Jane McGonigal is a game designer which means she thinks about video games and games themselves differently that most people ever would. According to her, games are a unique medium of entertainment because they have to utilize the efforts and attention of its audience. Something inherently within people makes them desire the completion of tasks but making tasks seem entertaining and purposeful is something that games do better than almost anything else.
McGonigal’s four main factors that make people who play games feel invested in them are; urgent optimism, social fabric, blissful productivity, and epic meaning. To break these down a little further, urgent optimism is the belief that a task can be completed no matter how difficult it may seem. Often times, games require you to save the world and defeat many powerful opponents. Strongly believing you can defeat these foes and accomplish goals helps a player put in the time and effort to do so. Developing a social fabric in a game can happen in many ways. There are relationships that can be formed with other players inside the game, or with people in the real world. Players can also form connections to the game and characters themselves. Learning the personality of a companion character and possibly spending the entirety of game-play with the character at your side allows a more personal relationship to be developed. Even a personalized relationship to the game or how it makes you feel while playing is a tangible factor. Blissful productivity is the fact that people feel happy in games, as long as there is something to do, even if inconsequential. For example, if someone walked up to me offering to give me $5 to collect 20 red flowers from the forest area near town I would likely decline, but in a game this type of activity is common. It’s the hope that bigger, more exciting missions will reveal themselves after the mundane tasks are completed that keeps players going in early-game periods. The final factor is epic meaning. In the Ted Talk presentation this was summed up by the term “epic win”. Because I hate using that term in any context, especially serious ones, I’ll refer to it as “big moments” from now on. She described these big moments as the events with the most excitement and meaning to a player. Finally conquering a boss that has been stopping you, earning a difficult achievement, or playing through the climax of a story can all be big moments. After you stop playing a game, these are the moments that stick with you and give you a sense of nostalgia for the game.
Taking these ideas and applying them to real examples in a game isn’t exactly hard because most games follow a similar structure. Missions, objectives, unique characters and combat or strategy are what make games interactive and entertaining, but one particular game works well with all four criteria. Mount & Blade: Warband is an open world, medieval-themed sandbox game. Within this world conflicts rage between factions ranging from Nordic warriors, mounted knights, mongol hordes, and several others. The interesting thing about this game is the fact that it allows the player to experience it however they want. Do you want to take up arms and fight for a faction in the ever present wars? Sure! Want to get a band of mercenary soldiers together to capture and sell raiders and bandits into slavery for gold? You can do that. Prefer to avoid the conflict and instead run merchant caravans between different kingdoms using the game’s economy to find the best trades? Also an option. This is part of the urgent optimism of the game. Because there are so many tasks you can take on, there is always something to do. Herd cattle from one stronghold to another, collect taxes from villages, escort the wives or sisters of lords on travel, and countless others. These missions, whether given by the game or made by the player, give them hope that they will build up to greater adventures in the future. The social fabric of the game is one of the areas with the most depth. Every major interaction you have with other important NPCs changes your relation with them and sometimes the faction they represent. You can use poetry learned from bards in taverns to woo women, and use the marriage to gain political standing in a faction. Go into battle with other leaders consistently and they will trust you enough to accompany you on your own conquests. So much of what happens in Mount & Blade is determined by the relationships these factions share. Wars can be started and ended based on the relationships of kings and vassals switch factions based on feelings towards leaders constantly. Being blissfully productive in Warband is the driving force behind the game. At times in my own experience the endless battles I would lead soldiers in felt like a ladder that was impossible to climb. Being beaten to the point of capture so many times motivates you to use other methods to grow stronger and fight back. By building your renown you can lead more soldiers, but with a bigger army, comes greater expenses. You have to be productive to be competitive, and gold is the lifeblood of your small army.Fortunately, there are many unique ways to acquire it. I gave the example of using merchant routes, but there are many others. My personal favorite is entering tournaments for arena battles with other characters and betting on yourself to win. Dumping gold into your army can grow it from recruits, to hardened knights and warriors. The progression you see in your unit is a continuous reward for your work and makes training and raising your group more personal. The most applicable part of the four properties for Warband is the concept of epic meaning. There are so many moments in this game that give you the grand sense of being just another soldier in a massive fight. My favorite moment I experienced was riding as the marshal of the Nordic army towards the last stronghold of the Swadian knights. With over 1500 soldiers total split among vassals and the king of the Nords, we approached the gates to the Swadian city. After a long fought battle we stood on the walls of the last stronghold of our long time rivals. Unlike other games, big moments don’t mark the end, just the opportunity to chase the next one.
The four pillars of making a game work for people is the base of all video games and I think Warband exemplifies all of them. Player freedom adds another layer of choice and motivation to the game. Because you build who you are, your accomplishments feel more personal and earned.
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