Plausibility, Realism and game design goals [an essay]

[John Kim]

I'd make the point a little stronger.  It is impossible in a game to model reality.  The best you can do is model someone else's model of reality.

If you're going to design a game that's "realistic" in the collequial sense of the world, then only thing you can do is find an expert in the field and base your game model of that expert (or school's) view of how things are.  Often times the experts don't agree (especially in the softer sciences which is where the majority of roleplaying takes place...or in the leading edge of harder science).  If you follow one group's theories the other group will disagree.  So which is "more realistic"?  Impossible to say.  The best you can do is say its very plausible given a specific set of standards that are accepted as a given.

Again, this is just arguing that because there can be mistakes and/or disagreement, "realism" doesn't exist in any field, period.  

Look closely at your claim here.  Suppose I am one of those experts.  I have a model intended for a computerized simulation for some experiment.  However, some of my peers disagree with me on some point.  Well, is it "realistic"?  By your criteria, since someone disagrees with me, it is impossible to say.  The only thing that I can say is that it is plausible to me.

[Ian Charvill]

Imagine it's 1988.  You produce a martial arts roleplaying game.  You release it, you sell it as "the most realistic martial arts RPG ever developed".  Someone playtests it.

For the playtest they stat up a taekwondo player, black belt, first dan, good physical attributes.  They also stat up a jiu-jitsu player from Brazil, purple belt, good physical attributes.  They run a hundred combats.

99 times the blackbelt loses.  If he's lucky he gets in one or two kicks, which have no appreciable effect, before ending up on the ground.  Defeat follows, usually in a few combat rounds, with the blackbelt getting choked out or getting a limb snapped.  The one time he wins it's an obvious fluke -- critical hit versus fumble.

No, in 1988 this idea would be greeted with derision.  That's not plausible, that's not realistic.  No way a blackbelt could get beated by a purple belt like that.  Nu-huh.

Why can I say that with confidence?  Because that's what happened when mixed martial arts competitions started.  The response from the striking martial arts camp was disbelief -- what was happening wasn't plausible.  But there it was in hour after hour of video footage -- there it was for anyone who cared to step on the mat and crosstrain.  Striker vs grappler -- striker ended up on the ground tapping like Sammy David Jr.

[I mean no particular offense against the taekwondo guys -- I think taekwondo is beautiful, the athleticism is amazing -- but you can swap in pretty much any striking martial art except maybe boxing, muay thai, a couple of others, and the results historically have been the same]

Purple belt wins, that's what's realistic.

We know this because it's 2005 and we have more than a decade of MMA footage showing the statistical reality of the TKD guy vs the BJJ guy.  To be fair, we know a BJJ purple belt takes longer to get than a TKD black belt (about five years versus about three years).

So there we have it: realism is no guarantee of plausibility.  Realism and plausibility are not similes.

We hear things on the street all the time that confirm this.  That's why we even have a cliche for it: Truth is Stranger than Fiction.  Guys don't fall thousands of feet from a plane and survive -- except they do.  First time I saw footage from the World Trade Centre attack I thought "Cool!" because I thought they were advertising a movie.  Took a minute for me to realise it was news footage not a trailer for the next Die Hard movie.  Real as it was, it wasn't plausible to me.

So, what does this mean for Ralph's rant?  Let me admit I couldn't give two hoots for realism.  When they first started hyping Riddle of Steel of RPG.net it was all about the realism of the combat system.  I tuned out after the first few posts.  Realism?  Snoozeville.

So given that realism is seperate from plausibility* why is it not a viable design goal for people who don't have tastes like me?

[* as a side question do people think plausibility can be a design goal -- I can't see an argument that would say 'realism doesn't make a good design goal' that would not also mean that 'plausibility doesn;'t make a good design goal']

[Domhnall]

Well, no one can accuse this forum of have dim discussions, at least.

I can see that there are many here who are fellow philosophers, which is a blessing and a curse.  I enjoy the Realist/Anti-Realist debates as I see many of you do as well.  But, cutting to the chase, I say that the issue of agreeing upon a "proper" definition of 'realistic' is not essential, or even very useful.  

What I think is more productive (for the sake of discussing RPG development) is an agreement on the common use of the term.  Can we agree that the non-philosophically trained person uses the term 'realistic' as "what is" (or "what would be, given that set of variables")?  Can we agree that the common person, who just watched Schindler's List will attest to its realistic plot?  (Leaving to the side that it's an easy mark for the philosopher to begin tearing that assertion apart is it agreeable that that is the way the untrained speaks?)  And thus, can we accept that the common RPer uses "realistic rules" as a signal that the gaming world will have closer correspondence with the "real world"?

If we can concede that, then isn't it the best course to allow the term 'realistic' be applied to systems that do (seriously and maturely) endeavor to correspond rule with 'fact'?   I also make the vulgar assertion that my game is "realistic".  All the hidden baggage of that term is irrelevant to the vast majority of readers, and so isn't bothersome to me.  Now, I will agree that making (grandiose) claims as to the "complete realism" of a system is folly, even to the ears of the untrained, and should be avoided.  

And, to the question of "Is there a good justification for incorporating [realism] into the game design" I give a resounding "Yes"...  But I am too tired to type that out.

[LordSmerf]

Okay, let me go ahead and put this out there since I stated my initial position very poorly.  I want to step back and see if I can sound a bit more intelligent...

Yes, there is such a thing a realism.  In RPGs I would say that you can call a system "realistic" if the output is the same as observable real-world events.

This means that I can make my physics realistic.  I can construct a model that has the same (or at least something rather close) to real-world outputs.  (I feel the need to note that this could be done with simple percentile probability tables instead of complex mechanical interactions).

The problem is when we start talking about "realism" in terms of history, but that's another matter.

So, John, I agree, there is an actual realism that is achievable.  However, i don't think that it's as easy to achieve as you have indicated (or at least as I have read you to indicate).  Further, I agree with Ralph that realism is not in and of itself an end, but rather it is a means to an end.  That means that you need to know what the end you are actually trying to achieve is.  Trying to attain realism for its own sake is just kind of silly.

Thomas

[Valamir]

I'd make the point a little stronger.  It is impossible in a game to model reality.  The best you can do is model someone else's model of reality.

If you're going to design a game that's "realistic" in the collequial sense of the world, then only thing you can do is find an expert in the field and base your game model of that expert (or school's) view of how things are.  Often times the experts don't agree (especially in the softer sciences which is where the majority of roleplaying takes place...or in the leading edge of harder science).  If you follow one group's theories the other group will disagree.  So which is "more realistic"?  Impossible to say.  The best you can do is say its very plausible given a specific set of standards that are accepted as a given.

Again, this is just arguing that because there can be mistakes and/or disagreement, "realism" doesn't exist in any field, period.  

Look closely at your claim here.  Suppose I am one of those experts.  I have a model intended for a computerized simulation for some experiment.  However, some of my peers disagree with me on some point.  Well, is it "realistic"?  By your criteria, since someone disagrees with me, it is impossible to say.  The only thing that I can say is that it is plausible to me.

I am looking closely at my claim here John.  An your last sentence which you state with incredulity is 100% accurate.  You CAN'T call it "realistic" you can only say its plausible to me.  This is a basic feature of science.  It doesn't prove anything.  A scientific conclusion is nothing more than the conclusion which bests fits available data today.  You can eliminate possibilities with science but that's it.

That's the same thing with Walt's example of exploding space men above.  You have 2 rules systems, one that allows for exploding space man and one that doesn't.  We know now that exploding space men has been shown to be incorrect so we know (those of us who are aware of this) that those rules aren't very plausible.  However, we can't say that the other rule is thus more realistic.  The other rule could be equally wrong and equally unrealistic in other less dramatic ways.  We don't know what those ways are, and so that set of rules seems more plausible to us.


But all of this knee jerk defense of realism is really just a Red Herring distracting this thread from the topic.  The fact is that realism has been put on a pedestool for decades.  Its been given precidence over just about every other design consideration in traditional games for years.

The ONLY other design consideration which has emerged to challenge it is "playability".  The Playability vs. Realism debate has raged longer than RPGs have been around dating back to the dawn of wargaming.  Playability is just as silly an nonsensical a design goal as realism.  Its has no more value than the Purple / Green debate on Babylon 5.

Now my point is that realism doesn't deserve to be on that pedastool.  That when you boil it down, nothing that has ever been labeled as "realistic" in an RPG has ever actually BEEN "realistic".  Silly arguements over this stuff have been going on for decades and nobody is ever actually "right".  You find source material that seems to make sense to you...that you believe to be credible...you build mechanics to model the conclusions of that source material and that's it.  The best you can say is that you've accurately modeled a certain source material.  

Riddle of Steel is no different...claims of "realism" is just more of that silly marketing stuff.  TRoS draws upon the research and experimentation of ARMA and bases its combat system on concepts consistant with that source material.  I happen to find that source material extremely credible.  Some people don't.  Is it "realistic"?  PURPLE....GREEN...please.  The goal was to model combat in a certain way, and that goal was achieved.  THAT'S what's important.


What is my goal in this essay?  Well I'd like to say kicking "Realism" off of its pedastool so game designers can focus their attention on the REAL goals of their design without being distracted by silly notions.  Unfortuneately of course a single essay on the Forge isn't going to accomplish that.

This isn't an anti-realism rant.  Some folks have tried to characterize it as that...but they're just sticking their fingers in their ears and not listening.  "Realism" is such a long held cherished concept that anything that suggests it might not actually be the most important aspect of game design is akin to insulting someones mother, and after that...whoa...

But no.  I'm not anti-realism.  What I am is anti-realism without a good reason.  Same as I'd be anti-anyting without a good reason.  Because having a good reason for what you are doing is the most fundamental concept of good design there is.  This is not my opinion.  This is a universal principal of design.  Identify what you are trying to accomplish THEN choose the techniques you're going to try to use to accomplish it.  If you're doing something in a game and you can't answer "why"...then you're making a mistake.  You need to back up and refocus on your goals so that you know why you just wrote that rule that way and not some other way.

Why am I targeting realism specifically?  Because realism's historic privileged position means that people assume you don't have to answer "why".  That when it comes to realism "because its more realistic that way" is answer enough.  This is, of course, complete bullshit.  But one can see posts even in this thread where not only is that opinion held but the holder is astonished to even have it questioned.

"realism is its own reason" would be a nonsense answer even if it did mean something more substantial.  But given that all claims of realism represent nothing more than mere plausibility (i.e. consistant with the findings of a given source material) its even more ridiculous and more damaging.

[Callan S.]

Imagine it's 1988.  You produce a martial arts roleplaying game.  You release it, you sell it as "the most realistic martial arts RPG ever developed".  Someone playtests it.

For the playtest they stat up a taekwondo player, black belt, first dan, good physical attributes.  They also stat up a jiu-jitsu player from Brazil, purple belt, good physical attributes.  They run a hundred combats.

99 times the blackbelt loses.  If he's lucky he gets in one or two kicks, which have no appreciable effect, before ending up on the ground.  Defeat follows, usually in a few combat rounds, with the blackbelt getting choked out or getting a limb snapped.  The one time he wins it's an obvious fluke -- critical hit versus fumble.

No, in 1988 this idea would be greeted with derision.  That's not plausible, that's not realistic.  No way a blackbelt could get beated by a purple belt like that.  Nu-huh.

Why can I say that with confidence?  Because that's what happened when mixed martial arts competitions started.  The response from the striking martial arts camp was disbelief -- what was happening wasn't plausible.  But there it was in hour after hour of video footage -- there it was for anyone who cared to step on the mat and crosstrain.  Striker vs grappler -- striker ended up on the ground tapping like Sammy David Jr.

This is a good example. So, still trying to wrap this up into a compact idea:

Realism is in the eye of the beholder.

Just like beauty isn't an inherant quality of an object, but instead each observer decides if they see beauty there, the same goes for realism.

This means you (as a designer) can't just put realism into a game. You can look at what certain people think is realistic, and then put that in. That's a lot different, even if it doesn't look like it at first.

Indeed, the pursuit of realism in design has only ever been a pursuit of what people think is realistic. The big problem comes when the designer can't discuss it at that level "Oh no, I didn't put X in to please those people, I put it in because its realistic. So I simply can't replace X with Y to please them more, since pleasing them is not my goal! I can not discuss that option at all...I just want to discuss putting realism into the game!"

Of course, to 'put' realism in, you need to discuss what pleases those people. But the goal of realism typically means full blown denial of that.

[Ben Terry]

I agree with the idea that "realism" in a universal, broad sense can not be a design goal for a Role Playing Game.  It could be a design goal, perhaps, for person attempting to synthesize human knowledge into some kind of "Science's Best Simulation of all Reality" project, but at that point you just have a model with no game to it.  The modelling one does in a Role Playing Game has to serve some purpose for the game, whether modelling reality or something else.  Modelling certain narrow areas of reality may support design goals, but modelling reality universally does not, as far as I can figure.

To get more specific, it seems that often in "realistic" games there is a large concern for basic physics, especially as it realtes to combat and other physical human activity.  Less often do you see concern for modelling how speices evolve over time, or how genetics, culture, and physical environment effect individuals in a society, or how economics arises and changes over time, how fads arise and spread, etc., etc.  To get to the core of it, in a system that has a model of reality as its core, why are you roleplaying?  Why not generate a plausable individual of the human species in an environment and just see how its life plays out?  If you chose to roleplay an individual, why not roleplay societies?  At some point you must sacrifice the goal of a realistic model to let players in to a game.  If a player plays a character in a way the reality simulation would consider highly improbable, is that bad role-playing?

All of that is just me being a little absurd about it.  I'm saying that for actual game to occur, someone is going to have to want to do something, usually with a character in the case of RPGs.  Say the player wants to immerse themselves in what it must have been like to be a Samurai in Feudal Japan.  Now, in the RPGs I play, that tends to mean a player wants to get into the head of the samurai and act as he imagines a real samurai may have acted, and getting some pleasure either from the internal emotions  the experience generates, living vicariously through a fictional character, or just the joy of seeing the events unfold.  This means that we probably won't apply a strictly realistic model to his character's psychology, upbringing, demeanour, to determining its course of action, because doing so removes choice from the player, and choice is essential for roleplaying to occur.  On the other hand, traditionally RPGs do allow some of the raw physical simulation aspects of a character's body to be handled by the system without too much uproar.  But then you have to ask, "Why can I have my character decide to proposition a beautiful woman at the bar and then later sacrifice himself nobly to save his friends, but I can't simply decide that my character can lift that boulder or jump that chasm?"  Universally modelling reality may give that character a 0.025% likelihood of performing the former, but a 55% chance of the latter, yet a game will often let a player perform the former 100% of the time he desires.

So, everytime a concious decision is made not to model something, or not to force events and agents to submit themselves to the reality model, your RPG is starting to take on actual design goals.  I think that often, though, these decisions to model or not model certain things are taken without deeply addressing why they are being made.  Eventually the game ends up supporting certain styles of play unconciously.

I could have been more clear about all this, but I hope at least there is some interesting perspective in there for you.

Ben

[John Kim]

And your last sentence which you state with incredulity is 100% accurate.  You CAN'T call it "realistic" you can only say its plausible to me.  This is a basic feature of science.  It doesn't prove anything.  A scientific conclusion is nothing more than the conclusion which bests fits available data today.  You can eliminate possibilities with science but that's it.
...
That when you boil it down, nothing that has ever been labeled as "realistic" in an RPG has ever actually BEEN "realistic".  Silly arguements over this stuff have been going on for decades and nobody is ever actually "right".

OK, stop.  Can you give me an example of anything, anywhere which has ever been realistic by your definition?  As far as I can tell, by your definition, silly arguments over what is "realistic" have been going on for centuries and nobody is ever actually "right".  Obsessed, pathetic dweebs like Newton and Einstein spent decades of their lives struggling with this "reality" thing and they never got it "right".  So as far as I can tell, the fact that RPGs don't get it right simply puts them in good company.  

I admire and value in itself modeling and learning about reality.  The quest for realism is an interest in reality.  And no, I don't think that interest in reality should be the exclusive domain of the world's top scientists.  I equally admire the kid who plays around with how marbles roll, or the backyard inventor who experiments instead of just reading.  Even if they don't get it "right" in an absolute sense, I believe there is value in the attempt.  Now, there are gamers who have different interests than me -- whether in different types of imaginings, or in different parts in reality (i.e. ballistics, say).  So maybe I will find some realistic games boring.  But that's just differing interests.  

The fact is that realism has been put on a pedestool for decades.  Its been given precidence over just about every other design consideration in traditional games for years.

The ONLY other design consideration which has emerged to challenge it is "playability".

OK, a quick glance at my shelf shows me a few of the top RPGs of the past few years:  D&D, Exalted, Deadlands, Big Eyes Small Mouth, Feng Shui, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and a host of others.  This is your "realism"?  Can you seriously look me in the eye and tell me that the designers of these games had no design consideration other than modeling reality, albeit possibly in a playable manner?  

I claim the exact opposite.  There is not have nearly enough realism in mainstream RPGs.  Reality is interesting and valuable.  Compared to the mainstream of RPGs, I would prefer to dispense with jumping up to treetops, wading through dozens of sword chops, fireballs, and a host of the other trappings that RPGs have grown to assume.  Give me a roomful of realistic characters with realistic problems at least once, as a change of pace if nothing else.

[contracycle]

Right.  It seems my previous post in this thread has vanished, unfortunately, so let me have another go.

Essentially I agree with John - realism IS, or can be, a design goal.  It IS, or can be, valued and valuable as such.  It is ridiculous to conflate "realISTIC" with "real".  RealISTIC is already a term that communicates an approximation of reality.

I further agree with John and others who have suggested that there is a didactic element in RPG and that the fact that the experience can be taken as realistic and lessons drawn therefrom.  I would even go so far as to say that the very goal of exploration is worthless without realism.

I fully, comprehensively, and without reservation agree with every word John writes in this paragraph:

I claim the exact opposite. There is not have nearly enough realism in mainstream RPGs. Reality is interesting and valuable. Compared to the mainstream of RPGs, I would prefer to dispense with jumping up to treetops, wading through dozens of sword chops, fireballs, and a host of the other trappings that RPGs have grown to assume. Give me a roomful of realistic characters with realistic problems at least once, as a change of pace if nothing else.

The issue of plausibility is the red herring here.  I have frequently asserted that, IMO, RPG is essentially unable to impose unpalatable insights or conclusions on players, but this does NOT to my mind undermine the value and validity of realism.  Because the plausibility which our text is attributed is subject to our own intervention through that very text.  If your model is realistic, and you know or believe you can support that evidentially, why not explain that argument to the reading audience?  We have already seen a move in this direction with the appearance of design notes discussing the intent behind the mechanical structure.

We have spent far too long shying away from realism in favour of "what the customer wants", the customer being presumed to be an idiot who wants only haughty elves and evil orcs and mail bikinis.

What this discussion reminds me of is the absurd efforts to get Special Creation taught alongside Evolution in schools.  The assertion that everything is "just a theory" or "subjectively plausible" is an appeal to solipsism and remains logically invalid in my view.  It is a nonsense to assert that personal subjectivity renders the conduct of science, the interrogation of actual reality, useless.  We have specific methods to overcome that problem, such as peer review and independant reproducibility.  And if I write a game based on peer reviewed, independantly verifiable science, then I can and will claim it be realistic in every honest sense of the term, and I fully expect it to appeal to an audience with similar proclivities.

[Callan S.]

Essentially I agree with John - realism IS, or can be, a design goal.  It IS, or can be, valued and valuable as such.

How about something simpler, like a design goal of having beutiful art in your book.

Can you ensure an art piece is beutiful to a user? How? Will it force them to think it's beutiful, or did you look at what certain people like in art and used that?

We have spent far too long shying away from realism in favour of "what the customer wants", the customer being presumed to be an idiot who wants only haughty elves and evil orcs and mail bikinis.

What this discussion reminds me of is the absurd efforts to get Special Creation taught alongside Evolution in schools. The assertion that everything is "just a theory" or "subjectively plausible" is an appeal to solipsism and remains logically invalid in my view. It is a nonsense to assert that personal subjectivity renders the conduct of science, the interrogation of actual reality, useless. We have specific methods to overcome that problem, such as peer review and independant reproducibility. And if I write a game based on peer reviewed, independantly verifiable science, then I can and will claim it be realistic in every honest sense of the term, and I fully expect it to appeal to an audience with similar proclivities.

So it'll appeal to those who like such procedures. You've worked the arguement along to the point where you find out "what the customer wants". ie scientific verification.

So what does the goal of 'Realism' mean if users don't give a stuff about scientific verification? Either your making realism your goal, despite the end users desires in relation to that, or it's because your pursuing what particular end users want. For the former, I'm not sure what that has to do with RPG design, and for the latter...yes, as noted, that's a great thing to pursue and a great, clear goal to have.

[Domhnall]

Hi,

I've offered an answer to the "why" of realism in my -Immersive-Relevant Realism topic.

[contracycle]

Can you ensure an art piece is beutiful to a user? How? Will it force them to think it's beutiful, or did you look at what certain people like in art and used that?

Obviously not; theres not accounting for taste.  That what makes realism eaiser and more accessible - reality doesn't care about your taste,m it merely is, and thus we are likely to have common experiences of its workings.

So it'll appeal to those who like such procedures. You've worked the arguement along to the point where you find out "what the customer wants". ie scientific verification.

Oh right - like medicines are only taken by scientists.

The product of the technique is distinct from the technique.

So what does the goal of 'Realism' mean if users don't give a stuff about scientific verification? Either your making realism your goal, despite the end users desires in relation to that, or it's because your pursuing what particular end users want. For the former, I'm not sure what that has to do with RPG design, and for the latter...yes, as noted, that's a great thing to pursue and a great, clear goal to have.

No, thats the njotional binary I am challenging.  Nowhere did I ever say "unrealism is evil" or th "there can be no unrealistic games".

What I am saying is that realism is actually not tyhat hard to achieve becuase we all live in the same physical world, and our aesthetic and ideological preferences about that world don't count for anything.  thats exactly why I can be confident that other people have encountered the same types of things I have encountered in the real world, and why a real depiction has a good chance of making that sort of connection in play.

[James Holloway]

What I am saying is that realism is actually not tyhat hard to achieve becuase we all live in the same physical world, and our aesthetic and ideological preferences about that world don't count for anything.  thats exactly why I can be confident that other people have encountered the same types of things I have encountered in the real world, and why a real depiction has a good chance of making that sort of connection in play.

I agree in principle, but in practice I'd be interested in hearing about an example of such a published system.

I think that there are aspects of reality that most RPGs model without any difficulty at all by entrusting them to the common sense of the players: things fall down instead of up while on earth, for instance. Likewise, a lot of games handle car collision damage well enough, if sometimes simplified for the sake of mechanical ease of use (because data on car collisions is widely available). Where RPG systems tend to make a big deal about "realism," however, tends to be in one of two areas:

1) combat, or

2) historical society or technology.

Or to put it another way: do RPGs tend to flog realism particularly in areas where the actual experience is under debate?

[contracycle]

Or to put it another way: do RPGs tend to flog realism particularly in areas where the actual experience is under debate?

In My Opinion, yes, thats why the debate in RPG is so poisonous.  Its not the issue of realism per se that is problematic, it is the topics that %RPG happens to focus on.

Magic - so is it realistic or unrealistic to have live gods?  Pantheons or monotheisms?  This external issue is easy to identify as contentious.

Combat - endless debate on wound cavitation, keyholing, whether we understand martial arts.  The modern stuff is inherently political; the historical stuff no longer has active practictioners, so realism is hard.

Society - society is much harder to encounter objectively, and people cannot all have the same experience.  But, many of us make worlds, but few have studied anything about how societies are made, so this is the blind leading the blind.

So yes, I think its the topics that RPG uses that are problematic rather than the principle of realism per se.  And its also true that the term "realism" is often used to conceal some oither agenda , or at least can be so used.  I understand why people shy away from the question, but I don;t think it should be given up on.

[JMendes]

Hey, :)

Can you ensure an art piece is beutiful to a user? How? Will it force them to think it's beutiful, or did you look at what certain people like in art and used that?

Obviously not; theres not accounting for taste.  That what makes realism eaiser and more accessible - reality doesn't care about your taste,m it merely is, and thus we are likely to have common experiences of its workings.

I'm sorry, but this is so utterly contrary to my personal experience, I felt I just had to speak up.

I agree that reality exists in and of itself, but when devoid of interpretation, reality has no meaning, i.e., it has no "workings". And once you put interpretation into it, it's about as wildly different from person to person as art taste is.

Whilst I may agree that realism may be a good thing, I simply do not see a way to dissociate it from the personal point of view. That's right, much like art beauty, realism is in the eye of the beholder.

Cheers,

J.