Why a game?

If we want to argue that games can have serious outcomes, at least some of our conferences should also be games. The first Ludium was a hybrid of sorts, with several mini-games only loosely connected to the main thrust of the conference. This Ludium was designed from the ground up as a play experience that would also have a serious outcome: a vision of how video games and policy should mesh.

Some have argued that the game framework of the Ludium warped the results (in particular, critics find the statements of policy to be relatively weak). I think you’d find the same broadness in any statements acceptable to a reasonably large heterogeneous group. In addition, any function with a similar goal is going to be game-like in some respects. Robert’s Rules of Order are merely a more familiar set of rules.

In particular, we designed the game to encourage the behavior we found most useful at the last Ludium and other conferences. Primarily, we wanted to make sure that everyone felt that their ideas had been heard. We wanted the Ludium to end with a group of people who were invested in the results.

What worked well?

Based on people’s comments after the Ludium, I think we met that basic goal very well. Even though not everyone agreed with all of the statements, they seemed to agree that they deserved to be discussed. And, unlike the first Ludium, there was a much greater sense of cohesion at the end, despite the sometimes vigorous debates during the conference.

Probably the central reason that everything went as well as it did is something that we can’t take the credit for: the attendees. We had a great group of people from diverse backgrounds who played the game with an eye towards the future. It would have been great to have more people and more stakeholders represented, but the people who did come were dedicated and cooperated even more than we expected.

A design choice that really made a difference was starting with small groups and merging them over the course of the Ludium. As a member of a group of 2-4 people, each player was able to have at least some say in the platforms that were considered. It was heartening to us that many of the statements coming from these distinct groups were very closely related. That indicates to me that there is a broad consensus about the most important areas of video game policy.

What could be improved?

In retrospect, the spies of Koithuo were the most game-like element of the Ludium. These three individuals were given a pre-defined list of ten concepts before the Ludium began, with the goal of getting as many of these as possible into the final platform. When designing the game, we had no way of knowing which aspects of the industry would be represented. To make sure that there would be some input from the industry as a whole, we used a Delphi study to find the ten most important policy ideas among a wide range of stakeholders. That ensured that these points would at least be discussed during the Ludium.

This turned out to be an unnecessary precaution, since all of the statements given to the spies were independently introduced on the first day. Given the makeup of the conference, we probably could have done away with the spies entirely. With a more antagonistic set of players, a less universal goal, or a more controversial topic, the spies could still provide a valuable service.

Procedurally, the biggest problem was that it took too long to tally votes. The scoring system required detailed record-keeping of who sponsored which statements. There were many more mergers of statements than expected, which made calculating the results slower than in playtesting. Physically entering the ballots into the computer also took too long. In the future, the IP system could be replaced with a simpler scoring system and ballot-entering could be done in parallel on multiple computers.

Was it a success?

It’s still early to say whether or not the policy will lead to real-world changes in video game policy. Nevertheless, there’s no doubt in my mind that the game itself was successful. The people who attended the Ludium left with a feeling of consensus and produced a document that has already fostered myriad discussions. The statements produced by the people of the Ludium won’t end the debate about video games and policy, but they show promise as a beginning.