First Person Games induce presence, thus fulfilling Steuer’s definition as virtual realities. As such, it is worth considering the qualities of the realities they form and how these may help us understand the relationship between the player, the contents of the game and the game system itself. Ludic reality is proposed as a construct to elucidate this relationship: an artificial temporal space in which the constrained rules of the system, the semantic contents and sequencing constructs it contains, and the behaviour and subjective experience of the player are combined into a more-or-less stable and effective state of being-in-theworld. Ludic reality directly addresses the question of the impact of internal, semantic factors in the experience, such as world, narrative and agency, together with the adoption, by the player, of a schematic, structured means of effectively interacting with the system to draw out its specific systems of affordances and reward. Read more...

How can we begin to empirically analyse computer games as dynamic systems that seek to motivate and facilitate meaningful and pleasurable player activity? This paper suggests that the concept of ‘challenge’ offers a promising starting point for such inquiries. First the notion of challenge will be briefly introduced. Then the The Sims and The Sims 2 will be analysed and compared with regards to their challenges in order to highlight some of their distinct characteristics as games and to identify some of their differences. These games are interesting in terms of challenge because they, according to a narrow definition of games, are borderline games due to their lack of clear overall goals and a winning condition. Still, challenge seems to offer a fruitful frame of understanding, thus showing promise as a foundation for an extended definition of games. Read more...