Do we learn anything from our games? Should we? And if so, what sort of things…?

Consider: Georgia Tech professor Ian Bogost and his site, Persuasive Games. And/or the accompanying book: Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames. Or just the gist of his games: Airport Insecurity and Arcade Wire: Airport Security, where you manage the unhappy traveler queue versus ever-changing regulations; Disaffected!, featuring you as a Kinko’s employee; Oil God, where your goal is to double consumer oil prices in five years; Bacteria Salad and Food Import Folly, which explore different intersections of agriculture, economics, and safety; and the upcoming, self-explanatory Fatworld.

Videogames have a much higher profile than board games in our culture and society, and one aspect of that is the constant consideration (hand-wringing?) of their potential role as legitimate art forms, or at least something more than just “fun” diversions. Given the broad internet availability today and the fairly well democratized means-of-production via Flash and whatnot, I’d also say that it’s much easier to make a videogame and get it in front of a lot of people, than it is to do with a boardgame.

So it’s probably no surprise that all the crazy experimenting and bleeding edge ideas in game design and the role of games in society is coming on the videogame front. Meanwhile, here we are – mostly undisturbed – in our little board game world. What gives? Oh, I suppose the purists among us would argue that our games are really just about being games in their most clean and pure form. Everything we learn from our games comes with layers of abstractions; somewhere in those varied mechanics and interactions lie some deep underlying truths about how our real world works, and the opportunity exists for us to leverage those lessons into real-world experiences. But it’s by and large an intuitive exercise with little or no connection to the ostensible theme of any given game. You can learn a lot from Puerto Rico, but you won’t learn how to effectively settle and manage a Caribbean island.

You also won’t, for that matter, learn a whole lot about what it really was like for the folks who settled Puerto Rico (hint: they weren’t German, and they weren’t all that efficient!) So, they’re also not effective history lessons.

Much is made of the distinction between “American” and “European” schools of board game design. According to the party line, American games have the theme front and center, and usually support the ideas of the theme strongly in the rules and order of play. However, this often does not add up to a great or repeatedly enjoyable game experience. The poster child for bad American games is Steve Jackson Games – the “theme” of a SJG game usually relies on sarcasm or dark humor (not unlike Bogost’s games, but catering more to the nerd-culture fanboy). The game itself is usually bad to the point of unplayability, and you can consider yourself lucky to “get” the joke of the game by reading the back of the box in your local store, so you can put it back and move on to something more worthy of your hard-earned dollar. Such a European game, which is said to strive for deeply-considered (and tested) mechanics, robust and emergent gameplay, replayability up the wazoo, and oh yes, let’s not forget: a veneer of a theme spread so thinly that it’s as good as transparent. All Euro-games are abstract, really, but only a small number of them are honest enough about it to drop the pretense. Serial Eurogame felon Reiner Knizia is the poster child for this particular continent.

Of course, this American-Euro thing is more than a bit of hogwash – at best we’re representing a couple of extreme ideals, and not universal truths. There’s a continuum at work, and it probably comes with well over one axis!

Rare is the game that ties a great theme or idea to a great set of play mechanics. That has something to say or teach us beyond the math and logic of an abstracted rule system. That casts light on history, or imagination, or both. I say this is good news, because it means we still have a long and enjoyable journey ahead of us as we continue to search and sift our way through the game continuum, under the direction of a community of explorer-artisans.

One example: the Vikings. I have a soft spot in my heart for the Vikings and have read my fair share of books on the subject. To the extent that your average Joe or even your average Joe Gamer knows anything about the Vikings, the majority of it is probably wrong, or at best, framed in a context of stereotype and misinformation. The perfect Viking game for me would have a wonderful set of mechanics that faithfully recreate the trials and terrors of the Viking Experience, and would do it in such a way that you actually come to learn and appreciate this episode of culture/history. Right now, I’m led to believe that an American designer could make this game and get a lot of the theme and history right, but it wouldn’t be any fun to play. Or that a European designer could do it, but it would be mostly about trading wool and bits of amber for victory points. It would be thrilling, but it really wouldn’t be about the Vikings.

If these guys don’t get on the stick and give me a really great game about the Vikings soon, I might just have to go do it myself.