From that day on, I devoted myself to studying the question through Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. It took a while, but I finally began sketching some ideas connecting this point to the practice of game design (this post, in fact, will form part of an article currently in production).
The theoretical grounding for the definition of "game" is generally established through a dialogue between sociological and anthropological perspectives, such as those of Huizinga (2001 [1938]), Caillois (1986 [1958]), and Retondar (2013). This perspective, however, finds a fundamental turning point in Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations (1953).
For the Austrian philosopher, the concept of game is not merely an object of study but the paradigmatic example for addressing the impossibility of delimiting concepts through unique, essential properties. In proposing the notion of "family resemblances," Wittgenstein argues that what unites the diverse manifestations of play is not a universal essence but a complex network of overlapping and criss-crossing affinities. This discussion, developed in sections 65 through 71 of his posthumous work (WITTGENSTEIN, 1999 [1953], pp. 52–54), lays the epistemological foundations that underlie the contemporary structure of game design and game studies, challenging the search for definitions in the field.
Before addressing the question of the game as an object, Wittgenstein introduces the concept of the "language game" (Sprachspiel), noting that he understands this to mean the whole formed by language and the activities into which it is woven (WITTGENSTEIN, 1999 [1953], p. 30). The metaphor of the game is chosen precisely to underscore that language is not a closed system of representations but a living practice whose meaning emerges from use in specific contexts.
Wittgenstein (1999 [1953], p. 35) also radicalizes this perspective by listing the multiplicity of possible linguistic forms: "acting according to commands," "describing an object," "inventing a story," "play-acting," "singing a round" and so on. The philosopher concludes that "this multiplicity is not something fixed, given once for all; but new types of language, new language games, as we may say, come into existence, and others become obsolete and get forgotten." This constitutive instability is fundamental: just as language is transformed through its uses, games likewise do not obey a stable, definitive form.
A point that stands out for its connection to contemporary game design ideas is the exercise of trying to define what, potentially, all games have in common. From here, Wittgenstein (1999 [1953], p. 52) proposes the following line of reasoning:
Consider, for example, the proceedings that we call "games." I mean board-games, card-games, ball-games, Olympic games, and so on. What is common to them all? Don't say: "There must be something common, or they would not be called 'games'" — but look and see whether there is anything common to all. For if you look at them you will not see something that is common to all, but similarities, relationships, and a whole series of them at that.
The instruction is methodological: rather than assuming an essence exists and then searching for it, one must look at the concrete phenomena themselves. And in looking, one finds that there is no single property running through all games. Board games share certain characteristics with card games, which in turn resemble certain games of skill, which share traits with sports — but the properties linking one pair are not always present in the next. The result is a network of overlaps and crossings with no fixed core. Wittgenstein concludes the reasoning by stating that "we see a complicated network of similarities overlapping and criss-crossing: sometimes overall similarities, sometimes similarities of detail" (WITTGENSTEIN, 1999 [1953], p. 52).
To name this structure of kinship without essence, Wittgenstein (1999 [1953], p. 52) coins the concept of "family resemblances" (Familienähnlichkeiten): the various resemblances among members of a family overlap and criss-cross in the same way — build, features, color of eyes, gait, temperament, and so on — and games likewise form a family. By the same reasoning, we recognize that two cousins belong to the same family not because they share all the same characteristics, but because each bears resemblances to other members of the family network. The concept operates through continuity and contrast, not through identity. Applied to games, this means that what makes something a game is not the presence of an essential trait, but its participation in a network of resemblances with other practices we already call games.
Wittgenstein (1999 [1953], p. 53) extends the argument using the concept of "number" as an example: just as we cannot define "number" through a single essential property, neither can we close the concept of game. The author asks directly: "How is the concept of game bounded? What still counts as a game and what no longer does? Can you give the boundary? No. You can draw one; for none has so far been drawn." For the philosopher, this openness is not a problem to be solved; it is precisely how the concept functions.
The Wittgensteinian discussion reverberates directly through the problems that designers and game researchers face when attempting to define, categorize, and design both video games and analog games. Suits (2005 [1978]) proposed that playing a game consists of "the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles," establishing criteria such as goals, rules, lusory means, and the lusory attitude — a direct response to the Wittgensteinian challenge. Salen and Zimmerman (2004) acknowledge the difficulty and compile dozens of existing definitions, evidencing precisely the proliferation of "family resemblances" that no single definition can contain. Juul (2005), in turn, adopts an intermediate stance, proposing a "half-real" model that recognizes the heterogeneity of games without relinquishing a minimal set of functional properties.
The diversity of the contemporary analog game market, for instance, renders the Wittgensteinian question observable in practice. Role-playing games such as Fiasco (MORNINGSTAR, 2011) operate with almost no formalized mechanics; narrative-experience games such as Dixit (ROUBIRA, 2008) challenge the centrality of victory as a defining component. No essentialist definition encompasses this entire diversity without arbitrarily excluding practices that we intuitively recognize as belonging to the same "family." The Wittgensteinian model is, potentially, the only philosophical framework that accommodates this multiplicity without forcing reductions.
The concept of the language game also has a specific application to game design: each game constitutes, in a certain sense, a language game of its own. Rules do not describe a pre-existing reality; they constitute it. The idea of "death" in the video game Dark Souls (FROMSOFTWARE, 2011) signifies a punitive restart that is integrated into narrative and mechanical progression; it is radically different from what "death" means in The Sims (MAXIS, 2000), where it may be tied to a comic, accidental, and reversible situation. These are distinct language games, whose meaning emerges exclusively from the context of rules and practices that constitute them.
Wittgenstein had already pointed to this: we learn what a game is through examples, not through definitions. As he writes, "examples are given and they are meant to be understood in a certain sense" (WITTGENSTEIN, 1999 [1953], p. 54). Meaning does not exist prior to the game; it is constructed in practice, in the act of playing.
This conclusion carries a direct implication for the design and playtesting process, to be explored in the following sections: if the meaning of each game is constituted by its own system of rules and practices, then testing it necessarily means putting it into play — that is, having people play it and observing what emerges from that experience. The singularity of each game, as a unique language game, is precisely what makes the presence of real players irreplaceable in the process of evaluating a prototype. No system external to the game can determine, in its place, whether that specific language game is functioning as an experience.
Wittgenstein's contribution to the field of game design is thus epistemological in nature: it frees the designer and researcher from the search for an essence that does not exist and invites them to operate with open, malleable concepts that are sensitive to history and to the context of use. In a field where new genres constantly emerge, this conceptual openness is not a limitation but a condition of thought.
#GoGamers
References:
CAILLOIS, Roger. Los juegos y los hombres: la máscara y el vértigo. Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1986 [1958].
HUIZINGA, Johan. Homo Ludens. São Paulo: Perspectiva, 2001 [1938].
JUUL, Jesper. Half-Real: Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005.
RETONDAR, Jeferson. Teoria do jogo: a dimensão lúdica da existência humana. Petrópolis: Vozes, 2013.
SALEN, Katie; ZIMMERMAN, Eric. Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 2004.
SUITS, Bernard. The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia. Toronto: Broadview Encore Editions, 2005 [1978].
WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig. Philosophical Investigations (Coleção Os Pensadores). São Paulo: Nova Cultural, 1999 [1953].
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