Love is a Game

How I Met Your Mother is, very obviously, a show all about love. It is about Barney finding out what love is, Robin figuring out how to let herself love, Marshall and Lily's love story, and Ted finding "the one."But, though this show's theme is so intrinsic, it is not something that is super serious or overly stated. Throughout the entirety of the nine season series there are many times the characters use "the game" as a metaphor for love. In the metaphoric analysis of the series the tenor is love or dating and the vehicle is "the game."

According to Richards. "In the most important uses of metaphor, as a source of rhetorical invention, a term (or vehicle) from one domain of meaning acts upon a subject (or tenor) from another domain. Their co-presence routinely yields a meaning which is not attainable without the interaction, and in certain cases the tenor becomes so closely identified with its vehicle that it is imagined to be that very thing which it only resembles" (1965, 100-101). This essentially means that a word can stand in the place of another word in order to form a meaning that isn't attainable with just the use of one word.

http://theodysseyonline.com/marist/11-reasons-why-being-single-is-just-great/236232

Every time this metaphor is used it is not super specific. Sometimes it is hidden in the context of the rhetoric. We are going to look at this like we are searching for pieces of a game. One of the first things every game needs is a set of rules, this is easily found in the series. The first set of rules is the Bro Code. The Bro Code is a set of rules for how bros should treat each other and what they should do in certain situations. On top of the Bro Code there are also Barney's Rules. Throughout the series Barney will randomly spout one of his catchphrases "I only have one rule." And despite the fact he says he only has one, he has many of these rules. One of the most infamous of these rules is "New is always better."

Another thing that every game needs is instructions or ways to play the game. This is yet another part of the metaphor that we can thank Barney for. Barney has the playbook, which is literally the ways that he gets women to sleep with him, or different ways to play the game. Ted models some different ways of playing the game that always ultimately fail and usually require Barney to sweep in and save the day with one of his surefire ways of playing (ex. "Haaaaave you met Ted?").

In most games there is also a sign that the game is beginning. In football there is a coin flip, in baseball there is "let's play ball!", and in Monopoly there is the argument of who gets to play the thimble game-piece. In How I Met Your Mother there is "Challenge Accepted." Before Barney starts to try out any of his plays or hit on any girl at all he always exclaims, "challenge accepted!" even if no one else actually challenged him to anything in particular. 

http://www.neontommy.com/news/2013/11/how-i-met-your-mother-recap-platonish

The most blatant use of the metaphor in the show is within quotes from some of the characters. In "Little Boys" (S3E4) Marshall states that "If dating is the game, then marriage is winning the game." The game is also mentioned in "Platonish" (S9E9). Barney attempts to hit on the mother and she not only tells him no, she also psychoanalyzes him to the point that they have a heart to heart conversation outside on a bench and she gives him a speech about the game:

[Mother] "Do you want to keep playing or do you wanna win?" 
[Barney] "I wanna win. What am I doing? In less than 20 minutes, Robin and I could be..."
 [Mother] "Oh, no, no, no, no. It's gonna take a lot more than 20 minutes. This is gonna take everything you have got. It will take all your time, all your attention, all your resources. This is the big one, diaper man! You gotta do it right, can't be messing around and picking up girls in drug stores. You got work to do."

There may seem to be a lot of references to the game when Barney is involved but it is true of many of the other characters as well. Ted often says he is going to lose the game of love. Ted's love life is also epitomized by one game we see him play many times throughout the series, "The Claw" (Insert Toy Story aliens here). In "Purple Giraffe" (S1E2), Ted sees a kid trapped in a claw machine that Robin is reporting on because he was trying to get a purple giraffe and couldn't so he climbed into the machine to get it. Ted decides to go after Robin like that little kid goes after the giraffe. But, much like the little boy, fails to get her fair and square. In "Miracles" (S3E20), Ted proposes to Stella with an orange kangaroo because he tried to get a fake diamond ring out of the claw machine and failed. So though these do not show Ted failing at "the game" in general, it does show Ted failing at a game and it alludes to his failure in the romantic game.

http://how-i-met-your-mother.wikia.com/wiki/Purple_Giraffe

Games are a huge metaphor used throughout the entire series to create a meaning to finding love. Many people refer to love as a journey and a road with many twists and turns but, in How I Met Your Mother, it is very strategically referred to as a game. We get to see the gang have fun playing the game for fun, playing to win, and winning. In "Bad Crazy" (S8E16), Ted tells his future kids that "being single is fun" and that is why he kept playing the game. But, ultimately, Ted wins the game along with all his friends and they all get to start dedicating their time to more interesting games, like "Marshgammon."


References
I.A. Richards (1965) The philosophy of rhetoric. New York: Oxford University Press