Fighting games
Under the generic name of fighting games , game science summarizes a number of very different game forms, which only agree that their game idea follows the fighting argument and the competitive principle . Within the variety of manifestations of the genre, the individual fighting game can be presented as a board game , a sports game, a war game or a terrain game . Some historical fighting games have survived the millennia in contemporary forms. For example, the ancient chariot race has turned into a modern car race . Other games such as tree trunk throwing are limited to a regional tradition.
character
The word formation expresses linguistically the typical combination of fight and game for this type of game. All kinds of fighting games try to determine an individual or team winner in the creation of opponents and the playful confrontation between them. The competition can be played as a board game (chess), in the sandpit (knight or soldier games ), in the field ( military maneuvers , paintball ), on the sports field (as a team game, soccer or party games such as dodgeball or hunter's ball), in the hall (basketball) , in the water (water polo), in the arena (bull games) or in the air (kite, model airplane competitions). What is essential is the characteristic of fighting in a playful form with the aim of determining a winner among the opponents.
Fighting games in the saga
Greek legend
As the poet Homer reports in his Odyssey , fighting games were held in honor of the Greek hero Odysseus , who ended up on the shores of the Phaiacs on his way back from the Battle of Troy , in which the guest distinguished himself through his extraordinary strength and skill, which was considered an indication and proof of its noble origin.
Germanic legend
Siegfried and the Burgundian King Gunther , who moved with him to Iceland for a bridal show, had to win against Brünhild in fighting games according to the Nibelung legend in order to be able to bring her home to Worms on the Rhine as his wife. The suitor had to defeat the hostess in a three-way battle of stone throwing, javelin throw and long jump.
Fighting games in history
Pre-Olympic era of antiquity
From ancient Egypt of the pharaohs , from ancient Greece , from the Byzantine Empire and from the Etruscans , chariot races with two or four-horse chariots are handed down as a fighting game of the warrior nobility, which lasted until the Roman Empire. The oldest written account of such a fighting game was written by the poet Homer in his Iliad , where he describes in detail an agon of death in honor of Patroclus who fell before Troy .
In addition to the chariot races, other types of fighting gradually emerged, which the Greeks called " agone " (ἀγών = "fight", "competition", "fighting game") and, in the Panhellenic Games, as gymnic (= athletic), hip (= equestrian) and performing musical (= poetic) agons.
Olympic games
The since 776 BC The Olympic Games held every four years in ancient Greece were regarded as fighting games and at the same time as a festival of peace for the (Greek) peoples, during which all armed conflicts had to rest. In the course of its three-phase history, which spanned almost three millennia, the Olympic fighting games repeatedly changed their shape and ideological orientation.
Gladiator games
The circus games with gladiators and wild animals, which were held in the famous Colosseum of Rome, but also in the arenas of the provinces during the Roman Empire, enjoyed great popularity among the population. With the free offer “Panem et circenses” (bread and games) senators could win elections, the emperors kept the population calm. Between 264 BC BC and AD 400 entertained the Roman population in the form of single fights, group fights or animal fights in public displays.
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Jousting
Throughout the entire European Middle Ages, the knights competed against each other in tournaments with regard to their martial skills and thereby won fame, honor, respect with the audience and the favor of the emperor and the noble ladies. The actors went to the fighting game individually or in groups, and even emperors (such as Maximilian I (1459-1519), who was referred to as the "last knight") did not shy away from taking part.
Bullfighting games
The traditional playful fighting with a bull known since ancient Greece (Greek ταυρομαχία = Tauromachia = bullfighting), primarily from the bull-breeding countries of the Mediterranean and South America, has numerous variants: In the palace of Knossos on Crete there is a bull jumping fresco from the Minoan Period (1600–1450 BC), which gives an impression of the bull games of the early epoch. Three artists apparently skip the charging bull with an artful somersault. The ritual game symbolized the triumph of man over the strongest animal in the Mediterranean. Later bull games since the Middle Ages represent deadly battles between a matador on foot or on horseback ( Rejoneador ) with the bull in an arena. But they can also be played in bloodless, playful confrontation with the bull: For example, try the "Courses à la Cocarde "courageous" razeteurs " to snatch a cockade attached between the horns from the bull . In Portugal, seven so-called "forcados" try without a weapon, only with courage and physical dexterity, to knock down the bull by the head and tail.
Fighting games today
The genre of fighting games is presented today in a variety of forms, such as board games, parlor games, sports games, outdoor games or war games. Only a few examples can be given.
Board games
A very old fighting game played on the game board, in which one can qualify up to participation in the world championship, is the game of chess . It was even valued by the nobility in the German Middle Ages.
Board games
The finger-wrestling handed down from the Alpine region , which is also figuratively expressed in the idiom “pulling someone over the table”, is an old pub game in which the aim is to pull an opponent over to you with strength, skill, cunning and trickery. Today it is also used in sporting competitions.
Sports games
The sporting fighting games include above all the so-called "big sports games" football, indoor handball, basketball, ice hockey, tennis or table tennis, which are played in championships, often also by professional players. But also regionally important sports games such as the Scottish tree trunk throwing ("caber toss"), the tug of war popular in countries like Switzerland, Sweden or Spain or rugby , which is very common in Anglo-American countries, belong to the category of sports games.
Terrain games
In Afghanistan , but also in China and Japan , fights between kite players take place regularly during the windy season, the aim of which is to use skill, tricks and technical skills to cut the cords of the other kites and in this way to get them out of the sky. The Afghan-American writer Khaled Hosseini memorialized this fighting game, which is popular and widespread in his country, in his bestseller “The Kite Runner”. The novel, published in 2003 under the title "The Kite Runner" (German "kite runner"), was also made into a film in 2007.
War games
War games can be found in all peoples on earth. They range in their range from the Indian or knight games of the children to the military maneuver games simulating warlike actions. The word “ war ” often leads to misunderstanding of the symbolic character of the playful genre, confusion with real war and a correspondingly hasty fundamental condemnation of these forms of play.
Fighting game and martial arts
While in fighting games ( car racing , tug of war , burning ball , batball , chess ) the playful moments of a competition predominate, rather the fun factor is in the foreground, martial arts ( kendō , budo , boxing , wrestling , fencing , karate , taekwondo ) are far tougher , specialized, often characterized by professional athletes after hard training arguments. The transitions between fighting game and martial arts are fluid and can be seen in the sports games (soccer, basketball, indoor handball, ice hockey), which aptly document their hybrid position between game and sport through the combination of words.
rating
Fighting games meet with rejection in public opinion above all if they lead to gross injuries, are bloody played or even aim to kill an animal or person. This is particularly true of historical forms, such as bullfighting.
In recent times, psychological and educational considerations have primarily played a role in relation to the character of the game: For example, with the emerging peace movement in favor of the so-called "alternative forms of play" it created, some educators discredited the game in the 1970s. In contrast to the societal trends that are perceived as overpowering, the opposition should give way at least in play to togetherness, competition and the thought of struggle at least in the play of cooperation and peaceful interplay. Games in which there should be no winners and losers and, accordingly, no tears, were favored over so-called zero - sum games , in which the amount of victory of one meant a correspondingly hard defeat for the other. In addition, war games of all kinds were outlawed.
On the one hand, the new game movement opened up awareness of the one-sidedness of exclusively combat- and competition-oriented games in the educational field, which was especially suitable for strong players who were used to winning and often excluded weaker players. On the other hand, she built up a new one-sidedness which in the long term took away the tension that motivates and supports the game. In addition, the initially euphoric propagation of the peace games overlooked the fact that both the party games and the team games usually involve both competition and cooperation: the competition is played in opposition to the other team. The partnership proves itself in the skillful interplay within our own ranks.
What has remained from the debate that has been going on for more than a decade is the realization that fighting games lose their pedagogical legitimacy if they absolutize the performance principle as the only dimension of playing in the school and education sector in the depiction of a successful society and thus lose sight of the cultural diversity of gaming.
Today's play education teaches that games should be designed as versatile as possible and one-sidedness should be avoided.
literature
- Alan Baker: Gladiators. Life and death fighting games . Goldmann Verlag, Munich 2002. ISBN 3-442-15157-0 .
- Josef Fleckenstein (Ed.): The knightly tournament in the Middle Ages . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1985, ISBN 3-525-35396-0 .
- Andreas Gutsfeld, Stephan Lehmann (Hrsg.): The gymnic agon in late antiquity. Gutenberg 2013, ISBN 978-3-940598-18-9 .
- Fik Meijer: Gladiators. The game of life and death . Patmos Verlagsgruppe, Düsseldorf 2004, ISBN 3-7608-2303-3
- Siegbert A. Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: Compete by playing - competitions. In: Dies .: The sense of playing. Reflections and game ideas . 4th edition, Schneider, Baltmannsweiler 2016, ISBN 978-3-8340-1664-5 , pp. 57-64.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Alan Baker: Gladiators. Life and death fighting games . Goldmann Verlag, Munich 2002
- ↑ Josef Fleckenstein (Ed.): The knightly tournament in the Middle Ages . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1985
- ↑ Khaled Hosseini: Kite Runner . Berliner Taschenbuch-Verlag, Berlin 2003
- ^ A b Siegbert A. Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: War Games. In: Dies .: The sense of playing. Reflections and game ideas . 4th edition, Schneider, Baltmannsweiler 2016, ISBN 978-3-8340-1664-5 , pp. 126-145
- ^ Siegbert A. Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: Controversial forms of play. In: Dies .: The sense of playing. Reflections and game ideas . 4th edition, Schneider, Baltmannsweiler 2016, ISBN 978-3-8340-1664-5 , pp. 126-161
- ↑ T. Orlick: New cooperative games. More than 200 competitive free games for kids and adults . Weinheim and Basel. 4th edition 1996
- ↑ Siegbert A. Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: Playing against each other - competitions. In: Dies .: The sense of playing. Reflections and game ideas . 4th edition, Schneider, Baltmannsweiler 2016, ISBN 978-3-8340-1664-5 , pp. 57-64