Emergent gameplay

Emergent gameplay refers to complex situations in video games, board games, or table top role-playing games that emerge from the interaction of relatively simple game mechanics.

Designers have attempted to encourage emergent play by providing tools to players such as placing web browsers within the game engine (such as in Eve Online, The Matrix Online), providing XML integration tools and programming languages (Second Life), fixing exchange rates (Entropia Universe), and allowing a player to spawn any object that they desire to solve a puzzle (Scribblenauts).

Intentional emergence

Intentional emergence occurs when some creative uses of the game are intended by the game designers. Since the 1970s and 1980s board games and table top role playing games such as Cosmic Encounter or Dungeons & Dragons have featured intentional emergence as a primary game function by supplying players with relatively simple rules or frameworks for play that intentionally encouraged them to explore creative strategies or interactions and exploit them toward victory or goal achievement.