ABSTRACT
Situational design is a player-centric approach to game design and analysis. As interactivity is so central to games, it's not surprising that a great deal of game design theory is focused on how to design good interactions. Situational game design is a design methodology that takes into account how play unfolds when the player either is not interacting or is not trying to win. The biggest advantage of situational game design, however, is that it provides an explanation for how games make meaning. It's a tool for getting at how the moves we make during a game translate into the significance that we ascribe to the experience of playing. Most approaches to game design are transactional. They treat games as self-contained systems that stand apart from the player who is playing them. It emerges from the moves the game allows the player to make toward winning, and from the countermoves the game makes in response.
