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Gameplay is the specific way in which players interact with a game, [1] [2] and in particular with video games. [3] [4] Gameplay is the pattern defined through the game rules, [2] [5] connection between player and the game, [6] challenges [7] and overcoming them, [8] and player's connection with it. [6] Video game gameplay is distinct from graphics [9] [10] and audio elements. [9] In card games, the equivalent term is play. [lower-alpha 1]
Arising alongside video game development in the 1980s, the term gameplay was used solely within the context of video games, though now its popularity has begun to see use in the description of other, more traditional, game forms. Generally, gameplay is considered the overall experience of playing a video game, excluding factors like graphics and sound. Game mechanics, on the other hand, is the sets of rules in a game that are intended to produce an enjoyable gaming experience. Academic discussions tend to favor game mechanics specifically to avoid gameplay since the latter is too vague. [13] The word is sometimes misapplied to card games where, however, the usual term is "play" and refers to the way the cards are played out in accordance with the rules (as opposed to other aspects such as dealing or bidding).
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There are three components to gameplay: "Manipulation rules", defining what the player can do in the game, "Goal Rules", defining the goal of the game, and "Metarules", defining how a game can be tuned or modified. [14] In video games gameplay can be divided into several types. For example, cooperative gameplay involves two or more players playing on a team. Another example is twitch gameplay which is based around testing a player's reaction times and precision, maybe in rhythm games or first-person shooters.[ citation needed ] Various gameplay types are listed below.
The term gameplay can be quite ambiguous to define; thus, it has been differently defined by different authors.
For instance:
This section possibly contains original research .(October 2013) |
Playability is the ease by which the game can be played or the quantity or duration that a game can be played and is a common measure of the quality of gameplay. [20] Playability evaluative methods target games to improve design while player experience evaluative methods target players to improve gaming." [19] This is not to be confused with the ability to control (or play) characters in multi-character games such as role playing games or fighting games, or factions in real-time strategy games.
Playability is defined as a set of properties that describe the Player Experience using a specific game system whose main objective is to provide enjoyment and entertainment by being credible and satisfying when the player plays alone or in the company of others. Playability is characterized by different attributes and properties to measure the video game player experience. [21]
The playability analysis is a very complex process due to the different point of view to analyze the different part of video game architecture. Each facet allows us to identify the different playability's attributes and properties affected by the different elements of video game architecture. [22] The playability's facets are:
Finally, a video game's "global" playability will be deduced through each attribute value in the different playability's facets. It is crucial to improve the playability in the different facets to guarantee the best player experience when the player plays the video game.
A role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting or through a process of structured decision-making regarding character development. Actions taken within many games succeed or fail according to a formal system of rules and guidelines.
Video game design is the process of designing the rules and content of video games in the pre-production stage and designing the gameplay, environment, storyline and characters in the production stage. Some common video game design subdisciplines are world design, level design, system design, content design, and user interface design. Within the video game industry, video game design is usually just referred to as "game design", which is a more general term elsewhere.
An audio game is an electronic game played on a device such as a personal computer. It is similar to a video game save that there is audible and tactile feedback but not visual.
A music video game, also commonly known as a music game, is a video game where the gameplay is meaningfully and often almost entirely oriented around the player's interactions with a musical score or individual songs. Music video games may take a variety of forms and are often grouped with puzzle games due to their common use of "rhythmically generated puzzles".
A video game genre is an informal classification of a video game based on how it is played rather than visual or narrative elements. This is independent of setting, unlike works of fiction that are expressed through other media, such as films or books. For example, a shooter game is still a shooter game, regardless of where or when it takes place. A specific game's genre is open to subjective interpretation. An individual game may belong to several genres at once.
In tabletop games and video games, game mechanics are the rules or ludemes that govern and guide the player's actions, as well as the game's response to them. A rule is an instruction on how to play, a ludeme is an element of play like the L-shaped move of the knight in chess. A game's mechanics thus effectively specify how the game will work for the people who play it.
Emergent gameplay refers to complex situations in video games, board games, or role-playing games that emerge from the interaction of relatively simple game mechanics.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to video games:
Cooperative board games are board games in which players work together to achieve a common goal rather than competing against each other. Either the players win the game by reaching a predetermined objective, or all players lose the game, often by not reaching the objective before a certain event ends the game.
A video game with nonlinear gameplay presents players with challenges that can be completed in a number of different sequences. Each player may take on only some of the challenges possible, and the same challenges may be played in a different order. Conversely, a video game with linear gameplay will confront a player with a fixed sequence of challenges: every player faces every challenge and has to overcome them in the same order.
Affective design describes the design of products, services, and user interfaces that aim to evoke intended emotional responses from consumers, ultimately improving customer satisfaction. It is often regarded within the domain of technology interaction and computing, in which emotional information is communicated to the computer from the user in a natural and comfortable way. The computer processes the emotional information and adapts or responds to try to improve the interaction in some way. The notion of affective design emerged from the field of human–computer interaction (HCI), specifically from the developing area of affective computing. Affective design serves an important role in user experience (UX) as it contributes to the improvement of the user's personal condition in relation to the computing system. Decision-making, brand loyalty, and consumer connections have all been associated with the integration of affective design. The goals of affective design focus on providing users with an optimal, proactive experience. Amongst overlap with several fields, applications of affective design include ambient intelligence, human–robot interaction, and video games.
A sandbox game is a video game with a gameplay element that provides players a great degree of creativity to interact with, usually without any predetermined goal, or alternatively with a goal that the players set for themselves. Such games may lack any objective, and are sometimes referred to as non-games or software toys. More often, sandbox games result from these creative elements being incorporated into other genres and allowing for emergent gameplay. Sandbox games are often associated with an open world concept which gives the players freedom of movement and progression in the game's world. The term "sandbox" derives from the nature of a sandbox that lets people create nearly anything they want within it.
A game is a structured type of play, usually undertaken for entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work or art.
Dynamic game difficulty balancing (DGDB), also known as dynamic difficulty adjustment (DDA), adaptive difficulty or dynamic game balancing (DGB), is the process of automatically changing parameters, scenarios, and behaviors in a video game in real-time, based on the player's ability, in order to avoid making the player bored or frustrated. The goal of dynamic difficulty balancing is to keep the user interested from the beginning to the end, providing a good level of challenge.
User experience evaluation (UXE) or user experience assessment (UXA) refers to a collection of methods, skills and tools utilized to uncover how a person perceives a system before, during and after interacting with it. It is non-trivial to assess user experience since user experience is subjective, context-dependent and dynamic over time. For a UXA study to be successful, the researcher has to select the right dimensions, constructs, and methods and target the research for the specific area of interest such as game, transportation, mobile, etc.
Gamification is the strategic attempt to enhance systems, services, organizations, and activities by creating similar experiences to those experienced when playing games in order to motivate and engage users. This is generally accomplished through the application of game design elements and game principles in non-game contexts.
An art game is a work of interactive new media digital software art as well as a member of the "art game" subgenre of the serious video game. The term "art game" was first used academically in 2002 and it has come to be understood as describing a video game designed to emphasize art or whose structure is intended to produce some kind of reaction in its audience. Art games are interactive and the result of artistic intent by the party offering the piece for consideration. They also typically go out of their way to have a unique, unconventional look, often standing out for aesthetic beauty or complexity in design. The concept has been extended by some art theorists to the realm of modified ("modded") gaming when modifications have been made to existing non-art games to produce graphic results intended to be viewed as an artistic display, as opposed to modifications intended to change game play scenarios or for storytelling. Modified games created for artistic purposes are sometimes referred to as "video game art".
This is a non-comprehensive list that includes terms used in video games and the video game industry, as well as slang used by players.
Game design is the process of creating and shaping the mechanics, systems and rules of a game. Games can be created for entertainment, education, exercise or experimental purposes. Additionally, elements and principles of game design can be applied to other interactions, in the form of gamification. Game designer and developer Robert Zubek defines game design by breaking it down into its elements, which he says are the following:
.. gameplay gestalt, understood as a pattern of interaction with the game system." ("A gestalt may be understood as a configuration or pattern of elements so unified as a whole that it cannot be described merely as a sum of its parts."); ".. In general, it [game play gestalt] is a particular way of thinking about the game state from the perspective of a player, together with a pattern of repetitive perceptual, cognitive, and motor operations. A particular gameplay gestalt could be unique to a person, a game, or even a playing occasion. Unique game play gestalts can also be identified across games, game genres, and players.
Game play is the formalized interaction that occurs when players follow the rules of a game and experience its system through play.
The experience of gameplay is one of interacting with a game design in the performance of cognitive tasks, with a variety of emotions arising from or associated with different elements of motivation, task performance and completion
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ignored (help)[T]he interactive involvement typically associated with videogames, that is, the activities that occur when one plays a videogame.
In line with the common use of the term, we will define gameplay as: the game dynamics emerging from the interplay between rules and game geography.
One or more casually linked series of challenges in a simulated environment"; "Gameplay is the result of a large number of contributing elements. .. gameplay is not a singular entity. It is a combination of many elements, a synergy that emerges from the inclusion of certain factors. .. The gameplay emerges from the interaction among these elements, ..
.. defined gameplay as consisting of the challenges and actions that a game offers: challenges for the player to overcome and actions that let her overcome them. .. [T]he essence of gameplay remains the relationship between the challenges and the actions available to surmount them.
gameplay (in a computer game) the plot and the way the game is played, as distinct from the graphics and sound effects
.. gameplay is the components that make up a rewarding, absorbing, challenging experience that compels player to return for more .. [Gameplay] does not come from a great visual character, not does it come from state-of-art technology and beautifully rendered art.
playability is the evaluative process directed toward games, whereas player experience is directed toward players. More precisely, playability methods evaluate games to improve design, whereas player experience methods evaluate players to improve gaming.(p.1)