I think that this topic greatly ties in with the whole idea of games as a form of art. Basically it really just depends on what people believe a game is, or what they believe the purpose of a game is.
Again i don’t think that it can be so strictly defined, there is no reason for it to be either. Games do not have to be for just one purpose and therefore do not have to be always for the sole purpose of entertaining or invoking an emotional response in a player.
If the purpose of a game is to be entertaining and widely mainstream and commercial then yes i do believe that the designer should keep in mind what the player wants and strive to achieve that goal. The game’s purpose and reason for existence is to entertain and therefore it should be what the player wants and pays for.
So yes a designer’s duty is to entertain and to empathize with players if the game they are to produce is purely for mainstream, commercial purposes.
However if the game’s purpose is to be more of an artistic statement on the part of the designer, then it can either be or not be what the player wants, depending on whatever the designer wishes. Art does not have to also be strictly of one purpose either, but can be commercialised and industrialised (pop art, fashion photography etc…) or move in entirely opposite directions and purposefully isolate, invoke emotional responses, challenge mainstream thinking, inspire, make political or moral judgements, and the list pretty much goes on.
So in this case, the designer’s sole duty is not to entertain but to reach whatever goal it is they are trying to reach. Which, fair enough may be to entertain the player in which case, their duty is to entertain and empathize; or it could be to challenge the players into thinking outside the box, in which case the empathy would definitely come into play but not necessarily the duty to entertain. Yet again the designer’s goal may be purely to design a game that is completely self-indulgent, like drawing for the sake of drawing not so that there would be a finished product for others to look at, in which case the designer has no obligation to entertain or to empathize with anyone at all.
It really just depends on what the game is for, which is decided by the designer, which i guess means the duty or obligations of the designer is whatever they wish them to be. The player’s opinion and desire only comes into play if that is what the designer wants, which i think is the case more often than not.
