What is fun?

[Easy E]

The eternal question.  Spoiler alert for this post.  I don't know the answer to the leading question in the title.  However, as a designer this is the #1 goal players have when they approach your game.  They want to have fun!  Of course, what that means varies a lot! 
I have talked to a lot of different players in my time to try to answer this question, "What is fun?".  Here is a snapshot of answers I have received:

-Winning is fun!
-Hanging out with my buddies is fun!
-The spectacle of a good game is fun!
-Getting some insight into the period is fun!
-Telling stories on or about the games is fun!
-Playing and seeing what happens is fun!
-Painting and setting it all up, and seeing it all come together is fun!
-Letting my imagination run wild is fun!
-Trying to master the game is fun!
-Smack talking my friends is fun!
-Researching the period is fun!
-Being part of a larger community of folks is fun!
-Talking about the games is fun!
-Having a lot of choices in gameplay is fun!

The list is honestly endless.  There are as many different answers to "What is fun?" as there are players.  Each player comes to the table with their own history, personal preferences, styles, and calibrations for what is FUN and what is NOT FUN! 

If you ask players the flip-side of the coin, what is NOT FUN you also get a variety of different outcomes too.  If you list what is FUN on one side, and what is NOT FUN on the other you will often see the same answers!

Therefore, how is a designer suppose to tackle the elephant in the room?  I take a crack at it on the Blood and Spectacles blog here:

https://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2024/01/wargame-design-what-is-fun.html 

The highlights are here:
- You can not be FUN for all players
- Focus on your design goals first
- Have a POV and design to that instead

However, I am interested in what you consider fun?  How do designers cater to it?  How would you go about defining "FUN"?  What are the intangible elements that come together to make "FUN" for you? 

[fred]

Interesting article - this feels one of the more personal, varied and almost unmanageable in total.

One thought is that if the players have agreed a game looks to be fun for them collectively (i.e. its their style of game) it should avoid the game becoming very un-fun for one of the players during the game. The usual way I have seen this happen is that one player feels they have no chance of winning, but there is still a lot of game to play out. From a mechanics point of view I think this means avoid things like continual reinforcement of the winner, or victory conditions that feel forgone, but aren’t resolved for some time.

I do like your notes about Kill Team EasyE as its a game I enjoy, but on the surface it doesn’t really tick what I normally express I like in a game.

[FramFramson]

...baby don't hurt me, baby don't hurt me, no more!

_{(sorry, sorry)}

[Belligerentparrot]

...baby don't hurt me, baby don't hurt me, no more!

_{(sorry, sorry)}

You should be sorry  Well played, sir.

EasyE - interesting post, thanks for writing it up. I also agree that Kill Team (and GW games generally in my experience) shouldn't be as fun as I find them. Corners of that universe do float my boat, though.

I agree that fun shouldn't be something written into rules, because it can't be written into rules. Fun is about what you and your opponent do with the rules, and no set of rules can determine that. For example, like Fred above I can't stand games that are regularly a foregone conclusion well before the end (the board game Civilization is the worst offender in my experience). Fortunately my friends are quite happy to stop the game at that point. If anyone insisted on playing right to the end, they're the one being no fun, not the rules as such. 

[Elbows]

As you indicate, it's different for designers and consumers.

As a consumer, the best thing you can do is find a few other players who enjoy the "same" kind of fun you do.  In that case you're basically golden.  It doesn't matter if no one else in the world enjoys a game...if the two or three of you do.  As long as you have someone to play against and they enjoy the game, all is right in the world.

As a designer...are you designing a game you enjoy, or one that ticks boxes in a market?  I can't fathom something I give less shits about than collectible card games...but the local game store is 100% supported by Magic/Pokemon(?)/Yugi-oh(?), etc.  If I were smart, I'd design a CCG, etc.  The market is vast, and the buy-in is cheap-ish, etc.

I'm definitely of the opinion "If it's not fun, don't play it".  Something I learned from years of trying to make 40K and similar games fun.  When I run my own games for friends and people at conventions, I'm often watching like a hawk to see what people enjoy/don't enjoy.  I've often told my friends "anyone can design a game, it's just math...but making that game fun...is another story entirely.".

I've abandoned dozens of game concepts which - while mechanically sound - didn't cause any joy during the playing process.  If you don't get wound up, or excited about a dice roll, or biting your lip as you draw a card/token/etc...why play?  One reason I abandoned 40K was that I found myself spending hours and hours painting, buying and building beautiful tables, loading up on custom dice, designing tokens, and rich back-story...to be...INCREDIBLY underwhelmed every time I played the actual game.  Spending 3-4 hours and thinking "Why did I bother putting all that work into something so...boring?", etc.

I have some friends who don't enjoy my games, and that's absolutely fine.  They tend to lean tournament/competition/control style...where my games are often difficult, chaotic, and include lots of random events/interactions, etc.  I have a few friends who are power gamers, and I use them to see what I need to fix to avoid power-gaming.  They'll find a loophole pretty quickly and I get to fix it.

There are some gamers who have incredibly low gaming standards...others have impossibly high gaming standards.  Some people want to game for story, some people want to hardcore-tournament game, etc.  The trick is to simply find the people who enjoy what you do.  Some people want to play a "silly" game, others want a "serious" game.  Some people are easily entertained, and others are more picky.  No one is "right".  Just gotta find the right opponent.

[fred]

Player expectation is probably important here too - if people want to play a silly game, then the artwork and the style should lean into that, partly to help players recognise that is what the game is at initial engagement / purchase, but also then during the game to reinforce this style. Conversely a more serious game will likely have a different style and presentation. All of this lends to players more likely having fun as they have pre-selected their definition of fun.

There is nothing to stop players bucking these tropes - but that is more likely down to a small group choosing their own direction to engage and have fun.

[ithoriel]

What is fun?

To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear their lamentations about their dice rolling. 

 More seriously, I'd say a game that keeps everyone involved.

One good enough that people enjoy it when they lose ... even if they lose every game.

One where all players have a reasonable chance to win.

With enough luck involved that I lose because I was unlucky but enough skill required that I win because I'm good! 

 But most of all fun is about the players more than the game. I've had a rollicking good time playing a dire game with good people and a miserable time playing a good game with nit pickers, rules lawyers and those who's play makes glaciers look speedy.

[Moriarty]

To defeat your enemies, to drive them before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women?

[Dice Roller]

I honestly can't think of anything worse, or less fun, than a game designer trying to build 'fun' in to one of their games.
That would be like analysing a joke.
No.
Fun is brought to the table by the players. And there's little or nothing the games designer can, or should, do about that.

[Daeothar]

Well, this is as subjective a topic as they come!

Obviously all I can comment on with certainty are my experiences and expectations; everything else is just assumption and/or filling in.

My idea of fun is a game where it's the players that decide how the game ends, not chance. Tactical accumen, not dice (or cards) should be the deciding factor. Some randomization is to be expected of course, but bucket loads of dice, while fun to throw every now and then, should not have more influence on the flow of the game than the way that players move their units.

My idea of fun is a game where there are not libraries of rules to memorize just to be in the know about all the special rules, tricks and abilities of each and every unit you can encounter. I just want to play units that behave predictably (within a range, obviously) and don't pull an unexpected game changing rabbit out of their hats on a crucial moment.

(A particular pet peeve of mine are games like Warmachine or Hordes, where the munchkin way of stacking feats, abilites, bonuses and unit synergies are just too much for my adled brain to keep up with. If I wanted to play a game like that, I'd pick up a deck of Magic cards   )

My idea of fun is a game that involves a bit of player on player psychology and bluffing. Like the combat system of Bushido for instance, where both players secretly pick up their combat dice, which can be split into offensive and defensive dice at will. Both players then reveal them simultaneously. There a remarkable level of bluffing and tactical thinking involved with this game mechanism

My idea of fun is a game where both players are constantly involved. be that through alternating activation, interupting mechanics or randomized unit activation. It requires a constant rethinking of tactics.

(Although, I've also come to realize that not having to 'be on' all the time because of the old IGoYouGo systems might actually be beneficial to one's energy levels and concentration. But maybe that's just me getting old )

My idea of fun are games that look amazing. Well painted units on nice tables with thematic and good looking terrain features. The spectacle aspect is important to me; I've come into this hobby in the late nineties from the plastic model kit scene and I therefore still find it vital that games look good.

This also extends to gaming aids, such as tokens, cards, templates, dice etc; they should all match the game (and even faction!) both in style and colour; it helps me with the immersion

I'm sure there are more aspects that I enjoy about gaming, but these are the first ones that come to mind, so they're probably the ones I find most important...

[Dice Roller]

I'm going to split a hair here, but are we not in danger of confusing a 'fun game' and a 'good game'?

Yeah, Yeah, I know the two pretty much always go hand in hand. But a lot of the things I've seen people here describe as a fun game seem to me to be all part of good game design.

I know it's a slight distinction, but surely one worth making.
As some above said, you can play a poor game and have fun just as much as you can play a good game and not.
So the fun seems external to the game design/mechanics.

Does that make sense?

[Daeothar]

I honestly can't think of anything worse, or less fun, than a game designer trying to build 'fun' in to one of their games.
That would be like analysing a joke.
No.
Fun is brought to the table by the players. And there's little or nothing the games designer can, or should, do about that.

I actually have to disagree with that (as people are almost expected to do with a subjective topic like this ).

I find the wacky rules that Orks had in older 40k or WHFB editions for instance to be highly enjoyable, even though they might turn out totally crippling to the greenskins player. I know I'm contradicting myself here a bit, as I've just advocated that wild special rules and unpredictable units are not for me, but I apparently do make an exeption here, as the factions in questions are designed to be wacky and unpredictable.

But the effects are at least balanced; they can go spectacularly wrong or teeth gnashingly well, and I suppose that's fine.

Zany rules with tables of ridiculous results are certainly not for everyone, but I must admit to kind of liking them, in the right setting...

[Belligerentparrot]

Zany rules with tables of ridiculous results are certainly not for everyone, but I must admit to kind of liking them, in the right setting...

That sort of shows Dice Roller's point though, doesn't it? (Emphasis on sort-of). Have you ever played old 40K against either an Ork player who takes it too seriously (I know, what were they thinking?) and gets in a massive sulk when their Supa-Doopa-Gizmo backfires and it goes wrong? Or as the Ork player against someone else who gets in a massive sulk when the Supa-Doopa etc. goes amazingly well and vaporises their best unit?

I've done both, and it isn't much fun I can tell you. I get what you mean, in that the rules as written aren't taking themselves too seriously, but whether that is actually fun or not is going to be something the players bring, not the rules.

[warwell]

To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women

[Daeothar]

That sort of shows Dice Roller's point though, doesn't it? (Emphasis on sort-of). Have you ever played old 40K against either an Ork player who takes it too seriously (I know, what were they thinking?) and gets in a massive sulk when their Supa-Doopa-Gizmo backfires and it goes wrong? Or as the Ork player against someone else who gets in a massive sulk when the Supa-Doopa etc. goes amazingly well and vaporises their best unit?

I've done both, and it isn't much fun I can tell you. I get what you mean, in that the rules as written aren't taking themselves too seriously, but whether that is actually fun or not is going to be something the players bring, not the rules.

Fair point.

I guess I've been looking at this through the lense of someone who's gathered a group of players around who are all enjoyable company in the first place and fun opponents in the second. My days of tournament play against random strangers are long past.

However; I know I've been frustrated when those gretchin exploded into my (death) star terminator squad from that Shock Attack Gun, nearly wiping them to a man, but also remember my opponent's sulking when his Goblin fanatics careened back into (and through) his battle line.

A bit of frustration should be part of every game; the sweeter the reward when things do go your way, but the annoying moments should never outweigh the good ones. But when things are balanced enough, the right company should be able to make any of those situations into an enjoyable one, even when losing.

So yeah; I agree that the people doing the gaming are the ones creating the fun, no matter which rules are used. But once beyond that point, I stand by my posing that I like certain elements in games better than others