"Every game has rules, conflict, goals, decision-making, and an uncertain outcome. Games are activities, they are artificial/safe/ outside ordinary life."
Formal elements of games are commonly known as the 'atoms', as they are the smallest parts of games that can be isolated and studied individually.
Examples of these are;
- Players - What is the relationship between players? Is there teams, or individuals? Can teams be uneven? Player structures include; 1V1 (solitaire), PvE (world of warcraft), One-against-many (Scotland Yard) and Teams (popular in online 'Battle Royale' games).
- Objectives - What is the object of the game? What are the players trying to do? Objectives include; 'Capture and Destroy', Collection, Problem Solving, Chasing and Building.
- Rules - There are three categories of rules: setup (things you do once at the beginning of the game), progression of play (what happens during the game), and resolution (what conditions cause the game to end, and how is an outcome determined based on the game state).
- Theme (narration, backstory) - Why bother? There are two reasons. One, the setting provides an emotional connection to the game. Secondly, it can make the game easier to learn and easier to play simply because it just makes more sense.
source: vrroom.buzz
There's a difference between a critical analysis and just a game review. A review is about user enjoyment and satisfaction, but an analysis is more about helping a consumer's decision to buy or not to buy the game.
There is a 3 step process to a game critical analysis:
- Describing the game's formal elements
- Describing the results of these when put in motion
- Trying to understand why the designer chose these elements
source: lifehacker.com
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