Introduction to Gamification Part 3: Games, Play and Toys

Intro to Gamification Part 3 Introduction to Gamification Part 3 Games Play and Toys

In the last part of my introduction to gamification, I explained a little about my thoughts on Games Based Solutions, but I didn’t really explain what a game actually is. The reason for that is, it is a little complicated from an academic perspective. Now, that doesn’t really affect you in a business setting or as you undertake your job as a gamification designer, but it is always useful to have a deeper understanding of things you are speaking about.

Play

Let’s start with play as this is the foundation of games. There are many thoughts on play, I have a whole ebook and sections of Even Ninja Monkeys Like to Play dedicated to it. However, in this introduction series, I want to try and keep things simple! Read More ...

Playing with Thought Experiments and Meta-Rules

Play thinking 2 Playing with Thought Experiments and Meta Rules

No great insights into gamification in this post, more me revisiting play, toys and games – again. When I need to clear my mind of clutter, I tend to consider the nature of play. That is probably why I write about it so much! I doodle about it on the plane, at night, when I have time to kill. I always come back to play. Dutch, a friend of mine in the gamification world likened it to Einstein’s “thought experiments”. Of course, I am not comparing myself to Einstein. The only things we have / had in common is dyslexia and a love (at one time) of physics. Read More ...

Learning about playfulness from Toca Boca

Photo 06 03 2015 10 27 52 Learning about playfulness from Toca Boca

Continuing my investigations into play, I wanted to talk about a few things my kids have been teaching me about just letting go and giving in to the fantasy and the lack of imaginative boundaries that real play demands. It is not as easy as it would first seem either.

There are lots of views of play out there. I offered some of my thoughts in a recent post, that play is a free form activity that is undertaken almost just because it can be and it brings fun and joy. In this sort of description, play is an activity – it follows a similar line of thought to  that proposed by Johan Huizinga in Homo Ludens. It was also Huizinga who gave us the concept of the Magic Circle – the boundary between reality and play. Read More ...

Play, games, toys, playfulness and gamification

Game vs play Play games toys playfulness and gamification

Lately I have been thinking about play a lot. This is probably because of watching my children growing up and seeing how play changes into games as they develop. I have written about play before and it does form part of my general Game Thinking framework, but it is lumped with toys and games – rather lazily.

I wanted to give play and my surrounding thoughts on it its own post.

Play

Play is free form and unlike a game does not need to have a point or a goal to it. It exists within a set of rules created by the person or people playing and is born in the imagination.  Often it is a way of exploring the boundaries and extremes of something, in search for new and novel experiences.  It is undertaken for its own sake often for fun and joy. Read More ...