If the last few weeks have been about games informing culture, than this week is undeniably about culture informing games.

Liubo and Weiqi have an interesting position in the games realm. They both represent ancient, sort of transcendentally mystical and aesthetically important games that were played (and to some extent are still played) for a very specific cultural purpose. Yao Wei’s Disquition on Boyi gives a glance into a very specific period of games history — where the predominant culture surrounding certain games lead to intrinsic changes in the aesthetic experience of playing them.

Maggie wrote an interesting essay relating to this that I had the pleasure of reading a few weeks back called The Games People Play. While it encompassed a much larger swathe of material than Boyi, a large part of the essay revolves around the distinct effect societal perception has on games and the way they are played. In this example, Mahjong’s evolution over time and the preservation of its aesthetic principles — loud sounds, penny betting, and large tables to name a few — were a direct response to the various criticisms and societal reactions to the game and those who played it.

Back to Boyi, it’s clear that the Confucianist reaction towards the game fundamentally interacted with the larger cultural perception of those who played the game and how it was played. While largely an analysis of these reactions, it becomes clear through the text that regardless of its foundations the criticism had a direct relation to the societal views towards the game.

Essentially, games provide a two way road; games influence culture and are fundamentally influenced by that culture themselves. It’s an interesting dynamic, and one that has undeniably lead to both the evolution and dissolution of many games throughout history.