idiosyncratic/personally provided definitions
- failure is part of the cultivated aesthetic experience
- when pixels dance to your baton
- ". . . anything you are still wrong about. so puzzles stop being games once solved . . ."
- a repeating set of chores that evoke surprisingly strong emotions
- voluntary / interactive / uncertain outcome / goal / has rules / has a force acting against the player / if there are multiple players (with opposing goals) they can impact one another

from books and stuff, still idiosyncratic but with more reach
- selection of idiosyncratic means / the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles
- a series of interesting choices
- closed, formal system that engages players in a structured conflict and resolves its uncertainty in an unequal outcome
- a problem-solving activity, approached with a playful attitude
- a system of rules in which agents compete by making ambiguous endogenously meaningful decisions ('endogenously' is roughly synonymous with 'intrinsically motivated', i.e. decisions which are meaningful due to the individual finding or making 'their own' meaning in them)
- a system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome (blah so boring and dry! it just has all the expected bits)
- voluntary activity or occupation (this is "play", not games)
- manipulation that indulges curiousity (this is "play", not games)
- activities performed for self-amusement that have behavioral, social, and psychomotor rewards (this is "play", not games)
- free movement within a more rigid structure (this is "play", not games)

credit given for quotes in this kinopio

my go l is not to redefine games. i'll state that for myself. so, like, what the hell do i want? i'm currently sifting through definitions of games which center largely around

- rules, and a system or systems
- a player who makes decisions or takes actions, in order to alter the outcome
- more simply, we could just say a player, one who plays, or play.

Suits describes "a voluntary attempt", so even more broadly, there is some agent, acting at the dead center of each definition of games that I encounter.

this adventure has lead me down a path of trying to understand play, rather than games. the way that 'games' are defined is very silly. will 'play' make any more sense? i theorize not

I went to the reference library and grabbed a shit load of books. None of the books I expected were here (not in this section anyway) but lots by authors I recognized. And, unfortunately, my old enemy: Games: Agency as Art. I grabbed some random books too.

* It's nice going to the library and finding adjacent books. It's much more satisfying than going to Wikipedia and getting lost. Maybe I need to describe the difference someday but for now I think it's just worth stating as a touchstone. I'll get back to that.

raw notes below:

i made a bleet asking people to share definitions of games. i may edit this opening post to be the summary.

[A -> B]

i like learning things about people. who do you think you are? what's going on in that head of yours? why?

i like to connect with people over things. even stupid, unimportant coincidences. i just like that spark of recognition.

i like to be mysterious and inscrutable, i like when i have to explain myself, i like how anytime i dig deeper i discover even more. i like not understanding myself. i like mysteries and what better way to appreciate them than to experience myself as one?

i like doing a creative task like ten times more than i need to do it, just to give myself the opportunity to choose my favourite--even if i know i'll probably end up choosing the first one.

i like falling asleep.

i like to discover new connections. i like when things finally make sense - that moment where chaos transforms or appears to transform into order. it isn't the real thing that i like (chaos into order) but my perception of it, that feeling, that sensation.

but i also like when i discover a feeling or sensation is pleasantly deep, is rooted in reality. i like when a sensation is not only a sensation but a detection of a deep truth. the thing that i like however is once again the sensation of rootedness, not the rootedness itself.

i like liking.

i like loving.