It’s time to add a new definition to the Semionaut’s lexicon!
Many in the game industry like to describe particularly simple interactive media as Toys. This is great because, you know, anything that might contradict some common knowledge about what a game is can be breezily dismissed with a wave of the hand, a slight chuckle and a statement of, “Yes, but that’s just a toy.”
I find this to be condescending and not terribly helpful™. First of all, the implication that toys are somehow inferior, or less socially worthy of discussion, than games is simply wrong. And secondly, I contend that any interactive media is a game by definition, as the media itself acts as a bounded space with a set of rules/mechanics that are established by a community (the developer who wrote the rules and the player who plays by them).
But toys are important to consider and I think we can define them in a manner consistent with the other definitions we use in the Semionaut’s Notebook. Let’s start by taking a brief look at three real-world toy groups that we’ve all probably played with at one point or another.
Building Toys: Wood blocks, Lincoln Logs, Erector Sets, LEGO, K’nex–the list goes on and on. These toys clearly suggest a function and have surfaces that behave in predictable, and consistent, ways when interrelated. Some building toys, due to their locking properties, fragility, and/or expense, lend themselves primarily to constructive pastimes, while some like blocks and Lincoln logs, seem to demand a joyous approach to destructive pastimes as well.
Baby Dolls & Plush Animals: These toys often evoke a more solitary form of play. Either through soft, furry, fabric, or mimicry of actual infants, they encourage hugging and protective behaviors. These types of toys often lend themselves to strong emotional bonds and offer opportunities to play-act at relationships.
Throwing Toys: A terribly diverse range of toys, from Nerf balls to frisbees. Throwing toys encourage group play, or environmental play, or both. Many balls have been designed for a particular purpose. American footballs, with their oblong shape, are designed to be thrown for distance, as is the golf ball with it’s dense core and aerodynamically dimpled surface. Throwing toys, clearly, are ideally suited for use in games.
As you can see, each of these groups suggests a particular type of play, but don’t demand it. There are no inherent rules stating you can’t interact with a toy in a given manner. You can certainly play catch with a building block, but they aren’t aerodynamic and hurt when you don’t catch them. You can build a wall out of stuffed animals, but it tends to topple rather quickly (and without a satisfying clatter). You can name your basketball, but it pretty quickly gets too dirty to cuddle with (if you’ve also been playing basketball with it, that is).
And, of course, toys can be used in games whose bounded spaces often reflect the implied play function of the toy.
So with all this in mind, the definition I’m proposing for toy is:
Toy: An object created for the purpose of play that may suggest, but does not create, a bounded space.
What about action figures? It seems like they’d be considered dolls, but playing with them was rarely a solitary activity for me. Would playing with action figures with another person be considered a game?
If we were to try and fully create a toy map, I’d probably create a parent Dolls category which would contain subgroups of Baby Dolls, Fashion Dolls, Action Figures, and Plush.
And yeah, I’d say that any time you start playing in cooperation with someone, you’re in a game space.
By this defintion, I’d say that all games are toys, *until played*, because I don’t think the the bounded space is created until play begins. I would change it to read: “does not come with a prescriptive set of rules for play, while it may suggest some.”
That’s not a bad point (and I feel the definition of play we use agrees with it), but there’s a crucial difference in design.
While neither a toy or a game technically has a bounded space when not being played, the game’s structure defines a defined bounded space to be created during play, while the toy’s does not.
What’s a complex example of how a game creates a bounded space and thus is different from a toy? I mean, I can see it on/with a board game, but with more complex games I’m not sure that the definition/distinction holds well.
Bounded spaces are not necessarily physical spaces, but bounds created by rule sets. Another key to the definition of game we use is that the boundaries are agreed upon by a community.
So all video games and sports are games because they have rules that are established and agreed upon by a community (even if that community is a solo player and a game designer that have never met).
I always get a little confused when SimCity is called a toy and not a game.
“While neither a toy or a game technically has a bounded space when not being played, the game’s structure defines a defined bounded space to be created during play, while the toy’s does not.”
The toy’s form uses the laws of physics, combined with cultural and instinctual influences, to define a bounded space. You might say every toy has a finite number of potential games within it, which multiply exponentially as you add more people and objects.
Sim City is a special case, since Will Wright himself calls it a toy. This suggests that it was created with a certain definition of ‘toy’ (and therefore a specific vision) in mind to which it could conform.
And C.S. Lewis wanted the Narnia series published in order of the storyworld’s chronology, even though they flow so nicely in the order he conceived of and wrote them.
Just because an author declares his work best experienced, or labeled, in a particular way–doesn’t mean he’s right.
You have my permission to remind me I said that if I ever complain about how people interpret my games. ;-})
Not all toys use physics!
And I’d argue that toys–while they are suited to a particular type of play–have infinite potential games within them, precisely because the addition of new objects and people multiple the potential exponentially. Hence–no defined bounded spaces.
Games tend to limit the number of actants allowed as part of defining the bounded space.
How about Chris Crawford’s dichotomy-based defintions? I think his idea that a toy is a plaything without an explicit goal, where a game (and many other non-game elements) will have a desired goal or end-state, is quite elegant.
I disagree with Crawford that games require goals and end-states are required. See the Rules of Engagement for the semionautical definition.
In my experience, Muds & MMORPGS are big exceptions that I agree are clearly games, but lack any well defined end-state. (More even than tabletop rpgs like D&D just because the world can be always there regardless of any DM’s assistance at any point in time, and if the players are always playing the game, the game continues onwards, end-point-less).
What happens when players take a game and change the rules? For example, DOOM speedruns ( http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/Speedrun ). Some players compete to finish a level as fast as possible while killing every monster, or while killing no monsters, or while using only the least powerful weapons. I could say that DOOM is an object that suggests a bounded space, but the players have created their own spaces using it. Dwarf Fortress ( http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/Challenges ) is an even better example, because it truly doesn’t have an explicit goal (whereas DOOM does—survive and get to the exit). So, are DOOM and Dwarf Fortress actually toys, games repurposed as toys or some combination?
They’re still games, because they are still bounded spaces. The ability to create your own play within them means that they have freedom from constraint built into their design. That’s actually a good topic for the other ongoing conversation we’re having about Developer, Shared, and Player Moments
Would Garry’s Mod be considered a toy then? I’m just trying to think of digital toys and it seems to fit your criteria for a Building Toy.
Forgive me while I quote myself from this thread:
Garry’s Mod is a game–with a strong emphasis on Player Moments–that gives the player a great many toys to play with. The toys exist as actants within the game.
Ack I must have glossed over that.
I’m still not convinced though. Garry did not create the Source Engine. He designed a playground (the default environment) and toys that work within the immutable rules created by Valve. How is this different from a toy/playground designer working within the “engine” of the universe?
Mods make this conversation a bit tricky and it’s important we don’t conflate “built with the Source Engine” with “just like Half Life 2 only different.”
The Source Engine–with its assembly of incontrovertible, controvertible, and subvertable mechanics–provides actants and establishes a bounded space.
Some of the actants provided within that bounded space suggest, but do not–when considered separately from all other actants–define a bounded space. Those actants can be considered toys. Of course, it’s not really possible to implement any of those actants without respect to bounded space, so this point is nearly moot.
The environment built with the Source Engine–whether that be Half Life 2, the Dear Esther mod, or Garry’s Mod–imposes certain constraints and allows certain freedoms.
The player, when interacting with these environments, forms a community with the developer and implicitly agrees to the rules of the bounded space.
Voila–game.
Toy = Game without a goal/victory condition.
Given that I utterly reject the idea that a game must have a goal or victory condition in order to be a game, that hardly works as a distinction.
You are wrong.
Rules of Engagement. ;-})
I suppose I’d argue for these definitions:
Toy: Something one explores through interaction.
Game: An experience involving challenges that one learns to better overcome.
I’d say that the activity referred to as “play” can involve one or both of these concepts simultaneously, and that the former generally gives way to the latter. By these definitions, the most notable ‘toys’ in video games would be interactive virtual simulations- the “sim” series (as mentioned above), but also “Avatars” whose movements we control (mario or a race car) and the “worlds” of sandbox games and western RPGs.
Also, by your existing set of definitions, a “bounded space” is a set of rules and conditions established by a group of people who have interests or experiences in common. I’m not clear on how an object *could* create such a thing.
Actually, while we’re on that topic: Say I invent solitaire, and play it in my spare time without telling anyone else about it. By your definitions there is no community, and thus no bounded space, and thus no game. Correct?
And yet, all video games do so. Which is why they don’t qualify as toys. You’re not wrong about avatars within video games being toys, by the way. I’m about to post a follow up that addresses that.
Not quite, no. If you create a bounded space and your future-self agrees to it, you’ve created an artificial community of selves. That’s a pretty similar question to one I usually field about the use of ‘shared’ in the definition of story in regards to authors who never show their work to anyone.
You may recall in “21st Century Game Design” I put toys and games on similar ground, calling both “tools for entertainment”, and distinguishing games as having “some degree of performance”.
And I feel toys imply “some degree of performance” in their design. In particular fashion dolls and action figures, which have strong cultural signals that strongly suggest specific behavioral and/or narrative play.
But when does a toy cease to be considered as such and becomes a tool?
When its design is no longer for play? Perhaps I should alter the definition to read:
It doesn’t matter if object is “created for purpose of play”.
For example, a car can be a toy or not. It’s not a toy when it’s not fun driving it (for example taxi driver could think a car simply as a way to earn some bucks). But when the car owner polishes the car daily, keeps it shiny “just for fun”… it becomes a toy.
Right?
That’s why I just added “or used” to the definition in the comment right above this one.
Hmm, but car is not created for this purpose – yet it can become a toy.
A branch of tree can be a toy, even thought its not necessarily even created by anyone… Same goes for rocks and stuff.
Bounded space.
Also, there can be rules. For example, we had this toy/play where there were certain rules on how the toy behaves. There wasn’t any goal and nobody could win, but there sort of was rules.
Not sure if I fully grasp the idea of bounded space in this.
Right, Juuso. That’s why I’ve amended the original definition. It now reads:
As I mentioned elsewhere in this, Bounded Space is not necessarily a physical space. Rules create bounds to behavior and therefor define a bounded space space. My contention is that this is what defines a game, not goal states.
So if what you’re calling a toy has rules that govern its use beyond the basic laws of physics, I would consider it a game.
Hmm, could be helpful to see a comparison of toy vs game… from your thinking.
Not that it would necessarily lead us anywhere but still…
A [hopefully] less conceptual, more demonstrative, post is on the docket for tomorrow morning.