I've often wondered at the competitive streak in human beings. Sure, it is an important survival trait for a species vying against others in Nature's food chain. But in our synthetic world of competing fast-food chains, that contentiousness is inflated to near-ridiculous proportions.

Some of our race's more gentle members claim that competition isn't an innate element of human nature, but rather something imparted to individuals by a violent society.

But I'm not convinced. As far as the question of " nature versus nurture" is concerned regarding competitiveness, I lean pretty firmly toward "nature" as the source. In part, that attitude is due (as I've mentioned in a previous article) to the fact that some of our teeth are designed for tearing meat, and that a few essential proteins are extremely difficult to acquire from a diet of plants. Biologically, then, we bear evidence of our ancestry; our forebears chased, killed, and ate animals, an image of competition in its most primal form. Also, I think that it is telling that the Western world's free market economy - which depends upon competition as its driving force - continues to thrive while noncompetitive models collapse under the weight of their own lethargy. My opinion is further firmed by the accounts of pacifists who have tried to keep their sons away from "war toys," only to find them pointing sticks at friends and hollering "Pow! Pow!"

However, modem society also depends on cooperation to a great extent. (After all, some of our teeth are designed for grinding plants, too, typical of herd animals.) We rely upon one another to fill specific needs, and develop specialists to supply food, water, electricity, medical care... and even entertainment. But paradoxically, the nature of that entertainment is quite often competitive. Consider popular sports, for example. Basketball, football, hockey, car racing, all involve human-to- human competition. Even in sports such as mountain climbing, in which climbers are apparently battling the rock face itself and the elements of nature, the goal is to beat an earlier record for speed or height; in other words, to do better than the individual who holds that record - to "best" that person, if you will. Sports involving head-to-head competition simply make our rivalry more obvious.

Given our heritage as both plant- and meat- eaters as both "bonders" and "competers" - it shouldn't be surprising that there is some difference of opinion over just how competitive a game ought to be. My spouse, for example, enjoys games in which cooperation plays a large part and despises games that pit individuals against one another, while I generally prefer the thrill of "dogeat-dog" individual competition and find cooperative games enjoyable only as an occasional break from savagery. The fact that both sorts of games continue to be produced says that there are lots of people out there from each perspective, and I certainly have a number of friends in each camp.

Largely, though, I think it is more a question of degree than of pure dichotomy. The team games my spouse prefers give her the satisfying feeling of working together, but she is still involved in a competition. And while I enjoy contests of individual prowess, I prefer to play things that move quickly, allowing several games to be played in one session, so that everyone has a good chance of going home having won at least once.

What's more, I enjoy watching people grow and learn from the games they play. I have a friend who used to become so irritated when the dice seemed to be against him that he would often throw them across the room. As weeks grew into months, and months into years, he steadily gained control over that irritation, and I am positive that it mirrored the growth of patience in his daily life. I have learned a few lessons along that line myself, lessons about not taking things too seriously, and about putting competition into perspective.

Perhaps the best example of my learning that lesson involves a session of the Chill: Black Mom Manor board game. In this game, players investigate a haunted house; seeking to destroy the evil master lurking there. The game is designed in such a way that the master changes from session to session, so each game session involves solving the mystery of what sort of creature the master is, what powers are at its disposal, and what item is required to defeat it. To set up the mystery, the game begins one player in the role of a minion of the master, and that player constructs the event deck to reflect the particular creature to be defeated.

The other players take the roles of envoys of S.A.V.E., a secret society which combats the supernatural. Over the course of play, envoys who lose all their willpower become, minions, while minions can be "saved" from their evil enslavement, thereby joining the ranks of the envoys. Envoys win the game cooperatively, by together defeating the master; minions can only win individually, by being the one who carries off the board the one item capable of defeating the master.

In this particular session, I began the game as the minion - so I knew who the master was and my spouse and a close friend were envoys. As play progressed, they managed to rescue me from the master's dominance. And yet - I am ashamed to admit - I would not tell them who the master was.

My reasoning was that the object necessary for defeating the master had not yet showed, and if, in the course of continuing the game, I became a minion again, I wanted the edge of being the only one to know what item was necessary to win the game. It was a wargamer's way of thinking, keeping the upper hand, covering all options. But my spouse and friend were incredulous at my attitude... and then disgusted. As things turned out, I did end up a minion once again, and with the edge of having kept the master's identity secret, I won the game.

It was a hollow victory. The other two players were really "cheesed," and as I thought things over during the next several days (having plenty of time to do so, considering that conversation at home was strangely scarce), I came to see that from, my spouse's and friend's perspective I had violated the spirit of the game.

Undoubtedly, a "real" person, having been rescued from a monstrous master's control, would have blabbed everything he knew about the master. Considering that, only a weasel player would refuse to do so in the game.

Mea culpa.

I've definitely benefited from the experience, gaining new insights into what strings different games pluck in the human psyche. That's knowledge that serves a game designer well. Oh, and by the way, I apologized about that particular session of the Black Morn Manor game, and things are fine at home now.