The document discusses what games are not in order to understand what games are. It states that games are not puzzles, as puzzles are static while games are interactive and change with player actions. Games are also not toys, as toys only provide interesting behaviors to explore while games include goals, objectives and victory conditions. Additionally, games are not stories as stories are linear while games are non-linear and depend on player decision-making. Finally, the document notes that while other art forms are passive, games demand active participation from players. It concludes by stating that the discussion on what games are not will continue next week to help define what games actually are.

1. LOOKING FOR THE
GRAMMAR OF
GAME DESIGN 1
PART
/GREG COSTIKYAN
/WHAT GAMES ARE NOT
/WHAT GAMES ARE
/WHAT IS A GAME
/THINGS THAT STRENGTHEN GAMES
Alvaro Gonzalez
Game Designer
--THE GAME A POWERFUL TOOL

2. FIRST
“If we are to produce works worthy to be termed “art”, we must start to
think about what it takes to do so, to set ourselves goals beyond the
merely commercial. For we are embarked on a voyage of revolutionary
import: the democrative transformation of the arts. Properly addressed,
the voyage will lend grandeur to our civilization; improperly, it will create
merely another mediocrity of the TV age, another form wholly devoid of
intellectual merit.”
Greg Costikyan
Game Designer and Science Fiction Writer

3. As game designers,
how to analyze games? how to
understand… …them? …what
works? …what makes them
interesting? To answer those
questions we need identify
which is GAME’s… LANGUAGE

4. What a Game is Not!
It’s Not a Puzzle
• Puzzles are STATIC, they present the “player” a logic structure to be solved.
• Games, by contrast, are NOT STATIC, they change with the player’s actions.
According to Game Designer Chris Crawford some “games” a really just puzzles.
For example: point and click graphic adventure games.
This kind of games sole objective is the solution of puzzles: finding objects and using them In a
particular way to cause desire changes in the game-state. There is no opposition, there is no
rol-playing and there are no resources to manage: victory is solely a consequence of puzzle
solving. If Crossword is 100% puzzle, point and click graphic adventure games are 90% puzzle
and 10% game.
A puzzle is static. A game is interactive.

5. It’s not a Toy.
According to Will Right, his Sim City is NOT a game at all, but a Toy.
• Toys are element that offers Interesting behaviors which you may explorer.
Sim City provides no objective, no victory conditions, no goals; it’s a software toy.
Toys could be part of a game without losing their qualities (a ball can be
thrown, bounced, twirled, and became part of basketball game with their victory
conditions, goals and objectives.
A Toy is interactive. But a Game has goals.

6. It’s not a Story.
• Stories are inherently linear.
• The outcome of a story can’t be changed.
• Characters, events and situations are fixed.
• Games are inherently non-linear.
• Depends on decision-making.
• Decisions have to pose real, plausible alternatives, or they aren’t real decisions.
• If you make a game more like a story –more linear, fewer real options- you make
it LESS like a game.
Gaming is NOT about telling stories. They borrow elements of fiction to define
meaningful decisions for the player to make.
Stories are Linear. Games are NOT.

7. It Demands Participations
Game provide a set of rules; but players use them to create their own consequences.
“The designers provide the theme, the player the Music.”
• Traditional art forms play to a passive audience.
• Game require active participations.

8. So What is a Game?
Continue next week on part 2…
/GREG COSTIKYAN
/WHAT GAMES ARE NOT
/WHAT GAMES ARE
/WHAT IS A GAME
/THINGS THAT STRENGTHEN GAMES
Alvaro Gonzalez
Game Designer
--THE GAME A POWERFUL TOOL

9. thanks
alvarogonzalez.mail@gmail.com
Alvaro Gonzalez
alvarogonzalez.skype
Game Designer – Game Producer
@WASDCtrlSPACE
“I've worked with Alvaro on several game projects over several years
and have always been very impressed with his creative thinking and
W www.alvarogonzalez.us inventive designs. Alvaro always brings a unique and fresh design
aesthetic that is more innovative and far more imaginative than other
www.linkedin.com/in/alvarogon designers.”
Aaron Norstad
Senior Producer at Playdom
Meet Latin American Game Developers
www.mlagd.com
meetlatinamericangamedev@gmail.com
@LatAmeGameDev
Bibliography:
Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals, Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman
Cambridge MIT Press, 2004
I Have No Words, Greg Costikyan
Article, 1990