Why Don't People Play Games - Game Invaders: The Theory and Understanding of Computer Games - page 53

Chapter 6
Why Don ' t People
Play Games
The title of Part I of this topic—the fi rst six chapters—is “Why Do People Play
Games?” Perversely perhaps, we are going to fi nish Part I by answering the question
of “ Why don ' t they?” It does make sense, so read on. Another reason for reading on
is that this chapter also reviews the things we have been discussing so far and adds
in a few new ideas to broaden the picture a little.
Some people play games, and that amounts to a very large number of people
indeed. But most people don't play games. And those people who do play games
only play some types of games. So, asking the question “Why don't people play
games?” seems a good idea.
But the game industry doesn't seem to work this way. Games are largely made
by people who know games from the personal experience of having made some
already. In this sense the game industry is much like the fi lm industry. Rigor, let
alone science, at least in the sense of deciding which games to make and how to
design them, must play no part. Unperturbed by this we are going to review how
we have applied rigor and some science in attempting to answer exactly these ques-
tions. The fate of a whole industry depends on the answer to our questions. While
meant essentially as a joke, the last statement is not entirely facetious. Most people
don't play games. And as the ones who do grow older, will they continue to do so?
Will enough youngsters in the following generations be as enthusiastic as were their
predecessors? They will need to be if the industry is to survive in its current form.
So it is a question worth answering and there are people and research groups around
the world, both in the game industry and in academia, who are interested in answer-
ing such questions.
So where do we start?