"No pain - no gain". :P
It's like asking "Is it neccesary to lose in games?". Obviously not, but that neuters the fun and challenge the game's supposed to offer.

Yes.

If you can't lose, someone else can't win. If someone else don't lose, you can't win.

The basic purpose of games is to be able to do something you can't do in reality.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Eagle of Fire @ Sep 11 2007, 07:41 PM) [snapback]310289[/snapback]</div>you can always "play" cooperative

Well simulation games for one kind are not about winning --or dying. But I'd also say that death is necessary most times, but also that a game that's so hard that it gets really frustrating will lose some appeal even if it's very good otherwise.

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I've always pictured playing games as playing against someone. Or something. Playing single player? You're pitting your own wit against the wit of the game developpers. Playing cooperative? You're playing against the computer as a team. Same thing, different approach.

The only difference is that when you play against a computer or simply some game mechanics, the game itself doesn't mind losing all the time. :P

so when you play a socialising game, you are losing against luck or what?

Socialising game......? :huh:

i dunno, sims or mmorpg furcadia

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(_r.u.s.s. @ Sep 11 2007, 10:50 PM) [snapback]310304[/snapback]</div>In fact, Sims has death too. If you don't pay attention to your sim's needs, he/she can die easily. And there is no recovering from THAT. Your former digital alter-ego will still exist tho...in an urn or six feet under in the garden, but the others can only cry at the deceased's remains. (although the later expansion packs have means to avoid, or cheat death, or even bring back dead sims, but that's not the point) Moreover, you sim can get into almost real-life-like situations where they can die instantly. If you have no mechanical skills, and you try to fix your broken TV-set yourself, there is good chance you get electrocuted and die. The same thing goes, if you stay outside in a blizzard in knee deep snow too long, you freez to death.

So simulation games are MUCH more better to depict the real action-consequence deal than any other games. And I think the The Sims series are good at teaching the children who play with those games, a sense of responsibility and providence. The learning curve is almost non existent and the players actions have clear consequences. It's not always totally life-like, but being a game, we can accept that.

But there is no better way to give them a dog to care about. If they mistreat the little puppy and it dies, there is no quicksave to that :/ Life has harsh lessons, games are just games, they are for fun. And I think its no good to makes games totally life-like. We have our own life to be agonized in. Personally I like to play games for fun, and not to be challenged by death. Reaching a certain goal using your skills could be just as exiting that fearing death.