Not to disagree with Kant, but I think I’ll disagree with Kant. Not real bad though. Just enough to say that he stops short when he says, “The understanding is hungry after rules, and it is satisfied when it finds them.”

I will go so far as to say that there is absolutely no satisfaction to be found at the mere discovery of rules. Satisfaction cannot arise until we realize (in both its discovery sense and its completion sense) the path to exploit those rules to bring about our victory over the rules. I think a lot of us settle for victory within the rules, but our longing is for victory over the rules.

I do like both the name of the site to which Rich referred us (as I loved Clu Clu Land) and the point made that games are the perfect medium for exploring this one particular kind of human desire—despite the fact that far too often, the author’s wrong and we do know the rules of the game before engaging them (but bemoaning stale game development is so vogue and hip that I’ll politely abstain until it becomes the renegade’s province once more).

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