1 post tagged “game design”

Kicking off the summer with a discussion on cheating doesn't seem to really make sense...since...well, school is out for the summer and who in their right mind would be cheating right now?

Lot's of people it would seem.

At least that is according to one of my colleagues, Greg Bemis, who offered up some thought today in a teaching demonstration about player-driven game design.  Greg's point in the lesson was that any time an individual behaves in a way and takes actions that were not intended by the game designer, it's cheating.  In essences, if it isn't in the rules, then it's cheating.

Other signs of cheating:

• Setting the game to an easier difficulty then you really need.
• Manipulating items in a game in some way they were not intended (example of Quake and people using rocket launchers to propel themselves up a cliff...rather than shooting someone with them.)
• Changing the "rules" in mid-stream when in a social game and working as a team.
• Shutting of your XBox just prior to it logging either success or failure in a competition-based area.

Greg's overall point is that human's are lazy.  We'll take the path of least resistance, and its even easier to do that in a virtual game environment where the social pressure that comes from a face to face game is not there -- where anonymity rules.

I had never thought of cheating in this way, and frankly am still not convinced.  In some of the examples above, I see inginuity and creative problem solving.  And yet...others are just mean-spirited.  So perhaps I don't disagree that much at all.  If you are going to play the game, go with the process and have fun.  However, if your fun is all about being better than everyone else at any cost, then it would seem that Greg's definition of cheating makes a lot of sense.

In the words of Mr. Spock, "Fascinating"!

Thanks Greg!