On "new" games

“Oh, that sounds a lot like ___”

You probably hear this a lot. Honestly, you probably say that a lot.

There’s a reason for that. It’s called making an analogy. We do things through analogy a lot more often than you might think. Some approximations put around 20% of our communication as analogy, or non-literal. Most major models of thinking assume that we use these sorts of bridges to keep track of information in our head. There are concepts known as “transfer”, where we literally transfer knowledge from one domain to a new one. Piaget called it assimilation, where one assimilates new information into their mind by pairing it with things they are already familiar with.

Oh, I should probably say that I’m a cognitive psychologist, before I get too deep into this. I got my PhD with a focus on text and discourse (not the argument kind on X/bluesky) processing, as well as the learning sciences. It’s important you know that, because this post is going to be talking about “new” games from an academics perspective.

Ok, let’s dive in.

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I’ve seen this happen a lot. Someone comes up with a game idea, a mechanic they really like, a core premise for a game, and then they excitedly share it with others. Inevitably, someone comes along and says “this sounds just like ___”. I get where they are coming from, they see something familiar, and our brains being pattern recognition machines, light up when we see the pattern. But it’s really not helpful, for a lot of reasons.

Let’s start with the practical before we connect this concept to academic research. In all likelihood, that person probably hasn’t read ___ before. I mean, I design games and I haven’t read most of them. So right away, let’s just acknowledge that differences in reading background can account for that, and just agree you probably don’t need to point it out in the first place.

But let’s say you’re interested in taking it a step further. After all, this person wants to make a “new” game, but it doesn’t sound very “new” to you! What should you do about that? How do we grapple with it?

Let’s talk about academic research.

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I’ve done a lot of research in my time in academia. I’m published, present at conferences, all that good stuff. And after doing game design for a few years, I can see the two are very very similar.

When you want to do a research project, as a scientist, you start with a literature review. See what other people have done. You do this for a couple reasons. First, you’re educating yourself. Seeing what the latest methods are, the newest theories.

But, you’re also looking for holes. The things that everyone else missed. That small variant in the previous methods that was overlooked, or simply not focused on in prior work. You want to fill that hole.

That’s how you get published.

You see, the vast majority of research that I read and see in journals and at conferences is extensions of previous work. “Hey, this group did X in their previous study. I did X+Y in mine.”

These folks aren’t coming up with ground breaking new ideas, new methodologies, time and time again. I mean, there are some people who do that, but it’s not every study they run. They are few and far between.

Science is an iterative process. The act of research builds and builds, with small tweaks and variations to what has come before us.

Not once have I been to a conference and heard someone say “Hey, this sounds like ___” in a disparaging way, like we see with game design. Instead, it’s an acknowledgement of what has come before, and an analogical bridge to connect to their new twist that they added to it. It’s a, “Hey, I see the shared knowledge space you’ve presented, and will now read your research through that lens, and appreciate your unique contribution” sort of lens. It’s pretty cool.

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So what does that have to do with games? Well, hopefully you see the analogy. You’re assimilating what I’ve just described above, and using that to infer what might be going on here.

But, let’s be explicit.

It infuriates me when people say “Hey, this sounds just like ___” when someone posts their game idea. I should specifically say it infuriates me when people say something like that, and they are coming from a space of really saying “why are you making this, it was already done”

Because that game designer with the idea is most likely following the process already embraced in scientific research. Yeah, they probably are building on some existing idea, but I bet they have a unique twist. I bet they read the other games, and found that hole I was talking about before. I want to read that person’s take, I don’t want to dismiss it because it feels familiar.

Familiar is good. Familiar is how we learn. Literally.

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One last sort of thought here, is that we’ve already established a space of the iterative design in our field. Hacks.

Hacking systems is a beloved tradition, and isn’t seen in the same negative light as someone coming up with a “new” idea that feels familiar.

We don’t mind hacks being samey, being a rehash of things. It’s that persons interpretation of an existing system.

We really only get bothered when someone calls their game “new”, and we see it as old.

And I think we need to get over that.

Scientists did, and scientists are pretty smart.

-Spencer