What are Game Goals and Objectives?
What are Game Goals and Objectives?
What are Game Goals and Objectives?
Games provide players, users, and learners with opportunities and aspects for interaction for them to engage and pursue a specific outcome. Sometimes those outcomes are set by the players themselves. Especially, if they want something from their experience.
Most of the time, those outcomes are set by the designer, teacher, instructor, or educator. Those are often called goals or objectives. They exist to give players and learners a direction to head in; a path to follow; or a challenge to surmount.
But what exactly are game goals and objectives and why should they be included? This article will review game goals as well as the different and distinct types that exist for players and learners to engage and attempt. These will be compared against transient and fixed goals in game design as well as how they influence and affect what players experience.
Game goals will be covered from a perspective of game design; learning game design; and games-based learning when connecting game goals to learning outcomes. Specific aspects of game goals and how they affect and influence player motivation will be covered in addition to how player engagement promotes flow state, reflection, and play within the magic circle.
This article will also cover how game goals work in concert with player agency and how designers can take advantage of player skill development while simultaneously mitigating luck and randomness. The player experience represents the defining factor for players engaging with games for learning; so, player feedback loops as well as how failure is addressed will also be considered.
Finally, player progression, development, and eventual change will be discussed as well as how accomplishment of goals represents a critical aspect of applied games through games-based learning.
Why Have Game Goals?
Without goals, games just represent activities and pastimes without any real sense of accomplishment; progression; or achievement. Goals also provide a structure and direction for what players are expected to accomplish as well as the rules and expectations for how to accomplish them within the bounds of the game. Therefore, goals represent the respective direction set by the game for what the player should ultimately achieve through their play.
In applied games and games-based learning, goals serve as means to direct and motivate learners to interact and engage with the game and learning content in order to acquire new skills, enhance existing competencies, and/or ultimately change their behavior.
Great goals in games augment and support the overall game structure by providing pacing and organic moments to increase and develop tension towards eventual resolution. All this is done in concert with providing a meaningful interaction with the game itself.
Conversely, bad goals are meaningless, frustrating, pedantic, shallow, and overall lack any real or meaningful engagement that connect the players to the overall structure of the game. Goals can also be convoluted and prescribed in such a way where the game goals are not coherent with the rest of the overall game structure.
If anything; goals should be clear and concise. Thereby serving as a strong beacon and signal encouraging the player to keep playing and engaging in an effort towards accomplishing that particular outcome.
Types of Game Goals
Of course there are many different types of game goals as they relate to the game, content, theme, players, and overall intention of the designer. Different goals also delineate and outline what happens when players succeed or fail at them.
These goals can also be represented as a hierarchy where there are parent goals and child goals that serve and are connected by them. Through this format, game goals serve various purposes for players and can likewise be prioritized and shifted based on immediacy and importance for both a designer as well as the player.
One of the first type of game goals are solitary objectives. Solitary objectives provide direction for players but not necessarily tension for pursuing them. Some solitary objective examples can be found in role-playing games where the main character must travel from one location to another. While the specific outcome of this goal is clear – the arrival at the target location – it is not necessarily wrought with tension as the player does not yet know what lies between their current location and the destination.
Comparatively, juxtaposed objectives are game goals where there is an opportunity cost to pursuing one goal compared to another. This is often seen in modern tabletop games with objective or goal cards. Wingspan is one such game are issued bonus cards at the beginning of the game that determine how their end game board will score according to some pre-determined rubric. Here, players must select just one of two issued cards. Therefore, they must determine which one they believe they will most likely fulfill to their maximum ability.
While juxtaposed objectives are game goals where players must choose one goal at the expense of another; overlaid objectives provide opportunities for players to pursue multiple goals simultaneously. Again, modern tabletop games are replete with examples of juxtaposed objectives. One such case is with Point Salad where players can select point cards that synergize with one another. An example here is a player drafting a card that gives them points for pairs of onions and carrots while later drawing a card that gives them points or individual carrots. Both cards pursue carrots as a way for the player to earn points at the end of the game.
Both beneficial objectives and progression objectives work in concert with one another to progress the player through the game. The difference however, is that beneficial objectives are those that give the player in-game resources or rewards for completion. Many players will recognize this in games where “loot” can be sold for an in-game currency which can be used to purchase other in game items. Comparatively, progression objectives are those that provide the player with some resource, component, or information necessary to move the game towards completion.
Examples of progression objectives are those that provide a key resource that allows a player to trigger an event which signals the end of the game. We can often see this in modern tabletop games when a specific score on a track is reach. Otherwise, players could play until a particular component is won or earned through player activity. Clank!: A Deck-Building Adventure represents this through the capture of artifacts which serve as a de facto signal of progression of the overall game. Lastly, social deduction games such as Secret Hitler also include opportunities for players to ascertain and determine information about other players that allows them to progress the game towards closure.
Many different goals can be used in many different games, however the defining factor for all of them is that they provide some degree of flexibility for the player to pursue and achieve. This is particularly important for games-based learning where instructors must apply the game in such a way were objectives are connected to learning outcomes within the course.
In addition, these applied games can be structured like some commercially available games where different players have different objectives where they are allowed to pursue them through their own means utilizing their own agency. This can often be seen in team-based games or “all versus one” games where a single player possesses asymmetric goals against all other players.
Transient and Fixed Goals
Many goals can be organized in a hierarchy. Though, they can also be organized into different states. Two of those states include transient versus fixed goals. These types of goals are important for the player experience because they influence the meta-affective cost of players dedication, time, and patience playing the game.
This means that players who fail to achieve smaller and shorter transient goals are much less affected than pursuing a fixed goal when they fail. These transient goals are often seen in massive online multiplayer games organized into matches. Winning a match here represents a transient goal. However, participating, completing, and winning those matches also includes some additional rewards for players towards achieving a fixed goal.
The main difference between a transient goal and fixed goal is that transient goals have a specific lifespan. Transient goals in massive online multiplayer games expire at the end of the game – whether a player succeeds or fails. This can be seen in Counterstrike where in-game objectives such as taking a bomb to a certain point and successfully defending it, represents an in-game win. This is compared to a permanent goal that becomes inactive only once success has been reached (i.e. playing a certain number of online competitive matches).
The format of transient versus fixed goals also fits nicely within the previously established hierarchy of game goals where parent goals contain child goals. This means that a series of transient goals can serve a parent goal. The main difference between parent goals and child goals compared to transient and fixed goals is that transient goals that are not attached to a fixed parent goal represent a finite time investment. This means that a loss or setback is not significant so long as it’s not attached to larger fixed goal.
Perhaps one of the most transparent forms of transient versus fixed goals that can be seen in digital gaming environments are those that surround the “achievement” system of Steam and Microsoft XBOX. Here, players complete in-game transient goals which are then applied to achieving out-of-game goal (achievement) tied to their in-game activity.
Goals and Game Design
One of the hallmarks of great game design is the creation, structuring, sequence, and deployment of game goals. Great games give the players much agency in how they approach, define the significance of, and ultimately achieve goals. In addition, great games connect game goals with game mechanics in concert with player interaction which creates game dynamics.
There are many kinds of goals to choose from in game design. Choice and inclusion of these goals can be defined by the designer’s ultimate objective; the outcomes for the player or learner; or the needs of a serious game or simulation. Therefore, not all goals included in a game need to be the same type or demand the same skills from a player. Rather, diversifying what players are doing and how they approach different goals helps provide a more layered and nuanced experience for players.
Designers must first determine what is needed and necessary from the player perspective whenever they are designing and creating goals. What information do they need? What do they need to do or understand? And most importantly, will there some kind of feedback provided to the player to help them determine if they are making positive progress towards achieving that goal?
Feedback in defining the goal seeking process for players is important because they will want to know what they need to do in order to win. This may be easier explained than achieved in some games compared to others. Fighting or wargames that have a high degree of contention often define their win state as when a player is eliminated or is surrounded and neutralized. Whereas in other games such as modern tabletop games; the win state is not as transparent or well defined. Therefore, the player must need to know what actions they must take within the constraints of the game’s mechanics in order to achieve victory.
This means that game objectives should be designed around and critically connected to game mechanics and how players achieve them. The results are games that are tightly focused on what players are doing as part of their core loop. In turn, this directly influences the steps necessary for them to achieve goals which position them to win the game.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that all game actions and mechanics need to serve the end goal state. Rather, game goals can be nested between parent and child goals so that progression is realized in a ladder or step format. The accomplishments of one or more smaller goals helps players progress towards the ultimate accomplishment and achievement of the parent goal.
The best games provide players the decision space; agency; and self-determination for them to make and choose the steps that they will take to achieve this end goal. However, excellent games make these various characteristics central to the game design in addition to making the central conflict of the game critically tied to its theme.
Learning Game Design & Goals
Designing goals for games and designing goals for learning games aren’t always one in the same. This is because serious games designed with learning outcomes in mind must allow players and learners to demonstrate skills, knowledge, and behavior that ultimately have value beyond the game itself. Therefore, learning game designers, serious game developers; and instructors focusing on games-based learning must examine, augment, and ultimately structure their game in consideration of the kinds of goals that help learners achieve a specific learning outcome.
This is because educational games and learning games are more effective when they are designed to address a specific problem or teach a certain skill. Such focus is necessary when learners are playing the game. This is because the goal is not to have students focus on the mechanics and dynamics of the game exclusively; but rather to see the connection between the core loop of the game; game objectives; and the learning outcomes of the educational content.
This doesn’t mean that holistic game design should be ignored. Quite the contrary. Instead, learning game designers should still address the need for “fun” and player engagement throughout game play. However, this should be done with a focus on tying game goals; mechanics; and play to the ultimate learning outcomes and goals of the content. Therefore, the most fun and engaging activities in these learning games should be carefully evaluated and curated for more than just their entertainment value. Rather, their presence must be evaluated and determined to be necessary to helping student achieve a specified learning goal.
Where learning, educational, and serious game designers can excel is through the use of theme and fantasy to affect and influence how leaners interpret, interact, and approach the learning content within the game world. The expectations of the theme within the magic circle of the game make it so that learners and players are embedded within the social constructs of the game in-line with their expected learning outcomes. Such a connection promotes students’ cognitive processes while simultaneously providing them the agency and structure to freely make choices with the learning game’s end goals in mind.
Connecting Game Goals to Learning Outcomes
When looking at game goals and learning outcomes, most people can usually see much of the similarity between them. It’s true that there are many similarities between game goals and learning outcomes. However, there are also some key differences. One of them is that the learning outcomes represent the knowledge and intellectual abilities that we want our learners to gain from playing the game. Whereas, game goals are objectives that players are playing towards achieving in the game. This means that game goals and learning outcomes can move towards the same objective. However, not all great game goals are good learning outcomes and vice versa.
Therefore, a balance must be struck with assessing the integration of learning outcomes and game goals. One must not be compromised in pursuit of another. This is difficult to achieve but can be done when learning outcomes are integrated into the direct development of the game such as with serious games. In addition, game goals can be made more granular with several “child” goals serving an overall “parent” goal in the game that is more closely connected to a specific learning outcome.
Learning games that focus on process and procedural knowledge do this now with games that are most closely follow, mimic, or emulate an actual real world process tied to a specific learning outcome. In this way, players will (by virtue of playing the game) learn the knowledge and skills incorporated as part of the learning outcome in their pursuit of accomplishing game goals.
This doesn’t mean that all game objectives need to be tied to a specific learning outcome. Instead, the overall game design can be focused on student and player engagement with “child” goals that are fun and evocative. In turn, those child goals serve a larger “parent” goal that is closely tied to the stated learning outcome.
Determining how to balance such learning outcomes as a “parent” goal is part of how a learning game designer utilizes game mechanics and dynamics in achieving this aim.
The best learning and educational games are those in which the learning outcomes, goal structures, game mechanics, and game dynamics are closely tied and aligned. This alignment creates a holistic product that emphasizes player engagement and interaction while still significantly serving the overall learning outcome of the game.
Player Motivation, Flow State, and Reflection in the Magic Circle
Game goals and objectives are also critical for incorporating players’ motivations to initially play and continually engaging with the game. There are several motivations that may influence a player to initially play a game. Those that come from outside influence such as real-world rewards for play are driven by extrinsic motivation. Some of those examples include activity or exercise goals that promote weight loss or exercise such as those with Apple Health or FitBit.
Conversely, goals that are aligned with players motivations to seek intrinsic feedback such as the desire to learn, satisfy curiosity, improve their own practice, or overall, positively impact their own personal development are known as intrinsic motivations. Some examples of those include games that focus on collection mechanics where players will want to discover and capture all Pokemon to complete their Pokedex.
Overall, game goals are most motivating when they are clearly defined and align with learners’ interests. Ideally these should address both intrinsic motivation for the greatest engagement and sustained play. That’s because intrinsic goals are those that help players enter, achieve, and attain a state of flow in which they become fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus and full involvement. Such a state supports players enjoyment of play as well as their continual learning and engagement that serves the game’s ultimate learning outcomes.
Therefore, in order to support learners’ flow states, the environment must closely match each students’ particular skill levels as they are matched with appropriately difficult goals that provide immediate feedback. Ultimately this not possible for all learners, goals, and games. But instructors and designers can create situations and structures from which players are provided the opportunity to attempt challenges and overall engage with this format that hopefully promotes these outcomes.
Activity alone doesn’t support achievement and learning outcomes. Rather, students must also be provided with opportunities to reflect upon their experiences and the motivations that influence and motivate their own play. That is because in educational games, learning takes place in both the realm of play as well as through active reflection as part of the experiential learning cycle. This reflection that can occur with the learner, their peers, their instructor, and content alike.
Games however have an added advantage as their creation of the “magic circle” in game play makes it so that different expectations and norms are established from which to base actions and activities. Such a creation emphasizes a connected empathy between learners, players, the game, and learning outcomes where divergent ways to thinking and problem solving often lead to new and novel solutions.
Player Agency, Skill, and Luck in Game Goals
As with learning and game play in general, the player and the student must make an active choice to play, learn, and participate. Likewise, this means that players need to also expend a certain amount of effort in achieving a goal. For game goals specifically, players must use some sort of skill application such as working out a correct sequence of steps, converting resources, or reacting with the correct units in a military campaign. The same can also be said for learning outcomes when learners experience different types of assessments such as quizzes, tests, projects, and presentations which demand that they also invest effort to realize an outcome.
However, unlike with learners, players often approach games with the end goal in mind. This is an outcome focused approach as opposed to a curriculum based one in learning design. That’s because when players sit down to play a game they determine or discover what the goal is, and then determine what they can and should do in order to accomplish it. Whereas with a traditional learning environment, leaners may be more input focused on what they need to do and how to do it in order to successfully participate.
A unique aspect that applies directly to game goals is the provision and inclusion of luck or randomness in the game. A designer could approach goal and objective design as using some kind of combination of luck and skill in determining the outcome. While the inclusion of both do make for some tense moments in game play; the same cannot be said for learning goals and outcomes. Here, learners should have clarity and transparency on what is needed to succeed to accomplish a specific outcome.
However, with games-based learning, a combination of the two approaches is possible. The pure transparency and direction of learning outcomes can be combined with some randomness of game structures that makes decision making in games tense and suspenseful. The downside to this is that learners progress can often be negated through back luck elements. Despite this, players can still invest time and resources into accomplishing a goal so long as there are other mitigating factors that require them to pursue multiple different strategies towards achieving a particular outcome.
No matter how designers, educators, or instructors choose to use or combine learning outcomes and game goals; it’s important to determine and share what the objectives are of a particular activity. This kind of meta-knowledge about goals is useful for learners and players to know even if they do not yet have all of the knowledge necessary for achieve it given the current state of the game.
This is because a certain degree of serendipity and unpredictability creates a feedback loop for players and learners that requires them to continue to return to learning content and even the game itself. While not all of their interactions may always be successful, their continued involvement emphasizes players gradually improving skills over time.
Player Experience, Feedback Loop, and Failure
The combination of player agency and self-determination create environments where students are empowered to seek and work towards a goal. Ultimately this means that they can also choose actions – based on what they know – in pursuit of those goals. In this case, instructors, educators, and learning designers can apply and take a page from applicable game design through the presentation and repetition of learning outcomes and goals. Like games that constantly display objectives and achievements for players, learning content should similarly strive for the same level of transparency for learners.
Many digital games provide status updates for game goals and objectives at key moments in play and update their status as soon as conditions have been met. This serves the same kind of feedback loop for players that continues to provide them agency and direction in how they move forward throughout the game.
If displaying learning outcomes and goals constantly throughout play is egregious or overbearing, then instructors, educators, and designers can also consider bookending in how these objectives are shared. Some games do this at both the beginning and end of a particular level or discrete structure within a game.
Players who receive feedback on this kind of progress can better align and adjust how their investment of time and patience is invested in learning and playing. This is especially appliable for fixed goals where a failure or setback could cause players to stop playing the game entirely. Whereas failing at a transient goal would not represent the same degree of time loss. This difference is important because seeing failure in terms of time loss provides players with an understanding of how play and engagement of a game or learning content fits in with other competitive priorities and activities in their lives.
This is most relatable and applicable in games-based learning where players are actively encouraged to return to play again and again to develop and apply new strategies learned and refined through player failures. Therefore, the feedback loop and experiential learning cycle of games-based learning gives players ample opportunities to lose in order to provide them with the structure and feedback needed to “win.”
Player Progression through Goals Focused Games-Based Learning
This layer and inclusion of feedback is the hallmark and critical aspect of applied games-based learning. The experiential learning framework serves as the way players learn through repetition, failure and the accomplishment of goals. This means that when learning with games; learners should still focus and pursue goals. Those goals can be integrated within the game; as part of the learning content; or a combination of both. The most critical thing to remember is that the process still be scaffolded for learner and player accomplishments. This is already done in games with parent and child goals. With learning outcomes, larger goals should be broken down into smaller and more requisite tasks which make the accomplishment of the end goal much more attainable.
Instructors, educators, and designers can also structure their games-based learning so that goals are created with dependencies in mind. This can be seen in many different aspects of course and curriculum design where smaller and sequential tasks must be accomplished first before attempting a larger and more summative assessment. This is also often seen in role-playing games where specific quests and other objectives must be accomplished first before attempting a larger quest or one that progresses the game’s overall storyline.
Likewise, educators should also carefully observe learners so that goals are adjusted accordingly to their own individual level and perceived efficacy. This is important for learners to enter and achieve a flow state which encourages their highest level of engagement. While this is not possible with all levels and manner of games; digital games often already include frameworks from which the game’s difficult level adjusts to best challenge (but continue) to engage the player.
Further flow for the player can be supported when a new goal is presented after a prior goal is accomplished. This provides the pathing necessary for the player to continue playing as the game provides the next challenge for them to attempt. This is often seen with digital role-playing games where a “quest log” provides players with an overview of the number and types of quests that they have open for accomplishment. Providing check marks next to the quests that have been completed and the ones that have not been attempted yet provides strong and meaningful feedback to the player.
Players and learners alike must find value and significance in accomplishing the goal. This means that they must be invested in its particular outcome. Further significance can be gained by chaining separate goals together that lead to a summative achievement. This is often seen in tabletop games where collecting multiple different sets of components creates scoring opportunities that allow the player to capitalize on them through different scoring rubrics. Likewise, classes and courses that break up and scaffold larger summative assessments into smaller chunks and projects provide learners with the framework in order to achieve them, as well as the steps necessary for them to master prior to accomplishing the final project.
After all, games can be as simple as the accomplishment of an end state. That can be as simple or as complex as the designer or educator wishes. But the creation of that end game goal is what directs, drives, and propels players and learners alike towards its completion.
Takeaways
This article reviewed and discussed game goals and objectives. Reasons for including game goals were included as well as different types of goals often seen in games. The differences between transient and fixed goals were shared as well as how goals are included in the game design process.
Learning games design is distinctly different from commercial game design; therefore, the use the application of goals in that respect was discussed in addition to how game goals are connected to learning outcomes and objectives. Motivation plays a critical role in why and how players engage and play games. This engagement often puts them in a “flow state” which is a heighted state of awareness and engagement. Overall, learning also occurs when players reflect on their game experience because of their participation in the magic circle.
Of course, player agency and skill should be critical determinant factors in games and courses alike. However, the introduction of luck and randomness can have both positive and negative effects for players in their pursuit of game goals. That means that the player experience should be carefully curated for the best possible outcome. Specific dedication should also be paid to the feedback loop for players as well as how learning can be achieved through the experiential framework of success through failure.
Finally, player progression through games-based learning and construction of learning content that is goal oriented and goal focused was discussed and detailed as an effective application of applied gaming.
This article was about game goals and objectives. To learn more about gamification, check out the free course on Gamification Explained.
Dave Eng, EdD
Principal
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Cite this Article
Eng, D. (2022, December 6). What are Game Goals and Objectives?. Retrieved MONTH DATE, YEAR, from https://www.universityxp.com/blog/2022/12/6/what-are-game-goals-and-objectives
Internal Ref: UXP1VXUG66V6