Dear Brave Legacy subscribers,
Keeping with the theme I have been exploring over the past few blog posts, today I want to tell you about 2 types of game I’ve come to respect and admire. First, however, some background.
One of my favorite lines ever from a sitcom came from Norm Peterson on the show Cheers. You probably remember it. You might recall that every time Norm walked in, everyone in the bar would yell “Norm!” Then Diane would say in a very proper voice, “Norman.” That prompted Sam to then say something like, “How’s it going, Norm?” In the particular episode I am recalling, Norm walked into the bar, and everyone followed the usual protocol ending with Sam asking, “How’s it going, Norm?” Norm’s response is priceless. He says, “It’s a dog-eat-dog world out there and I’m wearing milk bone underwear.” Great line. Great line.
Norm is right. It’s a very competitive world out there. We compete in sports. We compete in business. We compete in politics. We compete for resources, jobs, schools, and nearly everything else. In many ways, competition defines who we are as humans. Competition isn’t always bad, mind you, but it isn’t always good either. Competition is good when it pushes us to be better - better athletes, better businessmen and women, better politicians. But it’s not so good when it pits people against each other in ways that are destructive. It ceases to be healthy when we begin seeing others as merely competitors to be defeated and not friends to be discovered. And it’s certainly not healthy when, for example, political opposites are so partisan that the nation as a whole cannot move forward.
One of the things I’ve admired about the game conventions I’ve attended is the genuine attitude of support designers give to each other. It truly feels like designers are rooting for each other. It would be very easy for them to be secretive, insecure, suspicious, and highly competitive, but they are not. Game designers root for each other, help each other, and support each other. We can attest to this from personal experience. In our interactions with fellow gamers we have received helpful feedback, constructive ideas, and useful insights. These suggestions have come from people who genuinely want to help improve our game, and it has definitely improved our game.
That brings me to the types of game design I’ve come to admire and respect more than I once did. While I thoroughly enjoy competitive games (and probably always will), I’ve really grown to love the idea behind cooperative games and social games. Cooperative games, like Pandemic, Spirit Island, and Gloomhaven are designed to bring people together. Players “work” together rather than divide into sides to compete against each other. Social games, like Codenames and Apples to Apples, are less about winning and more about getting to know each other. There is something very satisfying about playing games that encourage people to work together. There’s something nice about getting to know people while playing a game designed with that purpose in mind. Competitive games can certainly do that as well, but competitive games are often designed for there to be a winner and a loser (or a few losers in some cases). By contrast, cooperative games and social games are designed to bring people together. What a great concept for a game. What a great concept for life, for relationships, for politics, and for community. Maybe if we designed a little less competition into our society and a little more cooperation, we would thrive more as a nation.
Clearly there are times when competition is healthy and pushes us to improve. That’s a good thing; a real good thing. But clearly, too, there are times we could all benefit as a society by working cooperatively WITH each other instead of working competitively AGAINST each other. I hope we human beings can exercise enough wisdom to have a healthy balance of both competition and cooperation.
Norm was right: it can be a dog-eat-dog world out there, but it doesn’t have to be. Clearly there are times when we can and should work cooperatively. If nothing else, even when we compete, surely, we can still help each other, support each other, and maybe even root for each other.
That’s it for this blog. Next month I plan to examine another concept in game design. This concept has routinely reminded me of an immensely helpful life lesson I’ve had to learn and relearn. Until then, keep playing games.
Tom