  

I highly encourage you to read the above thread since I think it is handling a similar topic in a bit more focused manner.

I find the whole conversation in this thread thus far highly dubious.  The reason why is that your question "Is there any such thing as an unworkable concept in a game?" is not a question of game design, but one of philosophy.  Ultimately, the answer will revolve around retroactively defining such words as "concept" and "workable" to support your argument.  I don't think that is particularly useful at this point; but if you can tell me why it is useful, I am more than willing to listen.

Later,
Mark

[Cemendur]

Mark Johnson's Concept games is an excellent example of games useful that are more useful in theory than in practice.

For another example, my initial reaction to the title may help:

An "unworkable concept" implies a theory that can not be applied to the play.

Some unworkable game concepts can be transformed to workable game concepts through innovative game design.

I had initially thought that this thread was going to meander toward game theories that are encountering significant barriers toward application. Game designers would toss out their game concepts that they are have trouble with applying and people could give ideas of how to apply it.

I believe that would be a workable topic for a thread.

Hopefully that helps.

[SrGrvsaLot]

Unplayable: A game can be unplayable for a variety of reasons. Some are technical, like bad writing, layout, mechanics, etc. It can also be unplayable for design reasons. The ideas could be presented in such a way as to be confusing, offensive (to a great many people, or to the game's intended audience), obscure to all but a small audience, boring, or insulting to the audience's intelligence. It's also possible to have interesting, well explained ideas that are poorly reflected in the rules. A key sign of unplayability is broad consensus on the game's poor quality, though it may attract a cult following (a good metaphor is that of the bad movie). Some games that utilize innovative ideas might be considered unplayable until the larger community "catches up."

A good example of something that would make a game unplayable is a mechanic I suggested earlier: assigning each object in the game world a mathmatical function, and then making task success contingent on integrating those functions.

Of course, all the above is sheer stuborness on my part. Cemendur explains what I was hoping for better than I've managed to so far.

[M. J. Young]

If there's no reasonable way to make it fun without fundamentally changing the concept itself. The rock game is a good example of this, and it would be easy to come up with lots of other examples that fail for the same reason.

Who besides me will admit to being old enough to remember Pet Rocks? They came out when I was in college. I thought they were pretty stupid, and never owned one.

A few years later some guy tried to do it again, packaging large shiny ball bearings in packages labeled "Robot Eggs". He claimed that they would hatch some time in the next thousand years, I think. He also said that there were lots of things you could do with them. One thing was they liked to play a game called "freeze", where the object was to see who could stay perfectly still the longest--they were said to be very good at this game, and I imagine so, although I never owned one of these, either.

I've seen people pretend to be mannequins; is that a game? It can be play, and it can be played.

People play stare-downs, where the object is to be the last one to blink. Is that not a game?

Could you not have a game of "rock" where the object was to see who could stay perfectly motionless the longest?

I think I, too, recall being asked to play such a game by a babysitter once, long ago.

As to Concentration Camp, the question really was whether the idea is unworkable, right? It has nothing to do with whether the color is necessarily offensive, does it? What if this were the pitch:

[*]The game is Isolation Center. The characters are government doctors at Core Medical Center, and their mission is to prevent the infection of the human race, by any means necessary. Players will have to think of new and creative ways to subjugate the infected populace (of various uncurable infectious deadly and debilitating diseases) while simultaneously overcoming problems that might hinder "the final solution."
[*]The game is Defensive Outpost. The characters are high ranking Human Space Marine officers at Zeta 9, and their mission is to ensure the racial purity of the human race, by any means necessary. Players will have to think of new and creative ways to humiliate the alien invader prisoners (and assorted collaborators) while simultaneously overcoming problems that might hinder "the final solution."[/list:u]
Sure, those aren't the concentration camps; but isn't a large part of your negative reaction to the concentration camp scenario precisely because it is historic? Several psychological and social science experiments have attempted over the years to put people in very similar sorts of relationships to each other--guard and prisoner games to see how people act in that context when they could opt out at any moment; the famous study in which subjects were asked by a man in a lab coat to keep administering punishments to the heard but not seen screaming man in the next room who was failing to answer the questions properly all as part of an "experiment". Is there a particular reason why a concentration camp game in which some of the player characters are prisoners and some are guards or officials, delving into the moral issues at the heart of this, couldn't be built on the basic concept you've presented? Could it become the story of Schindler, Anne Frank, Corrie Ten Boom?

Any idea that you can think about you can turn into a game, and with a bit of consideration can make an interesting game.

It's my understanding that the primary point of the design of Toon was to prove once for all that any idea could become a role playing game. Multiverser takes the same view.

So I'll answer the original question by saying no, there is no such thing as an unworkable concept. Anything can be made into a game, and find an audience.

--M. J. Young

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

John, you are indeed being stubborn, and that's my cue. It's not hard to understand that there are many ways to be "unworkable." I've stated that if you don't choose one for us to use in this thread, it's closed. And three requests is too many, so closed it is.

Really. We're looking at two pages of occasional and localized insight, embedded in ambiguity. That's not good. Even M.J.'s post is, with all respect, an exercise in the obvious.

Another, more focused thread would be welcome. This one's over.

Best,
Ron