Some good quotes from this excellent book. Informations for reference: SUITS, Bernard. The grasshopper: games, life and utopia. Broadview Encore Editions: Toronto, 2005.
p.37 – Let us say, then, that games are goal-directed activities in which inefficient means are intentionally chosen. For example, in racing games one voluntarily goes all round the track in an effort to arrive at the finish line instead of ‘sensibly’ cutting straight across the field.
p.48/49 – My conclusion is that to play a game is to engage in activity directed towards bringing about a specific state of affair, using only means permitted by rules, where the rules prohibit more efficient in favour of less efficient means, and where such rules are accepted just because they make possibly such activity.
p.55 – Playing a game is the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles.
p.59 – Cheaters at games are precisely like liars in everyday life.
p.120 – (about Role Playing Games) For at first it seemed that the performing of assumed roles was the essence of the kind of game we were trying to capture.
p. 130 – By amateurs I mean those for whom playing the game is an end itself, and by professionals I mean those who have in view some further purpose which is achievable by playing the game.
p.37 – Let us say, then, that games are goal-directed activities in which inefficient means are intentionally chosen. For example, in racing games one voluntarily goes all round the track in an effort to arrive at the finish line instead of ‘sensibly’ cutting straight across the field.
p.48/49 – My conclusion is that to play a game is to engage in activity directed towards bringing about a specific state of affair, using only means permitted by rules, where the rules prohibit more efficient in favour of less efficient means, and where such rules are accepted just because they make possibly such activity.
p.55 – Playing a game is the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles.
p.59 – Cheaters at games are precisely like liars in everyday life.
p.120 – (about Role Playing Games) For at first it seemed that the performing of assumed roles was the essence of the kind of game we were trying to capture.
p. 130 – By amateurs I mean those for whom playing the game is an end itself, and by professionals I mean those who have in view some further purpose which is achievable by playing the game.
