This quote, from the now central expression of cultural definition, wikipedia, sums up a brief understanding of the definition of a game. There has been for a while, since I became involved in this hobby really, the idea that what we do is not 'a game' but something else. From this brief introductionary definition I find no problem in finding these key components present in what we do, so why do we have a problem defining it as a game?

I write this now as I unabashedly state that I am 'a gamer'. I live in a world of games and I engage in the playing of them frequently and seriously. Does this make me sad? Perhaps so, but it is a pejorative that does not concern me. But what does this playing of them 'seriously' mean? Does it mean I am obsessed with winning? Well I do like to win, but no it does not. Winning a game is not what drives me play them, playing the game itself is the motivation. This motivation leads me to want my games to be an immersive experience, so that playing them is worthwhile. I seek for the best games to make my experience of playing them better, and constantly seek ways to make the games I play better still. This does not automatically make me desire realism in my games, for not all games have realism as in important element, I want a different experience when playing Cluedo to when I play Hearts of Iron.

So how does this relate to this airsoft malarkey? Well firstly what I want from my game of airsoft differs depending on the game. All games are, to me, inherently social activities (even computer games I can only really be bothered if I can play with someone else) so in the first instance I am only really interested in playing with 'friends'. In this particular scene it is the people that make WWII airsoft so enjoyable, and the reason I attend so many games so frequently. Likewise when I attend an open day I only have the interest in doing so when meeting up with these friends. For these open days what I desire from this game is covered by this, simply playing with these friends is all I desire from the day – like playing Risk with friends, the game is always going to be rubbish, but the friends you are playing it with makes it worthwhile.

The crux of this point, and at this point essay, is how does this seriousness for games effect my view of WWII airsoft? Here the game itself it an important part for me. Though you lovely people are the 'reason' I play it, my seriousness for games make me want more from it then simply shooting guns with friends. I desire to be immersed in the period and the situation, I want to feel like I am taking part in the tactics of the time and, to some degree, experiencing this world. To me it is the challenge inherent in the game (of overcoming the obstacles of the opposition) confined within it's rules (that force our fair play, period attire, and structure) that creates this immersion for me. If we lacked this game element, this challenge, then I feel that so much of the immersion would be lost. A blank fire battle without even the noise.

Without 'the game' there is not much so far as I can see, so why the need to re-label what we do? We haven't changed the activity, it still contains these definitions and I hope it will continue to so. Is it because a game is considered something ephemeral? Something that one picks up and puts down at leisure without ever being truly 'involved' with it? Or is it that we see games as childish, and we wish to be perceived as (like a 13 year old with a stuffed bra and make-up) grown up?

To all these I say, pish Sir! We can be as involved in any game as any event, and we can involve ourselves with this game, taking how it is played and the experience this creates, seriously. We haven't changed what we do, so why change this word. If people see us as childish for playing this game, then let them, I care not. If people perceive themselves as childish for playing, then if you will forgive the wittery, grow up.

Let us not shun this word, but let us embrace it. Let us strike forward from the secure supply base that we play this game and continue to improve what we do. Let us not pretend to improve what we do by re-labelling it, non of us fall for it in politics, why should we here.

In summary (and for those who have skipped to the end 'hello'):

let us not strive to move beyond playing games, let us strive to play better games.

Thank you madam speaker.

Could be a call of how the law will come to see the validity of owning a RIF?

While its hard to justify needing one to play 'a game' (or at least one that is 100 per cent accurate or close to)... re-enactment has a long and credible history in the UK (if you consider ECW re-enactments history at least) and would probably sit better as a valid reason.

Equally how does 'playing games' affect AFRA? Can they insure you and vaidate your purchases for 'games' or for 'living history and reneactment'.

I'm not saying its one or the other just suggesting why some may be more cautious as to the wording of their 'combat event' 'skirmish weekend' 'WWII battle' or whatever other euphamism its been given.

I totally see you point though Craig... and even the most traditional reenactment has an element of 'playing soldiers in the woods' when you get down to grass roots.

I'd say it's more than an "element" gadge. It's just people indulging their fantasies, no matter how you dress it up.

I couldn't care less whether anyone calls it a "game", "event", "combat mission", "airsoft battle" or whatever the hell you want to call it. To me, it's about being among friends who share a common interest and, enjoying myself.

For me too it is about it being a good time with friends who share an interest.

For what they are game is as good a name as any unless legal definitions force a change to something else and then any of the options mentioned seem fine. I was thinking of "Exercise" but I think it misses out on the required sense of fun or enjoyment that I good event should have.

All part of why the events contain realistic elements but are not recreations. They thankfully all miss out the people coming to bits part that makes real warfare so distressing.

Yup, totally Pete. What i was getting at though as well was even a Sealed Knot 'living history encampment' is really a group of guys (and families) playing make believe in a field, you might be able to justify it as terribly important historical stuff but if its wasnt fun and folf were not as you say 'indulging fantasises' then they wouldnt be doing even that.

Some one obviously enjoys waving a pike around wearing huge trousers as much as we love running around in webbing and wool

Strangely Craig, I feel that I should be giving your short essay a mark of some sort. But since you couch the essay in the style of debate a mark, I suppose, would be inappropriate.

A debate it is then!

"Game" as you rightly say conjures up all sorts of fun/play thoughts and there is nothing wrong with that. (Not sure about wearing a bra and makeup though.) However, CiA a good while ago switched to the word 'WW2 combat events' for three reasons.
1) to distinguish our events from other's more pure entertainment themed airsoft events
2) to give emphasis to the more serious side of what we do, that is historical and what one would call reenactment
3) to distinguish our events with monumental time and effort put into creating them from some light-hearted blat in the woods with a concept thrown together

Gadge has pointed out that there may be legal issues, should it be thought having a laugh in the woods wasn't sufficient reason to be allowed to buy a RIF, and this is a very important consideration.

So, yes, we do it for various reasons - comradeship, getting out of the house, conceptual game-play, shooting people, reliving history and so on. Pick and choose as you wish - same as trad reenactment, chaps do it for all sorts of reasons, history may not play a part of it, other than incidentally.

Now, I'm not a 'gamer' - I have no concept whatsoever of why table top stuff would be of any interest to a grown man (or an ungrown man come to that) - but I do seek the thrill of recreating and reliving the past and building some sort of concept of what it must have been like on the front line, and when out of game building a historical knowledge to make sense of it all.

So, in conclusion madam speaker, I'd be disappointed if players thought of CiA events just as games - quite possibly they would be missing the point (and will be a brutal shock this coming weekend!). An Event is what we are seeking - something special. Airsoft reenactment if you will, without scaring of people who fear or uncomfortable with the word reenactment. A game is just a game. Or a game is just part of an Event.

(As an aside, when trying to come up with a name that summed it up we discovered how few words in the English language there were that fitted!)

Note: My reference to CiA is not to denigrate anyone else's efforts at organisation but an explanation of why we call what we do err... what we do. Other events and games are available

WWII airsoft is a game. No point in pretending that it's anything else. All this stuff about paying respect to the veterans and teaching the youngsters about the war is pish. Immersion and realism are all important to the enjoyment of a CiA game just the same as they would be for a computer game.

We do it because we have fun doing it. It's a game.

I thank my learned colleague from Bedfordshire and Hartford for his wise words

Firstly, there could be legal issues, but I would be dismayed to find them for our rights to play games should be as seriously protected as our rights to attend events. To assume otherwise is to misunderstand the nature of the game by assigning it less importance than another activity.

This is exactly what the Right honourable Mr Chomley Warner has done. The three reasons cited are all disguises of the same point, that of defining something as being more serious than a mere game. It this notion of seriousness that I wished to address, given that you appear to agree that by definition the activity we undertake is a game. Firstly it is fun, that is why we engage in it of course, and this is the reason all people engage in any activity that is not work. Yet, as with re-enactment, just because something is fun does not mean you cannot take it seriously.

Martins point that 'All this stuff about paying respect to the veterans and teaching the youngsters about the war is pish' is one I wholeheartedly agree with. This is not because I engage in what I see as game, as opposed to something serious - I feel the same way about re-enactment. As Gadge said it is about 'playing soldiers in a wood' - for me it is about camping with friends in a funny hat - but I engage in re-enactment as 'seriously' as I do with WWII airsoft, a game.

However Chomley-Warner would be disappointed to think people thought of CiA events as games, well I hate to disappoint Mr Chomley, but I have.

I also see this coming weekend as a game, and you think this will shock me. I do not think it will, for your definitions have all been based not so much on what a game is, but on what you perceive a gamer to be. I approach CiA games as, I hope you are aware, not as some casual amusement thing, or something thrown together with little thought, but as an immersive experience. Indeed I have been looking forward to this 24 hour game because the living history element adds to the game for me.

You have even acknowledged that part of this 'event' is a game, and concluded that a game is either part of an event, or just a game. I would instead conclude that though a game is indeed just a game, if it is good enough one it becomes an event by virtue of it's qualities.

I see no contradiction in seeing, and indeed defining, Airsoft Re-enactment as a game, but would find it counter productive to loose the elements of our activity that are those of a game to those that are a not. for I think think this would remove the most immersive, challenging elements. It is not to denigrate the 'monumental time and effort put into creating' CiA games that I define them thusly, for I consider it far harder, all consuming and worthwhile to create a good game, than a good event.

It may be a game but the terms in which you couch the game make it historically relevant.
You adopt the uniforms and to a degree tactics of the period. You chose names for your games that are from the period. You attempt to have units that are accurate for the original battle.
This sounds more like a re-enactment of a single period of WW2 than most 're-enactor' battles where unit accuracy is often compromised for the sake of numbers or inclusivity.
I dont see a problem with this meeting AFRAs requirements.

I was going to ask AFRAs opinion in this regard given the points raised, and I commend them for making them thusly.

I think no matter how we try to perceive it we all make somewhat freudian slips in our terminology.

It may be as CW points out a lack of suitable terminology but I know i've been guilty of shouting 'game on' at the start of some combat missions (and much as i'd like to pretend it was it wasnt a 40s style 'oh isnt war a lark' officerism ) and only the other day headshot posted a thread about a 'post match' BBQ.

I think the nature of it being a game is very firmly entrnched as we nearly all essentially come from an open day 'gaming' route.

Thats excellent Stig but to play devils advocate and clarify if I were to apply to AFRA in order to get a RIF to play WWII Games that would be ok then?

edit: by that i dont mean to be truculant , im just interested in the terminology. I know that kit has to be of a 'good reenactor standard' (im sure i read that somewhere) but do you have to actually profess to be a re-enactor?

Ah, you see Wladek, you are just playing with words in your rather naughty and conceptual way.

A CiA event is an event. That's what it says. You can choose to call it a game, no matter, you can call your left foot your right hand if you wish. You might even say you can walk on your hands therefore it is a foot (but I don't think you would).

While both 'games' and 'events' (or a substitute thereof) are both fun there is in a change of word an implied definition between the casual and the considered, the silly and the serious. When I first started airsoft it was a game - no meaning other than dressing up vaguely like a soldier and shooting other people legally. Awesome fun. For a while. It would be a disaster if someone seeking such entertainment for such seekers of simple entertainment were to join a CIA game - it has happened and it doesn't work. They don't get it.

So, 'games' and 'events' are not mutually exclusive, just that one offers more than the other, should you seek it.

By the way, I'm not disappointed Craig, you qualified your statement to show exactly why you think CiA events are more than a game, even if you protest otherwise!

Indeed, a lack of suitable words, and a 'history' - I can't stop myself shouting "HIT" instead of "Aaaaarrrggh"

But again Gadge, you're choosing to define a "game" as something trivial. Think of the millions of pounds and many years of many lives that go into a little venture called the Olympic Games.

I don't hear anyone calling them the Olympic Events