Memetic game concepts: Approaching content evolution in games

Huizinga (8) denotes that games exist since the dawn of men. Without noticing these games must have always carried MEMES because successful games or parts of games survived over long periods of time, even when not being played. In 1976, Dawkins (5) described in "The Selfish Gene" MEMES as minimal knowledge elements/fragments which exist and evolve over time. Successful MEMES survive over long periods of time and adapt gene-like to the environment. In recent years, the computer game industry strove for mechanisms and approaches for creating more successful computer games. If a game concept proved well for one title, the common approach was and still is to re-use this approach for a sequel. This is basically nothing more than an evolution of concepts and techniques a Meme life-cycle. Why not create an explicit environment and therein techniques which allow easy content and concept evolution? This paper proposes a platform implementing the Meme-Media Technology developed by Tanaka (16) in digital games. Such a resulting system would grant deeper insights into the evolution process and creation of new game concepts and game content. Thus, allowing game developers to create more effective games.