Defining Video Games: Padia or Ludus?

In our lecture last week Thursday, 16th October we where discussing how to categories games e.g there genre such as horror or FPS (First Person Shooter).

We also went on to talk about the French sociologist Roger Caillois's notions of paidia and ludus which has made us able to separate games into two different categories based on these notions.

Games put into paidia are games that are played for pleasure and games that do not constrain you to rules.

However games that follow ludus are essentially the opposite of paidia games in that you are constrained by the rules and that there is a clear outcome to the game, e.g "winning".

After this we also spoke about different aspects of games, there where four terms that we used;

Agon - This is competition.

Alea - This refers to chance and randomness.

Ilinx - This is movement.

Mimicry - This is simulation, make-believe and role-play.

We where then asked to think about some games that we know well and try to think how these games can be defined as paidia and/or ludus and how they fit into the categories of agon/alea/ilinx/mimicry or if there are any combinations of the categories.

So I decided to pick one of my favourite game franchises and that is the Dark Souls franchise. I would put this game into the paidia category as a start this is because the game does not have a clear goal, there are no rules and you can tackle the game anyway that you want, although you do eventually reach an end you are not constrained by anything to make you reach that end, while playing the game you are not told where to go or which way is the right way so because of this i  would say that it is a paidia game. In relation to the four aspects of games I would say that the Dark Souls franchise has a bit of all of them, it has agon in the fact that there is a PvP aspect to the games where you can summon over players to fight against them, there is Alea because of the randomness of the enemy movements, you don't know if an enemy is going to do a certain attack or if they are trying to confuse you into thinking they are by doing the start animation of a move and then changing to another, not only is there randomness in the enemies but there is also randomness and chance that the enemies will drop a piece of there armor or there weapon when they are killed, there is ilinx because you are constantly moving through a large world, you can find bonfires which act as checkpoints and that can be teleported to and there is mimicry as you can role-play, you can choose from a number of different classes, such as a mage, a warrior, a knight or a thief, not only that but there are some people that role-play within the game itself as some of the bosses as it is possible to get there armor and weapons.

I also looked at the Call of Duty Franchise which I feel is a ludus game as you are constrained by rules and that there is a set path in which you finish the level and there is often times a clear goal within  the games and you are forced to play the game a certain way in that you can't really go and explore the levels and often times areas will be locked off so that you can't actually access them. I feel that the Call of Duty franchise can be placed into agon, ilinx and mimicry, i feel like it can be agon because of the online PvP that is available to the games, I feel that ilinx is in the game because there is a lot of movement within the games, the constant running and the driving sections that are in some of the games, and i chose mimicry because i feel that in someway Call of Duty can be classed as a military simulator as that is what you are doing so in this case it is also role-playing. I didn't add alea to the list of things that Call of Duty has as i do not think that there is an aspect of chance or randomness in the games.

Bibliographies.

Brathwaite, B and Schreiber, I (2009) Challenges for game designers non-digital exercises for video game designers. Boston Massachusetts, Course Technology.

Chick, T (2006) "Shoot Club: The Doom 3 Review" In Salen, K and Zimmerman, E (Eds) The game design reader: A Rules of Play Anthology. London, MIT Press, PP 156 -171.

Swacha, J; Skrzyszewski, A and Wojciech,A,S  (2010) "Computer Game Design Classes: The Students' and Professionals' Perspectives". Informatics in Education.  Volume 9 249-260..

A brief chat about me.

Shane

What is the title of the book (Fiction) that you are currently reading, or what is the title of the last fiction book that you read?

I am currently reading the book The Call of Cthulu and other weird tales, which is written by H.P. Lovecraft. I really enjoy reading horror fiction and after reading the short by H.P Lovecraft which is titled The Call of Cthulu I wanted to read his other stories as I knew that he was a horror fiction writer, so when I saw the book with Call of Cthulu and other weird tales I picked it up and started to give it a read.

What is the title/topic of the book (non-fiction) that you are currently reading, or what is the last non-fiction book that you read?

I don’t often read non-fiction books but at the moment I am reading some material that is needed for my course at University and the book that I am reading is Game Design a Book of Lenses by Jesse Schell.

What is the last live performance (music, drama or dance) that you attended?

Live performance – The last and one of the only live performances that I have been to was the 2014 Kerrang Tour, it was in Brixton and it was some of the most fun I have had. Kerrang are a magazine, radio station and T.V channel that play rock and metal which are my favourite genres of music.

 

What is the title of the last film that you saw at the cinema/online or watched on DVD?

The last film that I had seen at the cinema was Guardians of The Galaxy which was a pretty good film that I enjoyed a lot, I wish I had seen it in IMAX but it was just as good in 2D. I don’t have a large collection of DVDs but the ones that I do have are watched multiple times by me and my favourite film of all time is V for Vendetta which is the most recent DVD I have watched.

How often do you read a newspaper? (Which one? Online or physical)

Newspapers – I don’t really read newspapers but when I do I tend to read them online instead of having physical copies, I only really read local papers like the Ipswich star. There is a reason I don’t tend to read them and that is because I get most of my news via the news channels like BBC news and Sky news.

What art gallery / museum / exhibition did you last visit?

The last museum that I visited was the Ipswich museum a couple of months ago, I didn't really go for any specific reason but my most liked area of the whole museum is the Egyptian section I have always had an interest in the Egyptians so whenever I get the chance to read more about them I will take it.

How many hours a week do you spend playing video games?

I try to only spend 5-6 hours on video games if I can. I have been playing a lot of FTL: Faster Than Light over the last couple of weeks, I have also been playing a lot of The Binding of Isaac I find both of these games fun and challenging in their own ways, I have not yet been able to complete FTL but i'm working on it.

How many hours a week do you spend playing games other than video games?

I have only just started to play non video games like board games, card games and text based adventure games, but only yesterday did I start to play Dungeons and Dragons properly and I spent a good 3 and a half hours playing Dungeons and Dragons with a group of other players. So I hope to achieve at least the same amount of time on non-video games every week.