Gamification is not a game
Gamification usually borrows the visible parts of games—points, badges, streaks—and drops what makes them work: real choice, uncertainty and voluntary play.
Series 03
Beyond Entertainment
Serious games, educational games, simulations and gamification, and what happens when a game's purpose is not fun.
What is left of a game when its purpose is not fun?
Games are built to train pilots, teach chemistry, argue for policies and keep people exercising. This series covers that territory: the serious game, the educational game, the simulation and gamification. Each one keeps some of what makes a game work and sets other parts aside to serve a goal decided outside the game, whether that goal is learning, persuasion or practice.
These projects matter because they are everywhere, and because they test what games actually are. When fun stops being the point, designers have to decide which parts of a game carry the effect they want, and the results are often revealing, in both their successes and their failures. Every episode asks the same question: what is left of a game when its purpose is not fun?
Essays in this series, in order
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