Weekly Review Feb. 19th to Feb. 25th

This week's theory developments are intriguing, though somewhat sparse.

What Your Game Is About?

Most people seem comfortable describing the purpose of a given RPG. But often theorists will call into doubt whether the obvious purpose is the true one. Thomas Robertson offers a heuristic, derived from part of Wittgenstein's philosophical discussion of games. Namely, a game can only be about that which the rules refer. On the other hand, Eliot Wilen argues that this approach ignores the context of the game, which is exactly what doesn't get stated in the rules.

RPGs for Young Children

Richard Campbell introduced a thread at the Forge on how young children, ages six and younger, approach RPG-like games. He suggests the importance of simple, overt rules for focus and memory, especially in transforming typical explorative play into story creation.