Use of Language

In other fields, such as engineering, architecture, and mathematics, the spread of ideas is facilitated by the use of a common language. Each engineer or mathematician knows how to express ideas ”even brand-new ideas ”in the given language of the craft.

The vocabulary and mechanism for expressing ideas is already there, formalized and developed over many years of practical use and theoretical study. As game designers, we do not have that luxury. Although there has been talk of defining a universal frame of reference for game designers, no such lexicon has been attempted in earnest. Any attempts that have so far been made have not gained major acceptance, and there is no real coordinated effort or cooperation between alternate factions (to the best of our knowledge).

This chapter attempts to define gameplay without reference to itself or reliance on examples of itself for definition. That doesn't mean that we won't give examples, but those examples will not serve as definitions. Instead, they will be used in their traditional role to illustrate the definitions previously laid out. This will give us the beginnings of our lexicon of game design. This might or might not become a standard, but it is at least a starting point that we can use to explain our ideas in this book.