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Game
Exercepted from RubySteps: The Playbook
Because they're fun! Seriously. You don't work games, you play games. The more you play a game, the better you get at it. Simple as that.
Games have an objective. Unless you're playing competitively, it doesn't matter whether or not you meet the objective. You learn either way.
Do, or do not. Above all, try!
If meeting the objective doesn't matter, what does?
Games produce interesting, valuable, unexpected outcomes. Consider the game of futbol. It has one objective: to score goals. After billions of people play it for millenia, you end up with pick-up matches, academies, leagues, rivalries, and the World Cup. That's not all:
- In the 1960s, Pelé single-handedly brought a brutal civil war to a halt.
- In 1986, Diego Maradona received divine assistance in eliminating England from the World Cup (sorry to bring this up again, Brits).
- In 2015, Pat Maddox used the game as an example in his book, literally placing his name alongside two of the greatest players in history.
The beautiful game, with one simple objective, will produce incredible outcomes for as long as people continue to play. Why?
Mike Bonifer's ERGO™ framework explains the four elements of game:
- Environment
- Roles
- Guidelines
- Objectives
Make a slight change to any of the elements, and you have a different game - which may produce radically different outcomes.
You may find it helpful to think of ERGO™ games as design patterns you can play.
The games in RubySteps: The Playbook use ERGO™. Rather than break the elements in to lists that make you think of each element independently, I have identified the key elements in bold throughout the text.
Play the games, and then change them. Treat each element as a variable, and make the games your own. Go, play!
Three rules of game:
- There is always a game.
- Game is infinite.
- There are infinite games.
As discussed, game produces infinite outcomes. Look through the 21-day-challenge code base to see all the outcomes that have already happened, because of one simple game.
Change the game, and you get new outcomes. You can change the game by changing the ERGO™ game structure, or by combining games. Find your game. If you want more games to play, here are some suggestions: