283: Introducing The Escapist's Genre Wheel
- Thread starter Russ Pitts
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It is very pretty, though you mentioned that the whole point of the genre wheel is to improve straight foward communication. I think the wheel chart does the opposite, seeing as how it takes all that extra effort to identify the labels, shape, graph and position. Wouldn't it be far better to simply describe a game as "an RPG with first person shooter elements"? This chart actually makes genre definition more cumbersome to anyone not familiar with how it works.
I'm sorry to say this classification has failed to show any patterns to my likes/dislikes. The only genres I won't touch no matter what are Sports, Music (which are on rather distant sides of the spectrum there) and games that are mere skinner boxes, like MMORPGs/"social" games/etc.
The only thing I see in common between them is a general lack of complexity. At their core, Music games are a glorified version of "Simon Says", Sports have relatively simple rules and allow no room for innovation (it's not like you can reinvent football) and skinner boxes are... skinner boxes.
The only thing I see in common between them is a general lack of complexity. At their core, Music games are a glorified version of "Simon Says", Sports have relatively simple rules and allow no room for innovation (it's not like you can reinvent football) and skinner boxes are... skinner boxes.
Wow. Defining genres is not an easy thing to do, and I was expecting this wheel to be a huge failure by the time it hit the RPG point of the wheel. But this is actually a pretty good way of going about it.
Do you explore, is there conflict, is there strategy, and is there action? Though there isn't a section for all four to be together yet, it's pretty obvious that would be called ECSA. And the titles match the game play and not the gaming history.
It closely fits most attempts I have seen to define games. I have my five A's of gaming genres: Action, Annihilation, Arcade, Adventure, and Armada. On the 5 goals a game can have: move to a goal, annihilate things, get a high score, quest exploration, and winning a battle you're overseeing. But I can pretty much put these groups around the circle without any trouble.
Action=Exploration/Action.
Annihilation=Action.
Arcade=Conflict.
Armada=Strategy.
Adventure=Exploration/Strategy.
There's a few sub-genre's people might still argue over. Driving and Puzzle games tend to have Zero exploration, and should be way over on the conflict section along with Sport and Fighting games. Still, I think if players start defining games by the amount of exploration to the game, they would find a place on the wheel. And isn't that better than naming a game on whether it has Driving or a Puzzle in it?
Do you explore, is there conflict, is there strategy, and is there action? Though there isn't a section for all four to be together yet, it's pretty obvious that would be called ECSA. And the titles match the game play and not the gaming history.
It closely fits most attempts I have seen to define games. I have my five A's of gaming genres: Action, Annihilation, Arcade, Adventure, and Armada. On the 5 goals a game can have: move to a goal, annihilate things, get a high score, quest exploration, and winning a battle you're overseeing. But I can pretty much put these groups around the circle without any trouble.
Action=Exploration/Action.
Annihilation=Action.
Arcade=Conflict.
Armada=Strategy.
Adventure=Exploration/Strategy.
There's a few sub-genre's people might still argue over. Driving and Puzzle games tend to have Zero exploration, and should be way over on the conflict section along with Sport and Fighting games. Still, I think if players start defining games by the amount of exploration to the game, they would find a place on the wheel. And isn't that better than naming a game on whether it has Driving or a Puzzle in it?
A lot of the posts with complaints seem to be about people seeing a game of their favorite genre be on the "wrong" side of an axis. However, those don't seem to realize that the genre's on the outer edge seem to be used more as a reference as to where a typical game of such genre would end up.
Also, as soon as people start claiming certain genres should be at a certain point in between, I start thinking people are forgetting the concept is meant as a way of defining where a game comes out, as the current genres are all labels put on them by players and game-makers.
Not the best article (as your months of discussion can't properly be summed up in 3 pages). But a great idea!
Also, as soon as people start claiming certain genres should be at a certain point in between, I start thinking people are forgetting the concept is meant as a way of defining where a game comes out, as the current genres are all labels put on them by players and game-makers.
Not the best article (as your months of discussion can't properly be summed up in 3 pages). But a great idea!
Brilliant. You put a lot of thought into this and the result is very precise. This wheel will help me try new games, as I am now aware of what elements to look at when I buy a game. Do I want more Action? Feel like getting puzzled over Strategy games? It's a great tool to discover new games.
Several comments mention the difficulty of classifying this or that game according to the chart. To me, it is only normal. As the article mentioned, games are art. Art is by definition hard to classify because it strives to create something new and different. Designers will always come up with something new we'll have a hard time to define at first. That's the beauty of it. Personally, I love new stuff and surprises. ^_^
Several comments mention the difficulty of classifying this or that game according to the chart. To me, it is only normal. As the article mentioned, games are art. Art is by definition hard to classify because it strives to create something new and different. Designers will always come up with something new we'll have a hard time to define at first. That's the beauty of it. Personally, I love new stuff and surprises. ^_^
Anybody who knows how fighting games work, knows that fighters should be in the ASC category. Every reason from zoning, footies, yomi and whatever else that you use your brain for when playing.
A brawler (also known as the 'Beat-em-up') is where you or a human controlled ally attack waves of AI controlled foes and beat a boss to achieve a goal. Things like Final Fight, Devil May Cry, and God of War fall under this category.
Easy. A fighting game is a competitive genre where you one player faces off against another to defeat them usually by depleting their health with attacks (punches, kicks, throws, fireballs etc) or by having more health when the game timer runs out. Games like Street fighter 2, Tekken, Soul Calibur, Guilty Gear XX, Blazblue are fighting games.econael said:
A brawler (also known as the 'Beat-em-up') is where you or a human controlled ally attack waves of AI controlled foes and beat a boss to achieve a goal. Things like Final Fight, Devil May Cry, and God of War fall under this category.
"One is contemplative, the other reactionary."
I don't think 'reactionary' was the right word to use when trying to clarify the key distinction between Action and Strategy.
Reactionary is defined as follows:
?adjective
1.
of, pertaining to, marked by, or favoring reaction, esp. extreme conservatism or rightism in politics; opposing political or social change.
?noun
2.
a reactionary person.
Even though most people will understand what the writer intended to say due to the context it would have been better to write 'reactive'.
MegaRichards
I don't think 'reactionary' was the right word to use when trying to clarify the key distinction between Action and Strategy.
Reactionary is defined as follows:
?adjective
1.
of, pertaining to, marked by, or favoring reaction, esp. extreme conservatism or rightism in politics; opposing political or social change.
?noun
2.
a reactionary person.
Even though most people will understand what the writer intended to say due to the context it would have been better to write 'reactive'.
MegaRichards
Hmm I'm not so sure. It seems like a really nice idea but it seems like you have to make comprimises to make it work.
Like Music for example, does that really have any exploration in it? Don't a lot of RTS games have a strong element of exploration? And I'd say most racing games are more about conflict than exploration.
I really want to see a chart like this work, I just don't think you've nailed it just yet.
Like Music for example, does that really have any exploration in it? Don't a lot of RTS games have a strong element of exploration? And I'd say most racing games are more about conflict than exploration.
I really want to see a chart like this work, I just don't think you've nailed it just yet.
Hmm... This doesn't work great for me. I like things on the strategy end best, but I love music and driving games as well. Really I just can't play sports games, so I guess I like all games unless they're sports games. I think the main reason I don't like those is because nobody ever explains the god damn controls to me.
I've noticed it breaks down for extremely old games that seem to occupy the *center* of the chart.
Asteroids is *just* conflict. Monkey island is *just* exploration. Games this simple are rare today, but the point is that they can exist. Is suppose it's also possible to create a game featuring a strong emphasis on all four... though I can't think of one that can't be dismissed as an Action RPG with long-term tactical elements gussied up as strategic elements. Plants VS Zombies, perhaps, IF you count unlocking new seeds and game modes as "exploration."
A more interesting use of the chart is to think of it as a tool to design *better* games. We can readily imagine, for example, how to add more exploration elements into a game. (Make the game world bigger, add more obscure details to find, etc.)
A game developer could use the chart to not only classify the game they're developing, but to figure out which areas of gameplay have the most room for improvement. That's not to say a good game needs all 4 (or even more than two, if they're honed to perfection,) but it's one more way of polishing gameplay.
I really, really like that it only addresses gameplay. This could be the first step towards unlocking the science behind that elusive "fun factor."
Asteroids is *just* conflict. Monkey island is *just* exploration. Games this simple are rare today, but the point is that they can exist. Is suppose it's also possible to create a game featuring a strong emphasis on all four... though I can't think of one that can't be dismissed as an Action RPG with long-term tactical elements gussied up as strategic elements. Plants VS Zombies, perhaps, IF you count unlocking new seeds and game modes as "exploration."
A more interesting use of the chart is to think of it as a tool to design *better* games. We can readily imagine, for example, how to add more exploration elements into a game. (Make the game world bigger, add more obscure details to find, etc.)
A game developer could use the chart to not only classify the game they're developing, but to figure out which areas of gameplay have the most room for improvement. That's not to say a good game needs all 4 (or even more than two, if they're honed to perfection,) but it's one more way of polishing gameplay.
I really, really like that it only addresses gameplay. This could be the first step towards unlocking the science behind that elusive "fun factor."
Wonderful job on the chart. I think it not only helps define the general niche that a game fits into, but also may help explain why some games either amaze or frustrate the player due to having elements that fall outside the expected genre's niche.
For instance, the introduction of mini-games or action events inside RPG's was a cool new feature when it first came out because it added an element of action from the complete opposite side of the wheel into what was normally a purely strategic genre. However if it becomes a core element of the game, then it runs the risk of pissing off the player, because they wanted an RPG, not a skill/reaction based action game (what if I don't want to catch 50 frogs to advance the storyline?)
Couple of examples:
Final Fantasy as a franchise seems to be annoying more and more people because it's straying out of its niche. Newer games have had so damn much "exploration" forced onto the player that you can go ages without any "action". It has built in a lot of cool stuff, but in doing so has lost some of the appeal that some find in the genre.
My least favorite part of God of War was that goddamn climb up the tower of spikes to get out of Hell. Why? Because I liked it as an action adventure game, with the focus on combat and killing Minotaurs with my bare hands. The spike-tower climb was a pure platforming element like frogger, and it annoyed the shit out of me.
Successful deviations from niches include the "vehicle" quests in World of Warcraft, where you take a break from grinding for a quick segment and get to use your own skill and hand-eye coordination to target enemy hordes for destruction with a cannon, bombs from a balloon, or hurling yourself with a catapult, effectively adding action elements to an RPG.
A suggested "Third Axis" would be "social" - solo vs. community. There's been a lot of change in this in the last couple of decades. Final Fantasy I-X are solo RPG; WOW is community RPG. Gran Tourismo I-II were solo driving; Mario Kart was community driving.
You could also give a game different ratings - for instance Guitar Hero solo sucks, but Guitar Hero community can be pretty fun.
For instance, the introduction of mini-games or action events inside RPG's was a cool new feature when it first came out because it added an element of action from the complete opposite side of the wheel into what was normally a purely strategic genre. However if it becomes a core element of the game, then it runs the risk of pissing off the player, because they wanted an RPG, not a skill/reaction based action game (what if I don't want to catch 50 frogs to advance the storyline?)
Couple of examples:
Final Fantasy as a franchise seems to be annoying more and more people because it's straying out of its niche. Newer games have had so damn much "exploration" forced onto the player that you can go ages without any "action". It has built in a lot of cool stuff, but in doing so has lost some of the appeal that some find in the genre.
My least favorite part of God of War was that goddamn climb up the tower of spikes to get out of Hell. Why? Because I liked it as an action adventure game, with the focus on combat and killing Minotaurs with my bare hands. The spike-tower climb was a pure platforming element like frogger, and it annoyed the shit out of me.
Successful deviations from niches include the "vehicle" quests in World of Warcraft, where you take a break from grinding for a quick segment and get to use your own skill and hand-eye coordination to target enemy hordes for destruction with a cannon, bombs from a balloon, or hurling yourself with a catapult, effectively adding action elements to an RPG.
A suggested "Third Axis" would be "social" - solo vs. community. There's been a lot of change in this in the last couple of decades. Final Fantasy I-X are solo RPG; WOW is community RPG. Gran Tourismo I-II were solo driving; Mario Kart was community driving.
You could also give a game different ratings - for instance Guitar Hero solo sucks, but Guitar Hero community can be pretty fun.
A better metaphore for genre might be forsaking a polarity model and favoring the salad bowl. Genre elements can be combined in many ways, even some that most wouldn't think could be mixed for a tasty solution (those wonderful "cross-genre" innovations). Is the basic foundation vegetable, fruit, meat, grain, etc? Just like how you've decided to refine things down to action, strategy, exploration, and conflict. But unlike the food of comparison, these elements are much more agreeable to mixing, so none of them are exclusive to one another.
What comprises the dominant flavor would be what to attribute as a game's primary genre and the supporting genre elements are what help to bring it out through support or contrast. Certainly a number of common mixes are bound to seem like a genre in themselves so finding those key genre flavors would be the most important thing to creating a structure and the sub-genre (essentially the outermost wheel of your model) would be most helpful in determining a most-likely market group.
It may even make it easier to know who a game appeals to most by figuring out the primary genre (most dominant elements) and who it might also appeal to due to secondary genres rather than relying on the current scheme of popular genre names.
I'm sure there's coherent thought lost somewhere in my rambling.
Basically, game genres need to have a more open genre system than movies, literature, and television currently rely on. The best way to go about that is to view genre as more than a two-dimensional model of exclusive elements.
It's easy enough to find examples of games that will cross genre lines or combine elements that are considered opposites. But when each element is evaluated as separated from the others, there aren't exceptions anymore but there are dominant and secondary elements which would define a 'most-likely' classification.
What comprises the dominant flavor would be what to attribute as a game's primary genre and the supporting genre elements are what help to bring it out through support or contrast. Certainly a number of common mixes are bound to seem like a genre in themselves so finding those key genre flavors would be the most important thing to creating a structure and the sub-genre (essentially the outermost wheel of your model) would be most helpful in determining a most-likely market group.
It may even make it easier to know who a game appeals to most by figuring out the primary genre (most dominant elements) and who it might also appeal to due to secondary genres rather than relying on the current scheme of popular genre names.
I'm sure there's coherent thought lost somewhere in my rambling.
Basically, game genres need to have a more open genre system than movies, literature, and television currently rely on. The best way to go about that is to view genre as more than a two-dimensional model of exclusive elements.
It's easy enough to find examples of games that will cross genre lines or combine elements that are considered opposites. But when each element is evaluated as separated from the others, there aren't exceptions anymore but there are dominant and secondary elements which would define a 'most-likely' classification.
I really like the way it orients everything in an easy-to-follow way. I've even gone ahead and extended the background for use as my desktop wallpaper.
I have to wonder, though: where do party games fit in? Games like "Mario Party" and "Rayman: Raving Rabbids" don't quite seem to fit any of the genre labels you guys have up there currently.
Also, with regards to everyone's two-axis suggestion, I think that's being a little too nitpicky. It would help to see these genre labels as blending *slices*, rather than points. Individual games, then, can easily be plotted as a point within the wheel.
I have to wonder, though: where do party games fit in? Games like "Mario Party" and "Rayman: Raving Rabbids" don't quite seem to fit any of the genre labels you guys have up there currently.
Also, with regards to everyone's two-axis suggestion, I think that's being a little too nitpicky. It would help to see these genre labels as blending *slices*, rather than points. Individual games, then, can easily be plotted as a point within the wheel.
[/quote]The Total War games all contain two radically different play modes, and therefore two different genres. They include RTT sections and Grand Strategy sections, but they don't mix them. Basically, they have bits that are one genre and bits that are another genre. No genre-classification system can deal with that. It's TW's fault, not the wheel's. Rome would go in SC and ASC.
This is a very nice classification system, but I'm unsure of its practical usefulness. Aside from the minor niggles that I've just mentioned, I think my problem is that it's entirely gameplay-focused. Video games these days are more than just games, and I think a classification system should reflect that. I'm not saying it can't work, just that I'd want to see it really put into practice before I'm sure it would.[/quote]
maybe a clasification of "total war" could be used. as the total war series are the most famous of them i think it would be fitting to name the genre after them.
also, who agrees we need desktop sized genre wheels?
This is a very nice classification system, but I'm unsure of its practical usefulness. Aside from the minor niggles that I've just mentioned, I think my problem is that it's entirely gameplay-focused. Video games these days are more than just games, and I think a classification system should reflect that. I'm not saying it can't work, just that I'd want to see it really put into practice before I'm sure it would.[/quote]
maybe a clasification of "total war" could be used. as the total war series are the most famous of them i think it would be fitting to name the genre after them.
also, who agrees we need desktop sized genre wheels?
Ah, that makes sense. Guess there just wasn't room for four genres on the wedge. =)Farlander said:
Gotcha covered. [http://ennead.twentydragon.com/random/genre.png]radred said:
EDIT: Moved image; fixed link.
Very interesting. Two questions though:
Where exactly do pure quiz games lie on this wheel (such as the aged "You Don't Know Jack" series)?
What exactly is the difference between "Driving" and "Vehicle Simulation"?
Where exactly do pure quiz games lie on this wheel (such as the aged "You Don't Know Jack" series)?
What exactly is the difference between "Driving" and "Vehicle Simulation"?