My copy of Civilization IV shipped today. I’m pretty psyched about that. The Civilization franchise has always been one of my favorites. I am especially looking forward to trying out the multiplayer. Back in middle school I spent many an hour playing CivNet on the school computers during lunch.

I’ve been thinking some more about the the topic of player empowerment. I stated pretty broadly in a previous post that I thought empowering the player is what makes a game great. There are certain genres that may need a bit more explanation. While it’s easy to see how a player is empowered in a strategy game, it is more difficult to see how someone might be empowered in a puzzle game or a massively-multiplayer online roleplaying game (MMORPG).

In certain genres the empowerment of the player is outside the game world. That is to say, the player himself is empowered by doing well. In a game like Tetris, the player is empowered by the rewards they receive (score, access to new levels) rather than being empowered within the game world. Puzzle games also empower the player by rewarding the correct decisions they make. This type of empowerment is fundamentally different and requires less suspension of disbelief, which is why it is more often used in casual games. It is easier for many people to understand who are unable or choose not to fully immerse themselves in the world of a game. For this reason it is also often identified with older games, which were forced to be more abstract by technological limitations.

Attempting to analyze the empowerment of players in MMORPGS yields an interesting conclusion. In an MMORPG, most of the decisions the player makes affect the character, rather than the world of the game. Therefore, it may be useful to think of the character as the world of the game (or at least the play space of the player). An MMORPG then is a game where the goal is creating an alternative identity and the player empowerment comes in the form of decisions that guide the shape of the character. In a sense, each player is playing their own separate game, though they are able to interact with the other players while doing so.

Player empowerment is fundamental to great games. Though it may not be immediately obvious, this is true of all genres of games.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 25th, 2005 at 9:00 pm and is filed under game design, games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.