Gameplay is the specific way in which players interact with a game, and in particular with video games. Gameplay is the pattern defined through the game rules, connection between player and the game, challenges and overcoming them, plot and player's connection with it. Video game gameplay is distinct from graphics and audio elements.

Overview

Arising alongside video game development in the 1980s, the term gameplay was used solely within the context of video games, though now its popularity has begun to see use in the description of other, more traditional, game forms. Generally, gameplay is considered to be the overall experience of playing a video game excluding factors like graphics and sound . Game mechanics, on the other hand, is the sets of rules in a game that are intended to produce an enjoyable gaming experience. Academic discussions tend to favor terms like game mechanics specifically to avoid gameplay since the latter term is too vague.

Gameplay types

There are three components to gameplay: “Manipulation rules,” defining what the player can do in the game, “Goal Rules,” defining the goal of the game, and “Metarules,” defining how a game can be tuned or modified. In video games gameplay can be divided into several types. For example, cooperative gameplay involves two or more players playing on a team. Another example is "twitch" gameplay which is based around testing a player's reaction times and precision, maybe in rhythm games or first-person shooters. Various gameplay types are listed below.

Gameplay was a Russian language magazine about video games, published in Ukraine by ITC Publishing since August 2005. Its circulation (as for September 2009) was 20 000. It ceased publication in June 2010.

Staff

Notable writers for the magazine include Editor-in-Chief Serhiy Halyonkin (often referred as Segal), editors Anna Zinchenko and Alina Zhigunova, authors Oleg Ovsienko, Mikhail Zinchenko, Yaroslav Singayevsky and Igor Klimovsky.

Magazine content

Gameplay is best known for its "Evolution of genres" series of articles, that describes history and evolution of computer and video games for past 30 years.

Each April issue carries a theme "Our games" and writes about most game developers studios, situated in Ukraine.

Also, Gameplay publishes previews, reviews, interviews and such - as most of gaming press do.

Controversy

Some readers note that Gameplay gives a lot of attention to video games, sometimes giving a console games a higher score than to PC games. But editorial boards say that it is because of higher popularity of PC games in Ukraine, which sometimes is credited to higher level of piracy.

Gameplay refers to the way a player interacts with a game.

Gameplay may also refer to: