{"product_id":"how-pac-man-eats-by-noah-wardrip-fruin","title":"How Pac-Man Eats by Noah Wardrip-Fruin","description":"\u003cp class=\"book-summary\"\u003eHow the tools and concepts for making games are connected to what games can and do mean; with examples ranging from Papers, Please to Dys4ia.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn \u003cem\u003eHow Pac-Man Eats\u003c\/em\u003e, Noah Wardrip-Fruin considers two questions: What are the fundamental ways that games work? And how can games be \u003cem\u003eabout\u003c\/em\u003e something? Wardrip-Fruin argues that the two issues are related. Bridging formalist and culturally engaged approaches, he shows how the tools and concepts for making games are connected to what games can and do mean.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWardrip-Fruin proposes that games work at a fundamental level on which their mechanics depend: \u003cem\u003eoperational logics\u003c\/em\u003e. Games are about things because they use play to address topics; they do this through \u003cem\u003eplayable models\u003c\/em\u003e (of which operational logics are the primary building blocks): larger structures used to represent what happens in a game world that relate meaningfully to a theme. Game creators can expand the expressiveness of games, Wardrip-Fruin explains, by expanding an operational logic. Pac-Man can eat, for example, because a game designer expanded the meaning of collision from hitting things to consuming them. Wardrip-Fruin describes strategies game creators use to expand what can be said through games, with examples drawn from indie games, art games, and research games that address themes ranging from border policy to gender transition. These include P\u003cem\u003eapers, Please,\u003c\/em\u003e which illustrates expansive uses of pattern matching; \u003cem\u003eProm Week\u003c\/em\u003e, for which the game's developers created a model of social volition to enable richer relationships between characters; and \u003cem\u003eDys4ia\u003c\/em\u003e, which demonstrates a design approach that supports game metaphors of high complexity.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Penguin Books","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":46802110775462,"sku":null,"price":35.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/4637\/7638\/files\/IMG-1578.jpg?v=1762184082","url":"https:\/\/woollybearbooks.com\/products\/how-pac-man-eats-by-noah-wardrip-fruin","provider":"Woolly Bear Books and Gifts","version":"1.0","type":"link"}