Games can be characterized by "what the player does."[4] This is often referred to Group Game Activity as gameplay, a Group Game Activity term that arose among computer game designers in the 1980s but Group Game Activity as of Group Game Activity 2007 is starting to see use in Group Game Activity reference to games of other forms.[citation Group Game Activity needed] Major key elements identified in this context are tools and rules which define the overall context of game and which in turn produce skill, strategy, and chance.[clarify]
Games are often classified by Group Game Activity the components required to play them (e.g. Group Game Activity miniatures, a ball, cards, a board and pieces or a computer). In places where the Group Game Activity use of leather is Group Game Activity well established, the ball has been Group Game Activity a popular game piece throughout recorded history, resulting in a worldwide popularity of Group Game Activity ball games such as rugby, basketball, football, cricket, Group Game Activity tennis and volleyball. Other Group Game Activity tools are more idiosyncratic to a certain region. Many countries in Europe, for instance, have unique standard Group Game Activity decks of playing cards. Other games such as chess may be traced primarily through the development and evolution of its game pieces.
Many game Group Game Activity tools are Group Game Activity tokens, meant to represent other things. A token may be a pawn on a board, play money, Group Game Activity or an intangible item such as a point scored.
Games such as hide-and-seek or tag Group Game Activity do not utilise any obvious tool. Rather its interactivity is defined by the Group Game Activity environment. Games with the same or similar rules may have Group Game Activity different gameplay if the environment is altered. Group Game Activity For example, Group Game Activity hide-and-seek in a school building differs from the Group Game Activity same game in a park; an Group Game Activity auto Group Game Activity race Group Game Activity can Group Game Activity be radically different depending on Group Game Activity the track or street course, even with the same cars.
Where as games are often Group Game Activity characterized by their tools, they are often defined by Group Game Activity their rules. While Group Game Activity rules are subject to variations and changes, enough change in Group Game Activity the rules usually results in a "new" game. For instance, baseball can be played Group Game Activity with "real" baseballs or with wiffleballs. However, if the players decide to play with only three bases, they are arguably playing a different game.
Rules generally determine turn order, the rights and responsibilities of the players, and each player�s goals. Player rights may include when they may Group Game Activity spend resources or move tokens. Common win conditions are being first to amass Group Game Activity a certain quota of points or tokens (as in Settlers Group Game Activity of Group Game Activity Catan), Group Game Activity having the greatest number of tokens at the end Group Game Activity of the game (as in Group Game Activity Monopoly), or some relationship of one�s game tokens to those Group Game Activity of one�s opponent (as in chess's checkmate).
Skill, strategy, and chance
A game�s tools and rules will result in its requiring skill, strategy, chance or a combination thereof, and are classified accordingly.
Games of skill include games of physical skill, such as wrestling, tug of war, hopscotch, target shooting, and stake and games of mental skill such as checkers and chess. Games of strategy include checkers, chess, Group Game Activity go, arimaa, and tic-tac-toe, and often require special equipment to play them. Games of chance Group Game Activity include gambling games (blackjack, mah jong, roulette etc.), as well as snakes and Group Game Activity ladders and rock, paper, scissors; Group Game Activity most require equipment such as cards or dice. However, most games contain two or all three of Group Game Activity these elements. For example, American Group Game Activity football Group Game Activity and baseball involve Group Game Activity both Group Game Activity physical skill and strategy while tiddlywinks, poker and Monopoly combine strategy and chance.
Single-player games
Most games require multiple players. Group Game Activity However, Single-player games are unique Group Game Activity in respect to the type of challenges a player faces. Unlike a game with multiple players competing with or against each other to reach the game's goal, a one-player game is Group Game Activity a battle solely against an element Group Game Activity of Group Game Activity the environment (an Group Game Activity artificial opponent), against one's own skills, against time or against chance. Playing with a yo-yo or playing tennis against a wall is not generally recognised as Group Game Activity playing a game due to the lack of any formidable opposition. This is not true, though, for a single-player computer game where the computer provides opposition.
Sport
Main article: Sport
Association football is a popular sport worldwide.
Many sports require Group Game Activity special equipment Group Game Activity and dedicated playing fields, leading to the Group Game Activity involvement of a community much larger than the group Group Game Activity of players. A city or town may set aside such resources Group Game Activity for the organisation of sports leagues.
Popular sports may have spectators who are entertained just by watching games. A community will often align itself with a local sports team that supposedly represents it (even if the team or most of Group Game Activity its players only Group Game Activity recently moved in); they often align themselves against Group Game Activity their opponents or have traditional rivalries. The concept of fandom began with Group Game Activity sports fans.
Stanley Fish cited[citation needed] the balls and strikes of baseball as Group Game Activity a Group Game Activity clear example of social construction, the operation of rules on the game's tools. Group Game Activity While the strike zone Group Game Activity target is governed by the rules of Group Game Activity the game, Group Game Activity it epitomizes the category of things that exist only because people have agreed to treat them as real. No pitch is a ball or a strike Group Game Activity until it has Group Game Activity been Group Game Activity labeled as such by an appropriate authority, the Group Game Activity plate umpire, whose judgment on this matter Group Game Activity cannot be challenged within the current game.
Certain competitive sports, such as racing and gymnastics, are not games by definitions such as Crawford's (see above, despite Group Game Activity the inclusion of many in the Olympic Games) because competitors do not interact Group Game Activity with their Group Game Activity opponents, they simply challenge each other in indirective ways.
Lawn games
Main article: Lawn game
Lawn games are outdoor games that can be Group Game Activity played on a lawn. Many games that are traditionally played on a Group Game Activity pitch are Group Game Activity marketed as "lawn games" for home use in Group Game Activity a front or back yard. Common lawn games include Group Game Activity Horseshoes, Sholf, Group Game Activity Croquet, Bocce and Stake.
Board games
Parcheesi is an American Group Game Activity adaptation of a board Group Game Activity game originating in India.
Main article: Board game
Board games use as a central tool a board on which the players' status, resources, and progress are tracked Group Game Activity using physical tokens. Many also involve dice and/or cards. Most games that simulate war are board games, and the board may be a map on which the players' tokens move. Some games, such as chess and go, are entirely deterministic, relying only on the strategy element for their interest. Children's games, Group Game Activity on the Group Game Activity other hand, Group Game Activity tend to be very luck-based, with games such Group Game Activity as Candy Land having virtually Group Game Activity no decisions to be made. Trivia games Group Game Activity have a great deal of randomness based on the questions a person gets. German-style board games are notable for Group Game Activity often having rather less of a luck factor than many board games.
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Card games
Main article: Card game
Card games use as a central tool a deck of cards. Group Game Activity The cards may Group Game Activity be a standard Anglo-American Group Game Activity (52-card) deck Group Game Activity of playing cards Group Game Activity (such as Go Fish or Crazy Eights), a regional deck using Group Game Activity 32, 36 or 40 cards and different suit signs, a tarot deck, or a deck specific to the individual game (such as Set). Uno and Rook are Group Game Activity examples of games that were originally played with a standard deck and have since been commercialized with Group Game Activity customized decks. Some collectible Group Game Activity card games such as Magic: The Gathering are played with a small Group Game Activity selection of cards which have been collected or purchased individually from Group Game Activity large available sets.
Video games
Main article: Video game
Video games are Group Game Activity computer- Group Game Activity or microprocessor-controlled games. Computers can create virtual tools to be used in a game, such as cards or Group Game Activity dice, or far Group Game Activity more elaborate worlds where mundane or fantastic things can be manipulated through gameplay.
A computer or video game uses Group Game Activity one or more input devices, typically a button/joystick combination Group Game Activity (on arcade games); a keyboard, mouse and/or trackball (computer games); or a controller or a motion sensitive Group Game Activity tool. (console games). More esoteric devices such as paddle controllers have also been used for input. In computer games, the evolution of user interfaces from simple keyboard to mouse, joystick or joypad has profoundly changed the nature of game development.[citation needed]
In more open-ended computer simulations, aka sandbox-style games, the player may be free to do whatever they like within the confines of the virtual universe. Sometimes, there is a lack of goals or opposition, which has Group Game Activity stirred Group Game Activity some debate on whether these should be considered "games" Group Game Activity or "toys". (Crawford specifically mentions Will Wright�s SimCity as an example of a toy.[4])
Online games
Main article: Online game
From the very earliest days of networked and timeshared computers, online games have been part of the culture. Early Group Game Activity commercial systems Group Game Activity such as Plato were at Group Game Activity least as widely famous for their games as for their strictly educational value. In 1958, Tennis Group Game Activity for Two dominated Visitor's Day and Group Game Activity drew Group Game Activity attention to the oscilloscope at Group Game Activity the Brookhaven National Laboratory; during Group Game Activity the 1980s, Xerox Group Game Activity PARC was known mainly Group Game Activity for Maze Group Game Activity War, which was offered as a hands-on demo Group Game Activity to visitors.
Modern online games are played using an Internet connection; some have dedicated client Group Game Activity programs, while others require only a Group Game Activity Web browser. Some simpler browser games appeal to demographic groups (notably women and the middle-aged) that otherwise play very few video games.[citation needed] Some games can be played in browser. The computer game is the most established of all sectors of the emergent new media landscape. Group Game Activity The media is transformed from the traditional way of circulating in just one way to an interactive way. This is the phenomenon that is Group Game Activity broadening Group Game Activity around the world of videogame. It is an obvious example of the ways in which online and offline space can be seen as �merged� rather than separate.[5]
Media audiences� characteristic has been changing in consequence of the social changes and development. Group Game Activity They are becoming active and interact more than ever before. The players of the game in this phenomenon are just like the social formation in our society. They are both self-regulating, creating their own social norms and subject to Group Game Activity regulation Group Game Activity and constraint through the code of the game and sometimes through the policing Group Game Activity of the game by Group Game Activity those who run it. Group Game Activity The values that are policed vary from game to game. Many of the Group Game Activity values encoded into game cultures Group Game Activity reflect offline cultural values, but games also offer a chance Group Game Activity to emphasis Group Game Activity alternative or subjugated values in the name of fantasy and play. The players of the game at the new Group Game Activity century are now apparently expressing their profound self through the game. When they can play with their anonymous status, they are found to be more confident to express and to step out from the position they have never been out from. It offers new experiences and pleasures based Group Game Activity in the interactive and immersive possibilities of computer technologies.[citation needed]
Role-playing games
Main article: Role-playing game
Role-playing games, often abbreviated as RPGs, are a type of game in which the participants Group Game Activity (usually) assume Group Game Activity the roles of characters acting in a fictional setting. The original role playing games�or at least those explicitly marketed as such�are played with a handful of participants, usually face-to-face, and Group Game Activity keep track of the developing fiction with pen and paper. Together, the players may collaborate on a story involving those characters; create, develop, and "explore" the setting; or vicariously experience an adventure outside the bounds of everyday life. Pen-and-paper role-playing games include, for example, Dungeons & Dragons and GURPS. Modern independent RPGs, however, often blur the line between the more traditional idea Group Game Activity of the RPG and other traditional genres, or border Group Game Activity on story-telling.
The term role-playing game has also been appropriated by the video game industry to describe a genre of video games. These may be single-player games where one Group Game Activity player experiences a programmed environment Group Game Activity and story, or they may allow players to interact through the internet. The experience is usually quite different than traditional role-playing games. Group Game Activity Single-player games include Final Fantasy, Fable: The Lost Chapters, and The Elder Scrolls. Online multi-player games, often referred to as Massively Multiplayer Online role playing games, or MMORPGs, include RuneScape, EverQuest 2, Guild Wars, MapleStory and Anarchy Online. Currently, the most successful MMO has Group Game Activity been World of Warcraft, which controls the vast majority of Group Game Activity the market. |
