ABSTRACT
What exactly is a game? Defining this model of interactive experience is absolutely essential if we are going to explore it in any meaningful way. Creating a theoretical model of what we can even consider a “game” will help us understand all the elements of a game and how they can be conceived and created successfully. We can consider a game to exist on the highest level of the interactive experience, with high levels of control and synchronicity. This is one of the reasons that games are harder to make in many cases than noninteractive entertainment. There is a huge amount of intricate, connected pieces to create in order to make a top-level game experience successful. Digital game development has only been around since the early 1980s, and although the concepts and understanding of digital interactive entertainment as an art form and a science have been explored in those past 35 years, the rapid movement of technology and speed at which we have adapted to that movement has made it nearly impossible to create any cohesive set of rules or design principles that fit everything.
