Water Cooler Games served as the web's primary forum for "videogames with an agenda" — coverage of the uses of video games in advertising, politics, education, and other everyday activities, outside the sphere of entertainment.
The site was maintained at watercoolergames.org from 2003-2009, where it was edited by myself and Gonzalo Frasca. It is now archived here in full.
I recently found out about The Grocery Game on a parenting/education message board. The website gives subscribers access to a special grocery list, sorted by store and US location. The list is designed to maximize savings through strategic use of coupons and stockpiling.
It's admittedly not an electronic game in the traditional sense. But I found it interesting that she chose to call it a game -- there is certainly an underlying goal (save as much money as possible), as well as a simple ruleset (stockpile rules + coupon rules - "I use coupons like trading stock!") that yields an outcome. The outcome is, arguably, an emergent one: the simple rules need to combine with the player's individual shopping habits to yield the savings.
I found myself wondering if this was a scripted game, so a family of four would have to buy all the same stuff to "win." But reading the message boards, each individual seems to have their own individual approach to the list.
Also interesting is the competition the game generates. The message boards have entire threads devoted to savings for a particular week. I thought this was an interesting variation on the "leader board" concept - there's no hierarchy here, just an opportunity to share how well you did. Since most of the Grocery Gamers are women (presumably they're predominately 35 - 55), I wonder if this doesn't offer an interesting design lesson regarding women and competition. Often we hear that women don't like competition in games, but I think most of us know that women are often bitterly competitive. They also frequent message boards. It's interesting to see how the Grocery Game players turn the leaderboard into a community forum. It's not just about winning, it's also about telling people what you did and how you did it.
There's also some interesting lessons to learn about winning in The Grocery Game. Cash savings are obviously winnings in a literal sense, and to a lesser extent so is fooling the grocery industry by refusing to play by their profit maximizing rules. But the real winnings seem to come from what people do with what they save. Here's an example from the boards:
Finally, it's worth remarking on this kind of integration between a digital game (if you can call the website a game) and the real world. The game itself takes place on the supermarket aisles, while the rules, scoring, and winner's circle takes place online. In this sense, the electronic aspect game is more of a digital clubhouse.
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