Play Anything: The Pleasure of Limits, the Uses of Boredom, and the Secret of Games

by Ian Bogost Narrated by Jonathan Yen

Overview

Life is boring: filled with meetings and traffic, errands and emails. Nothing we'd ever call fun. But what if we've gotten fun wrong? In Play Anything, visionary game designer and philosopher Ian Bogost shows how we can overcome our daily anxiety; transforming the boring, ordinary world around us into one of endless, playful possibilities. The key to this playful mindset lies in discovering the secret truth of fun and games. Play Anything, reveals that games appeal to us not because they are fun, but because they set limitations. Soccer wouldn't be soccer if it wasn't composed of two teams of eleven players using only their feet, heads, and torsos to get a ball into a goal; Tetris wouldn't be Tetris without falling pieces in characteristic shapes. Such rules seem needless, arbitrary, and difficult. Yet it is the limitations that make games enjoyable, just like it's the hard things in life that give it meaning. Play is what happens when we accept these limitations, narrow our focus, and, consequently, have fun. Which is also how to live a good life. Manipulating a soccer ball into a goal is no different than treating ordinary circumstances-like grocery shopping, lawn mowing, and making PowerPoints-as sources for meaning and joy. We can "play anything" by filling our days with attention and discipline, devotion and love for the world as it really is, beyond our desires and fears. Ranging from Internet culture to moral philosophy, ancient poetry to modern consumerism, Bogost shows us how today's chaotic world can only be tamed-and enjoyed-when we first impose boundaries on ourselves.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

06/13/2016
It’s difficult to imagine a book that takes on David Foster Wallace, Barry Schwartz (The Paradox of Choice), Mary Poppins, and a host of philosophers under one premise. Yet Bogost (How to Talk About Videogames), professor of interactive computing at the Georgia Institute of Technology and founding partner at a video games company, has done so, with moderate success, while dissecting the notion of play. He defines playgrounds as “structures we discover,” fun as “the feeling of finding something new in a familiar situation,” and play as “carefully and deliberately working with the materials one finds in a situation.” Irony, the book’s principal antagonist, is described as a “fundamental affliction of contemporary life.” Bogost doesn’t fully deliver on his grand promise to offer “a perspective on how to live in a world far bigger than our bodies, minds, hopes, and dreams and how to do it with pleasure and gratitude.” Statements like “boredom is the secret to releasing pleasure” and “fun comes from wretchedness” are challenging to comprehend, much less credit. The book is abstract, interesting, complicated, confusing, and baffling, sometimes all at once. (Sept.)

From the Publisher

"[Bogost's] thoughtful book Play Anything makes the point that life's limitations—as with the limitations of a game such as soccer or Tetris—are not impediments to our enjoyment, but rather, what make life or the game fun in the first place."
-New York Times

"Proposing an aesthetic of play, [Bogost] draws on myriad examples, from golf to the task of watering his lawn to his daughter's self-directed rules of 'step on a crack, break your mother's back.' ...[the] idea-driven prose of PLAY ANYTHING might remind you of the applied-philosophy tactics of an Alain de Botton... demonstrate[s] the importance of thoughtful, serious criticism on gaming and play."
-New York Times Book Review


"Of all the books on this list, this may be the hardest to describe, and in my assessment that was an asset. The year saw a few new entries in the 'Tackle life's challenges like a game' category, a thesis that's gaining momentum, but this book goes deeper than most via an enlightening discussion of the role of limits in both games and life. Bogost strikes me as equal parts philosopher and savant game enthusiast-a systems thinker with a penchant for high score formulas-and I'm glad he wrote Play Anything because it's causing me to look at problems in a different way. Read it and I think you'll see why."
-Dan DiSalvo, Forbes.com, Best Brain Books of 2016

"An erudite and often amusing book."
-Wall Street Journal


"Play Anything isn't really just an argument for turning dull tasks into games. It's a manifesto for a different attitude to the world."
-Guardian (UK)


"I can tell you that a great way to have fun with the job of writing a book review-to play while writing it-is by pursuing it earnestly and seriously as a book review. A humble, highly constrained genre. You tell people about the book. You tell them whether you think it's worth reading. (Yes.) And then, instead of allowing your ego to ruin everything by trying to make it cool, you move on in search of the next playground."
-Slate

"Part personal meditation, part guide to living a happier life, Play Anything is a Walden for the 2010s."
-New Scientist


"Play Anything is a one-stop workshop for how to play in the 21st century... a manifesto, and it declares that more recess is good for the soul. Maybe pick this one up in your off-time."
-San Francisco Book Review

"Empowering, fresh, and engaged."
-Kill Screen


"For anyone who cares or works with or thinks about things like fun, enjoyment, happiness, play, and games, Play Anything is a conceptual thrill ride. Poetic. Deeply philosophical. Refreshingly insightful. It will challenge almost everything that you think you know about play, and then lift you towards a new and remarkably freeing perspective on everything else."
-Deep Fun

"An essential read for those seeking to understand how a new idea of play can be positive for our lives."
-Library Journal, starred review


"[Bogost's] arguments are thoughtful and useful for approaching ordinary experiences. A delightful book that promotes playfulness with a purpose."
-Kirkus Reviews


"It's difficult to imagine a book that takes on David Foster Wallace, Barry Schwartz, Mary Poppins, and a host of philosophers under one premise. Yet Bogost, professor of interactive computing at the Georgia Institute of Technology and founding partner at a video games company, has done so."
-Publishers Weekly

"Play Anything is nothing short of brilliant. It proves that philosophy can fun, that fun can be profound, and that play is in fact the bridge that connects what is most meaningful and what is most pleasurable in our daily lives. I will be recommending this provocative and entertaining book to everyone I know."
-Jane McGonigal, bestselling author of Reality is Broken and SuperBetter


"This is one of those books that blossoms: now tacking through intellectual history, now seizing on philosophical argument, now touched by memoir. At its hybrid heart, you'll find the meaning of 'play,' as well as 'fun,' and maybe even 'life.' Maybe you pick it up because, like me, you're a fan of Ian Bogost's essays, or maybe because you've enjoyed one of his previous books. No matter how you approach it, Play Anything will surprise you. You'll realize: this is a book with big ambitions, carrying a theory of the world that is covertly radical and, by the end, nothing short of thrilling."
-Robin Sloan, bestselling author of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

"A landmark. Play Anything is a humane and personal theory of play for the supermodern age. Full of fascinating insight and fresh perspective, Play Anything shows how play serves as a fundamental tool for examining the world around us. Through play we limit, focus, constrain and experiment into order to bring certain aspects of our world to the fore while allowing others to recede. As the basis both for creativity and for well-being, as well as the antidote to detached irony, play is how we all recognize our Davids, big and small, from the infinite blocks of marble all around us."
-Stewart Butterfield, CEO of Slack Technologies


"Play Anything is a profound book: both a striking assessment of our current cultural landscape, and at the same time a smart self-improvement guide, teaching us the virtues of a life lived playfully."
-Steven Johnson, bestselling author of How We Got to Now and Everything Bad is Good for You

Library Journal

★ 08/01/2016
What is play? How do you define fun? Bogost (Ivan Allen Coll. Distinguished Chair in Media Studies, Georgia Inst. of Technology; How To Talk About Videogames) has poured a lot of thought and work into answering those questions. His book doesn't argue for gamifying your life; it explores the conditions necessary for play and fun and convinces us to change how we think about these concepts. Bogost analyzes the everyday—lawn maintenance, golf, navigating a crowded shopping mall—and debunks long-held notions of pleasure. He takes on ideas from high and low culture, challenging in one breath the works of novelist David Foster Wallace and German philosopher Martin Heidegger, and in the next taking down the "spoonful of sugar" from the musical Mary Poppins. Along the way, he examines play in the contexts of creativity, asceticism, boredom, pleasure, and novelty, and in the process challenges readers to rethink its applications. Perhaps Bogost's most trenchant move is pinpointing irony as fun's most powerful archenemy. VERDICT An essential read for those seeking to understand how a new idea of play can be positive for our lives.—Paul Stenis, Pepperdine Univ. Lib., Malibu, CA

Kirkus Reviews

2016-07-19
Why the best way to happily take on the challenges of modern life is to turn them into games.Bogost (Media Studies and Interactive Computing/Georgia Institute of Technology; How to Talk About Video Games, 2015, etc.) disputes the common view that playing games is merely a way to escape the trials and tribulations of life. Underlying the author’s narrative is his rejection of the popular idea that happiness and pleasure are the results of escaping from the pressures of life. For him, rules are what make games fun; they provide a safe space in which a player can explore new possibilities and opportunities. As the author notes, looking at things in unconventional and whimsical ways can replace—or at least enhance—the tedium of routine. These kinds of mental tests provide zest to life and are pleasurable for their own sakes. The author examines games through the lenses of many disciplines, including metaphysics, aesthetics, psychology, and, most prominently, philosophy. Take the case of the humble stick. Recently inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame in Rochester, New York, along with the skateboard and the baby doll, the stick was chosen because it is “very open-ended, all natural, the perfect price.” However, Bogost digs deeper and sees it a bit differently. Sticks have properties such as length, breakability, woodenness, and sharpness, which define their potential and thus, subtly, rules for their use. Rules limit the open-endedness by establishing possible spaces in which working within them evokes creativity. It is no longer simply escapism but “a kind of craftsmanship.” Freedom then becomes “an opportunity to explore the implications of inherited or invented limitations.” Limits also involve humility—not necessarily looking for happiness in ourselves but in pursuing greater respect “for the things, people, and situations around us.” Though some readers may think Bogost takes play too seriously, his arguments are thoughtful and useful for approaching ordinary experiences. A delightful book that promotes playfulness with a purpose.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171112820
Publisher:	Recorded Books, LLC
Publication date:	09/13/2016
Edition description:	Unabridged

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