Chapter 5. Creative and Expressive Play

Playing any game involves an element of self-expression because the decisions a player makes reflect his play style: cautious or reckless, aggressive or defensive, and so on. Video games can let players express themselves in the ways traditional games always have and in a variety of other ways as well. This chapter examines several types of creative play that you can build into a game: self-defining play, in which players modify the avatar that represents them in the game; constrained creative play, in which players may exercise their creativity but only within certain limits; freeform, or unconstrained, creative play; and storytelling, in which players present other players with a drama of their own invention. We end the chapter by briefly discussing some features you may wish to include that allow players to modify your game for their own entertainment: level editors, mods, and bots.