In game design the Mechanics-Dynamics-Aesthetics (MDA) framework is a tool used to analyze games. It formalizes the consumption of games by breaking them down into three components - Mechanics, Dynamics and Aesthetics. These three words have been used informally for many years to describe various aspects of games, but the MDA framework provides precise definitions for these terms and seeks to explain how they relate to each other and influence the player's experience.
There are eight type of Aesthetics as stated by Hunicke, LeBlanc and Zubec:
- Sensation (Game as sense-pleasure): Player experiences something completely unfamiliar.
- Fantasy (Game as make-believe): Imaginary world.
- Narrative (Game as drama): A story that drives the player to keep coming back
- Challenge (Game as obstacle course): Urge to master something. Boosts a game's replayability.
- Fellowship (Game as social framework): A community where the player is an active part of it. Almost exclusive for multiplayer games.
- Discovery (Game as uncharted territory): Urge to explore game world.
- Expression (Game as self-discovery): Own creativity. For example, creating character resembling player's own avatar.
- Submission (Game as pastime): Connection to the game, as a whole, despite of constraints.
The paper seeks to better specify terms such as 'gameplay' and 'fun', and extend the vocabulary of game studies, suggesting a non-exhaustive taxonomy of eight different types of play. The framework uses these definitions to demonstrate the incentivising and disincentiving properties of different dynamics on the eight subcategories of game use.
From the perspective of the designer, the mechanics generate dynamics which generate aesthetics. This relationship poses a challenge for the game designer as they are only able to influence the mechanics and only through them can be produced meaningful dynamics and aesthetics for the player. The perspective of the player is the other way around. They experience the game through the aesthetics, which the game dynamics provide, which emerged from the mechanics.