FUNDAMENTALS OF GAME DESIGN, SECOND EDITION
The Definition of a Game
Defining any term that refers to a broad class of human behaviors is a tricky business, because if anyone can find a single counterexample, the definition is inaccurate. Efforts to find unassailable definitions of such terms usually produce results so general as to be useless for practical purposes. The alternative is to acknowledge that a definition is not rigorous but serves as a convenient description to cover the majority of cases. In this book, we'll use the following nonrigorous definition of a game:
GAME A game is a type of play activity, conducted in the context of a pretended reality, in which the participant(s) try to achieve at least one arbitrary, nontrivial goal by acting in accordance with rules.
There may be exceptions—activities that someone would instantly recognize as a game but that don't conform to this definition. So be it. The definition is intended to be practical rather than complete.
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OTHER VIEWS________________________________________
Many people in fields as diverse as anthropology, philosophy, history, and of course, game design have attempted to define the word game over the years. In Rules of Play, Salen and Zimmerman examine several of these definitions (Salen and Zimmerman, 2003, pp. 73-80). Most, but not all, make some reference to rules, goals, play, and pretending. Some include other elements such as decision-making or the quality of being a system. This book doesn't try to refute or rebut any of these; it just presents a new definition to stand beside the others. Note that some commentators, such as Raph Koster in A Theory of Fun for Game Design, disparage the distinctions between toys, puzzles, and games as irrelevant (Koster, 2004, p. 36). However, it is important to address them in an introductory text.
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