OBJECT-ORIENTED DESIGN: ELEMENTS AND MODELLING

Object-Oriented Design: Elements and Modelling

Object-Oriented Design: Elements and Modelling

Introduction

Let's start with a definition: game mechanics are methods invoked by agents, designed for interaction with the game state. "Methods invoked by agents" defines this approach to game mechanics, as it formalizes the use of terminology taken from the object oriented programming paradigm (Weisfeld, 2000). In this appropriation of the terminology, object orientation provides a set of metaphors that describe the elements of systems and their interrelations. I do not want to imply that the analysis of the source code of a game will reveal that all game mechanics have been implemented as methods of classes or that object-oriented programming should be considered a default methodology for the actual production of computer games. Object Orientation provides a clear, formal framework for the description of games and as such is a useful analytical tool. It is useful because it provides a formalistic approach to actions taken within information systems like games, which may lead to the application of modeling languages like UML to the description of game systems (Rollings & Ernst, 2007: 85). The Object Oriented framework is also appropriate because it facilitates an analysis that does not require human players to understand in-game agency.

For game analysis, this suggests the possibility of closely studying the relations between input device design, and player actions. It would allow, for instance, the study of how in some fighting games, one mechanic is not triggered by one button, but by a combination of input processes. Thus, it could be argued from a formal perspective that mastery in fighting games comes from the mapping (Norman, 2002, pp. 17, 75-77), of one mechanic with a set of input procedures, which leads to both psychological and physiological mappings - how the "body" of a player learns to forget about the remembering the illogical sequence of inputs, and maps one mechanic to one set of coordinated, not necessarily conscious moves.

In this object oriented framework, rules could be considered general or particular properties of the game system and its agents. All objects in games have properties. These properties are often either rules or determined by rules. These rules are evaluated by a game loop, an algorithm that relates the current state of the game and the properties of the objects with a number of conditions that consequently can modify the game state. For example, the winning condition, the losing condition and the effects of action in the player's avatar health are calculated when running the game loop (Iser, 1980: 59). This algorithm relates rules with mechanics, exemplifying the applicability of an ontological distinction between rules and mechanics.

For designers and theorists, game mechanics are discrete units that can be created, analyzed and put in relation to others. But for any agent in a game, the mechanics is everything that affords agency in the game world. Mechanics is thus tied to agency in the game system.

With this definition of game mechanics, I have intended to contribute to game studies by:

Formalizing an ...