Collaborative Games

From Mmswiki

"Opposition. Oh, say the politically correct. Those bad, icky games. They're so competitive. Why can't we have cooperative games?"

- Greg Costikyan, "I have no words & I must design"[1]

Competition, opposition, comparision, struggle is a valuable motivational aspect of games. But you don't always have to pit one opponent against the other in a simple, static player vs. player situation like in chess or most other two-player strategy games.

• Have the players form dynamic alliances against the leading player. This can be seen in complex, negotiation based games like german board games (i.e. Settlers of Catan), where trading alliances form in mid-play and allainces against the winning player form in the end-game.
• Have one chosen player fulfill the roll of an opponent, playing the forces of nature, the evil overlord or just market forces. Playing a baddie, and especially with the chance to win, might be motivating and education. Next time another player takes this role. This is also an approach followed by the ARG concept, where the unfolding opposing events are described to the players by dedicated gamemasters.
• With a computer playing the opposing force or a randomized stack of event cards, you may have a somewhat clumsy opponent for your players. This is a little bit difficult, since the non-human opponent has to be balanced and diverse in its possibilities. The computer may play a personalised antagonist to be overcome, or just represent entropy, like the incoming flood destroying a sand-castle, defended by the 'players'.
• Most competitive game mechanics are based on a limited shared resource (money, raw materials, board game area, options for moves etc.). The prevalence for these resources may be an ingrained sociocultural bias to western culture. Games which may be build upon immaterial resources which increase when shared, may further collaborative play. A classic / new media example (e.g.Hacker ethics, Open Source Movement) may be information, but also affective resources like love and trust, fear and hate. These multiply by sharing.

--Weytan 11:07, 6 December 2008 (UTC)