Far as I can tell, games are intended to induce an individual to adopt some sort of behavior or perform some task. The idea of “gamification” essentially involves adding or incorporating game-like elements into another wise “non-game” task to encourage people to regard that task as a game, make it more enjoyable, invest the user in the task a bit more, and thus more likely adopt some sort of behavior or perform some task.
Games are played by individuals (who play independently or as part of a group) and by groups themselves.
My question is whether or not (or how) gameification (or at least some of its elements) is scalable beyond interacting with people atomically, but as a community or a society.
In the early days of the Space Race between the US and USSR, for the most part, the average individual was not able to “play” in that game, but the nature of the competition goals, First Man in Space, First Spacewalk, Longest Duration Flight, and so on, had some game-like features. Would it be possible, then, to think about designing an exploration program (let’s say looking for signs of ancient life on Mars) with game-like features, such that it generated persistent interest, some sort of narrative arc, and so on?
Perhaps another example might be the competition between nations in the Olympics, World Cup, or other major sporting events.
How well can application of game-like elements at that scale be done absent a direct head-to-head competition?
How does that work with an infinite game (rather than finite)?
If so, what’s the best way to do so?
I apologize for asking such a big raft of questions and don’t need or expect anyone to tackle all of these at once, but I’m still learning to think about this stuff, soany suggestions, comments, or brainstorming would be most welcome.
