David Parlett wrote:
> In message <1167752276.443003.217110@s34g2000cwa.googlegroups. com>,
> Patrick <patrick1955carroll@yahoo.com> writes
>
> >But if S&L isn't a game, what is it? It's certainly not a strategy
> >game -- but it's still a contest where one player will win and the
> >other will lose. I think we have to admit that games of chance are
> >still indeed games.
>
> Yes; it would be going against universal custom to deny them that
> status. But, as with all categorisations, it's hard to establish
> semantic boundaries. For example, is Bingo/Lotto a game? Is doing the
> national lottery, or "playing the horses", a game?
True. Semantic boundaries do tend to be porous. It might help here if
we stick to discussing card games. So, instead of Snakes & Ladders, we
can substitute a pure-chance card game (the children's card game War
pops to mind, but I'm sure there are gambling games with cards which
involve no decision-making skill).
> >In either case -- game or puzzle -- the player's pleasure is reduced if
> >the struggle is either too hard or too easy. The player wants a
> >well-deserved triumph, a memorable experience.
>
> I think here are some people who, by temperament, actually prefer
> gambling games because winning makes them feel that fortune has singled
> them out for favour. This idea is explored more deeply by Roger Caillois
> in his book Man, Play and Games.
Ah -- good point. Though I've experienced that feeling myself, I've
always had a hard time understanding the gambling phenomenon. My
father was a sometimes gambler, and he taught me some gambling games
when I was pretty young -- but when I became old enough to grasp
strategy games, all of a sudden gambling games all seemed trivial to
me. I've visited casinos in hopes of discovering what all the
excitement is about -- but it continues to elude me. Evidently I'm of
the wrong temperament for that.
> >But in one-player games, it's different. Since there is no one else to
> >outplay, you have to beat the system, or the shuffle, in order to win.
> >You can't find a well-matched opponent, so you have to try to find a
> >patience game that suits your skill level or willingness to struggle
> >for victory.
>
> You can also play against your own self on other occasions, by trying to
> achieve a better target score or a quicker win than ever before.
Yes. Some software packages are set up to facilitate that. My wife
has long been fond of Pretty Good Solitaire, where she likes to work at
improving her statistics in various games. In fact, she has complained
about computer games where there's no running scoreboard; without a
scoreboard, she doesn't see any point in playing.
Me, I'm more likely to play one game at a time, as an isolated event.
If I win it, good; if not, I may try again. If I happen to play it
frequently, and there happens to be a scoreboard, I'll look at my
rating and hope to improve it. But in all honesty, I never try that
hard to improve.
Still, it bothers me when I can't be sure whether a game is winnable or
not. Last night I played two games of Pyramid. In the first, the
starting layout was so bad that it looked hopeless, and I lost
decisively. I strongly suspected that that particular game could not
have been won -- but I wasn't curious enough to stop and analyze it.
The second game was just the opposite: all the cards just fell neatly
into place, and I won easily. So, I wonder if that particular game
could possibly have been lost.
I think I'd prefer a game that I always *know* can be won or lost.
Then I can rest assured that I'm not engaged in something hopeless or
something trivial.
> >Yet, if you choose a game that's known to almost always be winnable --
> >like Penguin or Freecell -- aren't you really just doing a puzzle
> >rather than playing a game?
>
> I don't think so. I would only call it a puzzle rather than a game if
> you always started with the same distribution of cards.
OK, but what would you call a computer game that generates random
sudoku puzzles? Every time you start a new puzzle, you begin with a
new distribution of numbers. So, is it still a puzzle, or is it now a
game?
Since every sudoku puzzle *can* be solved (if the computer program is
designed properly), it sounds like a true puzzle. There's no chance of
losing unless you give up.
If it weren't for that one-in-a-million Freecell layout that's
impossible, it seems to me that any individual Freecell game is about
the same as sudoku in this respect.
***
On the other hand, most classic board games do start with a fixed
setup, yet they're games nevertheless. Or are they? I've read that
Nine Men's Morris has been solved -- meaning that somewhere there's a
computer that can play a perfect game every time (always winning or
drawing, according to the best result that's possible for that side).
Does that mean NMM is no longer a game, but just a puzzle?
It's clearly just a puzzle to the computer. But since the complexity
continues to baffle most human players, people can still enjoy it as a
game.
Maybe that's true of games like Penguin and Freecell too. It might be
possible to create a computer program that "solves" every Penguin
"puzzle"; but its complexity still defies my human ability. So to me,
it's a game: I sometimes make enough of the right moves that I win,
but other times I make so many wrong moves that I lose. As it is,
Penguin is one of my favorite games, partly because I win often enough
to keep me from getting discouraged, yet I lose often enough to keep me
interested. If someday my skill increases to the level of a
supercomputer, I may then dismiss Penguin as merely a replayable
puzzle. Meanwhile it does seem like a good game to me.
So, I suppose there's a subjective element to the definition of "game."
Theoretically, a player's skill level might increase to the point
where all games are reduced to the status of puzzles (if that is a
reduction in status). Unless the game has a randomizer, in which case
even a supremely capable player would have to play the odds.
That reminds me of something I heard long ago: all games have a chance
element; if there's no chance element, it's not a game. The speaker
(Alan Watts, IIRC) gave chess as an example, and he insisted that the
chance element in chess is your opponent's next move. You can never
predict your opponent's move with certainty; it comes as a surprise.
How does that apply to patience games? Clearly there's a chance
element in those with facedown cards. But in open games like Freecell,
it seems the chance element is all spent once the cards are dealt; from
then on, it's 100 percent deterministic. Just like a puzzle rather
than a game.
> >So, I guess I'm still struggling with the distinction between games and
> >puzzles. And to understand what makes for a good patience game.
>
> Well, while we're in the mood for definitions, what about also taking
> into account the idea of competitions? To my mind, a competition is a
> cross between a puzzle and a game. It shares with a game the feature of
> winning and losing, but differs from it in that there is no interaction
> between the players. Also, winning and losing is often decided by an
> external judge, whereas in a game that which constitutes a win is
> defined by the rules of the game itself.
I pretty well agree with all that -- but it sounds to me like another
good reason to focus on card games here.
I notice that for the first time you're bringing up "interaction
between the players." That's another thing that some claim is a
defining characteristic of games -- and yet it doesn't seem to apply to
patience games (unless we count Russian Bank and such).
Now that I'm thinking about it, I suppose sometimes there *is*
interaction between players in a competition. The American TV show
"Survivor," for example, is a competition that involves a good deal of
player interaction. Even in recent popular TV competitions like
"America's/Britain's Top Model," the contestants are made to interact,
and the judging is partly based on how they interact.
As to the winner being decided by a judge, rather than being defined in
the game rules, I think there are many *games* where that's also the
case. In the history of wargames, for example, there was once a rift
between those who favored expert adjudication and those who preferred
explicit victory conditions. In modern role-playing games, it's still
common to have an umpire or game master to make key decisions and grant
or withhold rewards/penalties at will.
In case you haven't read it, there's a short online book by Chris
Crawford that I recommend:
http://tinyurl.com/dmug
It's an old article now, and some of it is obsolete; and besides, it's
all about *computer* game design. But in the first couple chapters,
the author makes some very good points about game playing in general.
Just some more food for thought.
All the best,
Patrick