Topic analysis

Trivial Pursuits: Review of C. Thi Nguyen's *The Score* on Games and Gamification

This London Review of Books essay by David Runciman reviews philosopher C. Thi Nguyen's book *The Score*, which distinguishes between healthy, voluntary value-adding game play and extractive, coercive societal gamification that reduces human experience to measurable, marketable metrics. Runciman critiques Nguyen's binary framework, noting that many formal scoring systems ranging from etiquette to university rankings have both oppressive and liberating dimensions depending on context and access to rules.