3. Exercise 2.3: Objectives
List five games, and in one sentence per game, describe the objectives in each game.
- Scrabble: Players must score more points than their opponent(s) by using letters to create the highest possible scoring words on the game board.
- Cell to Singularity: Starting from a single-cell organism, players evolve and progress as far as possible, unlocking new content and learning about the evolution of life and technology.
- Darts (501) – Two or more players compete to be the first player to score exactly 501 points (starting from 501 and ending at 0).
- Guess Who – Players must correctly guess the identity of their opponent’s mystery character before their own mystery character is correctly guessed.
- Cards Against Humanity – Several players collaborate to create inappropriate or absurd phrases from a given prompt.
Discussion
In most of the examples above, the games are successful because the objectives are challenging but achievable (Fullerton, 2019, p.68). The more compelling games often mix objectives – for example in Scrabble the objective is to score more points than the other players, but finding new high-scoring words, or reusing more letters that have already been played, could also be seen as objectives for the individual players. Objectives often involve other game elements – for example in Guess Who there is inherent conflict with the other player who is trying to guess your mystery character before you guess theirs. Thinking about objectives necessarily leads one to think of the other game elements, such as conflict and resources. It is in the interplay of the elements of a game that the unique qualities (and fun) of the game can emerge.
References
Fullerton, T., & Taylor & Francis eBooks EBA. (2019). Game design workshop: A playcentric approach to creating innovative games (Fourth ed.). Taylor & Francis, CRC Press.