Games and the Western Mind
Some recent psychological research, described in the National Post, has confirmed that not everyone in the world thinks like westerners. This is not surprising, though apparently many psychologists have hoped their work was universal, even when only American college students were used as subjects. Regardless, the new work identifies particular differences. The surprising: Our desire for fairness seems uniquely strong. The unsurprising: individualsm, namely identifying the self with traits rather than a role in society.
The most ambitious role-playing games aspire to stretch our minds a little: to see ourselves in another place and time, with different motives and ideas than we have. Aiding such explorations is difficult: games often struggle to evoke even the physicality of another world believably. It is especially hard because, as the article suggests, so much of our thinking is unconsciously—but very substantially—influenced by our society. Can games hope to evade such biases, even a little?
That was partly my intent with City of Birds which, for instance, has characters with no abilities, only social roles. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that it has been successful with people who disliked role-playing previously (especially women). Clearly, games do not have to be as individualistic as they usually are, or concerned with material gain and utilitarian do-gooding; with dice and the numerization of everything. I wonder, though, if role-playing—as a hobby—is somehow uniquely western at its core. If so, there may be limits on what it can do. But we’re far from any limit now, so let’s keep pushing.
Aug 26, 2010 | Filed in design | Tagged: analysis, anthropology | 0 Comments