On Agency

Murray (1997) seems to have been the first to coin the phrase and to define a gaming process known as ‘agency’. Murray describes agency as the ‘satisfying power to take meaningful action and then see the results of these decisions and choices’. This meaningful interactivity and sense of freedom and choice separates digital games from other media experiences.

In a game, a sense of agency is achieved when players, by virtue of their actions, change the world in which they inhabit, altering the storyline or sequence of events accordingly. In a ‘complex game’ (Gee calls good games complex games), gamers rarely get from A to B using the same route or the same powers, tools or weapons.

Agency means that players feel responsible for the circumstances at hand. A sense of agency comes when a player has an individualised experience, that’s dependent on their actions, choices and patterns of play; when they feel as though they are calling the shots and are in control of the game.

This is not just about what happens in-game and on-screen – i.e. what the game designer intends or hopes to happen when a player plays their game - but also what happens in the mind of the player whist they play. Agency is about an approach players take and the time they take to make it. Using a real-world game analogy, playing chess is not limited to the actions on the board but includes the thought processes required to decide on what moves to make.

According to Murray (1997) it’s an aesthetic pleasure in its own right. Taking action and seeing the consequences of your actions is a central part of digital gameplay and of games in general. For example, a fundamental propriety of chess, is that there are a set of given rules (pieces movement), with an objective to accomplish (pin the King) and the game is down to what action and strategy each player decides to use.

James Paul Gee (2004) talks about players as active agents, producers or ‘co-creators’ (alongside the game developers), directing the flow and action of a game, not simply consuming it as a passive experience. Moreover, taking on a role and identifying with the player-character triggers what Gee calls ‘deep investment’. The deeper the investment, the greater number of game hours a player is willing to commit. Agency is therefore a crucial element of RPG gameplay.

More on RPG game mechanics to follow.

Murray, Janet H. (1997) Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace (MIT Press)

Gee, James Paul (2004) Learning by design: Games as learning machines in Interactive Educational Multimedia, number 8 (April 2004), pp.15-23 www.ub.es/multimedia/iem

Labels: agency, RPG

posted by DS at Sunday, May 23, 2010