# chapter 7 of games **Opening (not a real abstract):** The Distance in the Game Like traditional works, games have prescriptive frames. But games are also very distinctive from traditional works. They are works that prescribe the active, practically engaged participation of the audience. I discuss that difference in this chapter. In games, the player takes a crucial role in constructing the object of the appreciation. In aesthetic striving games, players appreciate their own activity. The object of their appreciation, then, isn’t entirely fixed by the artist, but is at least partially created by the players themselves. Game designers are interestingly distant from the aesthetic effects at which they aim. Their works leave a special sort of gap for the agent to occupy. I will call this gap agential distance. The goal of game designers is to shape a particular practical activity, **Authors:** [[Nguyen]]