Simulation in Games

The following section will be trying to provide an overview about “simulation” as a generic form of computer-games as well as it’s going to exemplify characteristic aspects of “simulation games” by the example of the game series The Sims (Maxis, 2000-2013) on the one hand and Gran Turismo (Polys Entertainment/Polyphony Digital, 1997-2017) on the other. Most of the topics are mainly based on the assumptions established by Seth Giddings and Espen Aarseth, which can be looked up in The Routledge Companion to Video Game Studies (2016). Providing an adequate and valid definition of “simulation-games” turns out to be an exceedingly challenging task, not only because the term “simulation” inherently contains a massive variety of definitions and meanings. Looking at some examples of use, the problem, resulting from plurality and especially diversity of games considered as “simulation-game”, becomes even more obvious: The spectrum extends from “bird’s” or “god’s eye-perspective-games” like The Sims to military-strategy and economy-strategy games like the Anno series (Max Design/Related Designs/Blue Byte, 1998-2019) towards various vehicle simulations. All of them can extremely differing from each other in terms of viewpoint, gameplay, interface or used controller (e.g. a steering wheel used for racing simulations or a special joystick to operate an aircraft in Flight Simulator (Microsoft, 1982-2020)). According to Giddings, simulation-games often follow a “sandbox” – system, therefore one can state that an “open-ended structure” can be seen as a characteristic aspect of this generic form of computer-games. This leads to the conclusion that, on the player’s part, testing the system within an arranged setting of variables is one of the key features of “simulation games”.