Games are a Reflection of Behavior as Told by John Satta
According to John Satta, games are a reflection of society as a whole. This holds true for not only video games but board games as well. In this article, you'll get insight into how the patterns that we see in trading card games, table top games and video games all come from the same root behavior that we exhibit in society. You'll also see how video game violence is actually representative of our own violent pasts and how it's a coping mechanism for both the player and developer alike.
I'll give a quick recap of the article. Satta first examines the history of trading cards and video games, specifically Magic: The Gathering, Hearthstone and Pokemon. He then analyzes how they came to be as we know them today to illustrate how certain game mechanics are both based on real life behavior and also reflect our own behaviors as humans. After that he moves into board games (both tabletop and digital) and talks about both good and bad behavior in games.
For our purposes, let's talk about video game violence. It's important because video game magazines have been covering this topic recently with articles like Dave Grossman's address to the Academy of Interactive Arts' 2015 Excellence in Narrative award ceremony . A few other articles were written with different perspectives, but the one that caught my eye was Grossman's. And I'm not just looking at this because of how he bases his argument on military experience and war in general, but also because his speech is written extremely well and is a great example of video game writing.
But what's more important is the content behind that writing, especially when it comes to violence in video games. Like I said above, John Satta discusses this in-depth as it relates to Magic: The Gathering, Hearthstone and Pokemon. But what I'm going to do is summarize his points.
The first is a behavioral/social study done by Dr. David Brooks of the University of Toronto on what makes a successful card game like Hearthstone and how it differs from how trading cards came into being in the first place. Here's an excerpt:
"Brooks, director of the Alan Turing Institute at the University of London and associate professor in the department of computing at U of T, says that before Hearthstone arrived, there was very little interest in trading cards for their own sake; most players had no knowledge that they were even collectible or special. As such, it's difficult to see exactly what drew millions to the game when it came out four years ago. Brooks calls the game "a synergy of several innovations coming together at once."
"First was the decision by game designer Blizzard to give players free cards every day. This made it possible for players to build decks without spending money, which helped to increase the player base. "One of the big draws for having a collection is that you can take it from zero and make something with it," says Brooks. "That's why people collect baseball cards, stamps or Beanie Babies, even though those things aren't easily tradable like Magic cards are. But you can build a whole collection of virtual things in Hearthstone without investing anything. That's a big difference."
"Another key factor in the game's success is that card packs can only be purchased with real money, but earned cards can always be traded or sold to other players. Here is where Brooks sees the game adopting the most human of behaviours. Just like in the real world, "people don't want to play with their money," he says. "People will invest real time and energy into building something and then make it tradable for virtual money."
In short, Dr. Brooks' study reveals that the reason Hearthstone is successful, besides the fact that it's a well-designed game, is because it has built-in social behaviors that mimic real life. It's a reflection of what we do as humans because we inherently want to build things and then trade them with one another just like how you would do in a game like Force of Will or Magic: The Gathering.
Another interesting point Satta makes is comparing trading cards to table top games as it relates to war and peace. Here's an excerpt from Satta:
"The first time I heard about playing cards was in school during social studies when I learned about the earliest forms of trading cards, called "War Cards". Wars are, of course, a reflection of the overall state of the world at any given time. Wars change over time in relation to the ongoing changes in culture and technology. The differences between these types of cards is what they represent: they both reflect our history and to a lesser extent, our behavior as humans."
"Trading card games are design-based; it's not as much about the context in which trade occurs as it is about the game itself. This is the same as with war cards: The war represents a larger aspect of history. In this case, the game designers take things from real life and use them to create fiction for other players to interact with. Both of these games are designed to represent something in the real world, so there is a metaphor involved. Even though it's fictional, it still exists and has a similar representation as military history."
"But why do these games portray violence? It's not because they're violent people or because they should be condemned for what they are doing. It's because the designers need some representation of conflict in order to get a sense of how players will respond to certain situations."
"More specifically, it's about perspective. They look at the choices and actions of their characters and then model the resulting outcomes based on the context in which it occurred. This is why it's important to understand what a designer is trying to communicate by building these cards. The game designers have an idea of how players will act, so they build games that portray that."
"When I was playing Magic: The Gathering, it always stunned me when players would violate other people's rights for their own benefit. It was always during combat: destroying things that belonged to other people or stealing resources from them. I always felt bad doing this because I knew this was not right. But being a game designer and illustrator, I wanted to start a dialogue about it in the hopes of getting more people involved to help society."
"I always wondered what the designers intended with this. Was the game meant to portray reality? Was it supposed to be something that educators could use as a teaching tool? Or was it just something they did out of habit?"
"After doing some research, I found out that some trading card games have changed their style of gameplay by making non-violent alternatives available. Magic: The Gathering has provided benefits for players who choose not to destroy or damage other people's characters during attacks.
Conclusion
Hearthstone is a game that appeals to the masses because it has been designed in such a way that it mimics the way trading cards work in the real world. It's not only a game, but also a method to teach people about ethics, culture, and history while simultaneously sharing fun activities with friends. By using real life items as part of the game, we are able to get closer to getting new people involved with our hobby and encouraging them to carry on playing after they've had their fill of learning.
It's not all negative though, as Hearthstone is engaging many audiences beyond the Magic: The Gathering crowd.