Exhibition of power..

I haven't written in awhile. Sorry, I've been hella busy.

Anyways, I've not the time for excuses. Likely, you've not the attention span either.

I was just outside smoking a cigarette and I saw a junebug crashed into the wall next to me then fell to the ground. As the junebug lay on it's back, frantically scrambling to flip himself over, I folded my flipflop in half and let it spring open, catapulting the junebug off into the lawn. This made me laugh, and I said to myself "that was fun, and I helped him out, he can't get stuck in the grass."

I realized suddenly that I had defined something as fun. So naturally I had to dissect why I felt it was fun. The answer is, as the title states, exhibition of power.

It's something we see all the time, and rarely give credence to. Something as simple as showing our power or skill can strike us as extremely enjoyable. In all fairness, it's totally logical, but for some reason oddly foreign. Why? Why is it a problem for us to show power over something? I think it has a lot to do with the perception of power. We constantly think of power as a bad thing. When was the last time you heard anyone talk about a person being "in power" as a good thing? As a designer, this is something that needs to be broken. Understanding that power doesn't equal bad is important.

If people perceive an exhibition of power as an enjoyable thing, then where's the negative part? In order to have power, you have to have power over something else. Nobody gains power without something else losing power. This seems moot when you're launching a junebug off of your porch, but when you're attempting to develop a space for multiple people to exist simultaneously, a problem arises. So the question reveals itself as "how can everyone have power at the same time?"

This is an easy solution in a single player environment. A single player can be given near infinite power over emotionless code. Look at "build it yourself" games. Take minecraft for example, a huge part of that game revolves around the fact that you have the ultimate power to do whatever the hell you want. Look at any competitive game, the simple act of competing is a power struggle by nature. And who has fun when they are losing? So how can we harness the power into a multiplayer gamespace?

The definition of power. This is where we see character classes, or different play styles emerge. Team Fortress 2 has multiple different classes. Each one of those classes has complete and total mastery over their power. How good does it feel to backstab someone as a spy? Why? because you just expressed your total power and dominance. How much does it suck to BE backstabbed? why? because your power was just taken from you. Healers have the power to overcome the opponents damage, scouts have the power to escape and outmaneuver their opponents and heavies have the power to dominate anyone in their way.

I'm honestly pretty upset about this whole concept. Not because it's enlightening or new, but because it's so obvious and clear that I've never given it the amount of thought it really deserved. The next time you look at a game, or think about a game, or design a game, take a moment to think about your power. The power you have, the power you take, the power you give. If your anything like me, the thought alone will give you a new found clarity over the this one tiny slice of game design theory pie.