Please Shut Up if you say SL is not a game.

game1 [url=http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/edu/ref/ahd/t/pron.jpg]http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/edu/ref/ahd/t/pron.jpg[/url] (ghttp://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/edu/ref/ahd/s/amacr.gifm) KEY

NOUN:

1. An activity providing entertainment or amusement; a pastime.
   

I don't see 'goal' anywhere.

Secondlife meets these criteria, thus is a game.


Quod erod demonstrandum.

American Heritage Dictionary.

Your definition is incorrect: self-defined goals exist in many games, such as SL. Secondly, your latin is attrocious. Please don't do that to try to look clever. You aren't.

Whether pre-defined or self-defined, a game needs a goal else it is pointless. To say that the goal of any game is the entertainment it provides also does not define something as being a game.

Too many teenagers see stealing cars and taking them on "joy rides" as being a great game, that doesn't make cars into games, even in the eyes of the "joy riders", only the activity.

Whatever you do within SecondLife, if you do it purely for entertainment then that activity could be called a game. However that does not define SecondLife itself as a game.

Sio, using the thing you're trying to define as an example of what you're defining is bad...

Make your own goal. I don't need to be spoonfed, do you?

I see White Wolf's LARPs as games, hell, they are defined as games, and they or alot like secondlife in the aspect of goals. Secondlife fits the definition of game to me.

LOL, did I miss a comma ...nope I didn't... I didn't say "in games such as SL", I continued a sentence with "in games, such as SL", perhaps "such as in SL" would have conveyed my meaning better...

In any case, SL is a game. Anyone who tties to tell you differently is selling something.

Sure, SL is a game.

It's a non-zero-sum game. I'd argue your real life is the same thing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-zero_sum#Economics_and_non-zero-sum

What isn't a game these days, anyway? ;P

This states that there are many games with self-defined goals and offers SL as an example of such. This is bad because in terms of the argument at hand (Is SL a game) you're offering SL as your comparison to what defines a game.. SL is a game because SL is a game.

Alternatively..

"self-defined goals exist in many games such as SL" (note the lack of a comma).
This presuposes that SL is a game (your view point) and indicates that there are many others like it to back up the supposition.

At this point in the post my nit picking over grammer and punctuation (I'd never pull anyone on spelling, mine's atroshus ), itself becomes source of entertainment while bored at work. Does this make the post, the thread, or the whole forum a game? Maybe...


The point is that while SL does not have pre-defined goals, neither do you need to define your own. There is no requirement for goals at all. Thus SL deos not fit the offered definitions of games.

game 1 (gm) KEY

NOUN:

1. An activity providing entertainment or amusement; a pastime
   

This is the one I've been using and showing. SL fits it EXTREMELY well.

If the definition read "ALL activities providing entertainment..." then I may agree with you. However games are just a small subset of activities that can provide entertainment. We all agree that SecondLife can provide many hours of entertainment, just as watching TV, going to the movies, listening to music, going clubing with friends or watching a total stranger make a complete fool of themself in public are all sources of entertainment. You need to prove that this particular entertainment medium fits in the small subgroup of Game.

You can play games in SL, that does not imply SL is a game.

Just wanted to say HI JOHNNY ) Long time no see

You can play games in SL, that does not imply SL is not a game.

SL is a game to me. You won't change that fact. All I've done in this thread is show my reasons for feeling so, and suggest people relax and quit trying to define what SL is for others.

You can only define it FOR YOURSELF and I don't press my feelings onto anyone. See it as a platform, a game, a toy, maybe a work trainer or social interactive aide.

Thats what it is to YOU.

Go enjoy it and stop worrying about how others feel about SL.

I agree with the op's topic line.

I'm sure everyone agrees that the system can be used for gaming purposes, however, a user providing thier own goals and objectives doesn't make it a game.

I like to play a little game with Google Earth sometimes. I turn off all politically boundries and then try to find landmarks. I suppose you could turn this into a party game. Have a bunch of computers on a LAN and see who can get there the quickest. Even though you can do this with Google Earth, calling it a game would be quite inappropriate.



You've lost me here. What relevance is the fact that SL is not exactly
like RL? Not every form of entertainment is a game

If you think game and platform are on the same level, it seems you don't know what a platform is.



There's nothing wrong with coming up with an accurate definition for what Second Life is and there's nothing wrong with correcting someone when they say SL is a game when it is, in fact, much more than that.



I haven't seen anyone try to get you to stop using SL for gaming.

You never heard anyone define it as a platform that supports gaming, business, social skills development, and etc...???

I don't have time to search for who may have posted a better definition, but calling SL a game, and in particular *just* a game, is incorrect as it's missing the other things SL supports.

How is this any different than taking a stroll on the beach and watching the seagulls? Or going to the movies? Or riding rides at an amusement park?


This definition of 'game' is too vague and can encompass *many* things which are clearly not games... or only defines *everything* as a game.


Besides, SecondLife is a virtual place... not an 'activity' in and of itself.


And... "Activity" (the state or quality of being active). Active is certainly not a very good description of the RL body connected with the online avatar.


Try again.


--
Your reality, sir, is lies and balderdash and I'm delighted to say that I have no grasp of it whatsoever. -- Baron Munchausen

That's a definition of a game that's so broad it's practically meaningless.

I think that SL is a game if you want it to be, and a social network if you don't (It can also be other things!). There will be some people who come on to role-play, create characters with their own personalities, establish goals and "play" it like a game. There are others who will come on and just talk with friends, with no care for developing a character other than themselves.

To me, Second Life is a tool. Take this example, no one wants to use a computer. People want to find information, people want to type up documents, people want to play games. The same is for SL. No one wants to play SL because it is SL. People want to be able to meet new people, they want to develop items, they want to construct, they want to role-play. SL is a way of helping a person complete those tasks, just as a computer is used to help people do the things people do on computers.

~ dons robes of acrimony +2 ~

IT'S A GAME CUZ I SAY IT IS! IF YOU THINK ITS NOT YOU'RE DRINKING THE KOOLAID THEY'RE SELLING YOU YOU YOU DUMMY!

whew! i feel much better about me now

SL is a game.

SL is not a game.

Confused? Here is what I mean...

IF you use Second Life as a source of entertainment, it is a game.
IF you use Second Life as a virtual place to meet and talk to real people, it is a glorified graphic chatroom.
IF you get a job on Second Life that pays ALOT of Linden Dollars, it is a second job.
IF you use Second Life as a way to express yourself in the way you could NEVER do in the real world, it is your canvas.
IF you use Second Life to portray a character of your creation's personal story, it is your stage.
IF you use Second Life to do any of the above, it is exactly what it says it is, a second life.

Life is what you make it, and so is Second Life. LL has basically provided a way for people from opposite sides of the globe to get to gether and do whatever it is they want to do, be it play games, go to a casino, go clubbing, drive around a bit, kill each other with absolutely no ramifications, or just hang out and talk.

Second Life is what YOU want it to be, it may be a game to you, but to those who say it is not a game, please do not be unkind to them. I don't know about the whole "I'm not going to answer your question bacause SL is not a game." thing, I've never seen it so I won't comment on it, but otherwise, SL is just like RL in the respect that it is what YOU make of it.

Thank you, Topic over.

This is pretty much what I said, that means we think on the same level.

Let's do lunch

Quod erat demonstrandum.

Happy now?

With respect to the definition of a game, I draw not upon the the American Heritage Dictionary, but on my own 20 years professional experience designing and building PC and arcade games.

In any case, your definition of a game is circular and vague. Yes, you can define your own goals in any activity, and find a way to create game play using virtually any platform. People have written space invaders clones using pocket calculators. This does not mean that the pocket calculator as a platform for the game development is any more a game than Second Life is.

The misconception is that because Second Life uses gaming technology, that it is the same sort of product, and it just isn't - any more than Blaxxun is a game, or any of dozens of other online virtual reality chat environments.

The most commonly used definition of the word "game" implies simply an enjoyable activity engaged in for diversion or amusement - however, this definition upon which you pin your arguments does not preclude such things as watching television, reading a book, or any of a vast array of things that we do not think of as being games. The definition is so overly broad as to be useless in this context.

Second Life clearly does has many of the same tools and technical features that modern computer games have, but it most certainly does not fit the basic criteria of being a physical or mental competition conducted according to rules with the participants in direct opposition to each other.

It is very tempting to be fooled by the visual illusion created by the software, but if we remove the technically enhanced eye candy, we are left with a set of constraints that define the deterministic relationship of scripted or manually directed agents within a simplified virtual environment.

This provides the framework within which we function within this environment, but it does not enforce, in any way, a direct mental or physical competition between participants or between users and non-intelligent entities present.

And it therefore certainly does not, in and of itself, define a game, as anyone may casually observe.

that's what I get for skipping every other topic xD sorry 'bout that.

Sure, lunch sounds good, anything to pass the time while LL does things on SL.

I'm afraid I can't really argue....

Most of my "it's a game" insistance comes from a reaction to the "Not a game" people who really turn my stomach. When you do a reasoned analysis like this, I just can't argue...

Damn you Myou (Can I call you Myou?), you've stolen my thunder...


Hope to see you in game sometime... you sound fun.

Your spelling of atrocious is atrocious.



Please don't use English to try and look clever. You aren't.