Due to shifts in the priorities my game project, and me spending more time planning and researching than I initially imagined, I didn’t completely the entire board game in a single week’s sprint as I initially planned. This is the point in my backlog sprints where I should have an entire board game. A big change that contributed towards this is that I will also be more likely to make a digital demonstration of my game than a prototype, and focusing heavily on my written work aspects: thus allowing me to play to my strengths. The board game at the end will act more as an application of all my acquired knowledge, acting as evidence that I’ve improved throughout this process and applied it into a game. Because of this I’m shifting my priorities towards this area, and the digital demonstration will still be made, it’s just it will be something designed to fit into the presentation at the end of the project, and it will really help increase audience engagement as well as inform the audience how the game plays much better than just having the physically printed-out game on the day.
I feel this is the better direction to work in, as it shows a better example of professional practises due to my more extensive planning and research into the direction my board game is taking, rather than me just diving right in and making something in an entire week. I simply set my expectations too high in my project proposal and now the focus has changed, there’s still plenty of time to continue working towards a great project.
I am kickstarting this sprint by writing another entry in my gameplay journal, and the two games I’ll be analysing today are the hit detective board game Cluedo and Mario Party 10, a digital board game on the Wii U that’s played on a video games console and not in real life like a traditional board game. I chose to play a digital game to analyse this week in order to broaden my horizons in just how many different board games there are out there, and comparing Mario Party to Cluedo will allow me to see what gameplay mechanics do and don’t work in a game, regardless of what platform it’s actually being represented on. I need to see and compare how the two mediums can coexist in a world that’s progressively getting more digitalised during the development of this project. With recently created websites like https://tabletopia.com/ which allow players to “play 200+ board games with your friends online in an experience almost like gathering around a real table” (Tabletopia, 2016), physical board games could definitely be declining in popularity. But the question I’ll be answering is: are digital games really that much better.
(Must Have Toy, 2013)
First is Cluedo, another free-for-all physical board game that includes a massive amount of strategy, and arguably a lot more wit and skill than Risk or Monopoly which I previously researched. The game plays out in a detective setting where there has been a murder in the mansion (with the board being set out like the layout of a house), and each player races to become the first person to discover the murderer, murder weapon and the location of the crime. This rustic and old fashioned visual style of the board fits the theme well, and all of the cards, pieces and characters share a similar theme. The game also makes great use of semiotics, with all of the murder weapons (like a candlestick or dagger), having their own specific shapes and proportions, making them easy to identify at a glance. Even all of the characters are identifiable, since they’re all based around a single colour like red, yellow and blue, with charming character names like Colonel Mustard to match. It really helps keep the audience engaged.
The game keeps its competitive edge with an excellent use of the flow channel, as there’s a constant nervous tension throughout the game as you sit on the edge of your seat, and whether or not your murder theory proves to be correct through the process of elimination. This means the game’s endogenous value comes from your own knowledge and reasonings than any form of in-game currency or collectables, since your own concepts and theories grow in value as you eliminate the improbable and constantly change your mind on how the murder happened as the truth is slowly uncovered, it’s genius.
Cluedo itself is a very balanced game since everyone from the start has a fair chance to win, and the main limiting factor to success is a person’s lack of logic. The game tries to appeal to as many different bartle types as possible, despite its more adult target audience with gameplay that children will struggle to get on with. Explorers who play the game will enjoy roaming about the manor and uncovering its secrets. Achievers will want to figure out who and what didn’t take part in the murder, and eliminate any impossibilities as quickly as possible. Socialisers won’t be able to work with their fellow players, since the idea is to keep your own knowledge hidden. However they can still converse with players during the game, and maybe even taunt or mislead their friends to trick them. Killers are the main players to be left out, since the game’s about solving a murder instead of starting one. They’ll still take great pride in figuring out the answer to the game’s murder first and winning the game, though, keeping the element of competition Killers enjoy.
(Nintendo of Europe, 2015)
Now onto Mario Party, a game created by famous game designer Miyamoto who I researched in the games design unit. It, like Cluedo, also works in a free-for-all affair, but there are elements of teamwork which aren’t seen in other board games. It’s wacky and fun, and was definitely built with families in mind and I simply couldn’t imagine playing the game on a physical board without the gameplay having some major retuning (especially since there are various ‘minigames’ to be played throughout a typical game session, which will be incredibly difficult to replicate on a physical board game since they all have different controls and win conditions). There are essentially three types of board games in this one comprehensive package, which are all executed very interestingly and there’s useful for me to talk about in relation to how I’d execute my own game concept:
First is Mario Party, the first mode which blends competition and cooperation well, in which players all move around together in a vehicle from the start of the board to the finish, and the player with the most stars (essentially points) at the end wins. It brings a lot of opportunities to plan ahead, and trap your opponents into landing on a bad space since you all move around together, but you still work together for certain events that take place. Next is Amiibo Party, which plays similarly to Monopoly as players move around a board in a circle to collect stars instead of cash and without the property collection aspect. You even use actual figurines which are tapped onto a controller to move around the board, replicating that experience. Last is Bowser Party, which is a 1 vs 4 game where four players all essentially are against one play who plays as the big evil boss. It’s the boss’ job to take out all of the other players’ health, while the others run away across the gameboard in order to survive. It’s very creative concept, and uses a form of teamwork that is asymmetrical yet balanced to create a real sense of frenetic fun that’s enjoyable by both parties: the team and the solo player. I should try to implement gameplay mechanics like this in my own game, so it’s never unfair for either side and they both have a chance to win.
(❤Sunny❤, 2015)
The four players must work together to win against one other person in 5 player multiplayer, however in a casual party setting this is more fun than frustrating and never feels unfair.
Mario Party surprisingly utilised various game design techniques well underneath its cute and friendly exterior. For example as you play the game it contains great endogenous value in the stars, as the main collectable in the board game, it works on a simple premise where whoever has the most, wins. It’s a simple concept for a simple target audience. Likewise, player turns are incredibly short and snappy, increasing the game’s flow channel since you’re not waiting around that much. Plus the 80+ minigames that you play take everyone out of the turn-based action and mix up the game with something else, which prevents it from getting tedious or frustrating. Since my game won’t be able to include separate games like a board game on a digital console can, instead the action will be broken up by the lucky chance cards players can draw when they land on a purple space.
Mario Party, like Cluedo, also has its fair share of charming and recognisable characters, which really helps keep the game engaging with its diversity of characters! Whose cartoony shapes and proportions follow the game’s wacky and kid-friendly style well: like Waluigi’s shockingly long legs and cheesy voice, or Wario’s huge head, these are characters that would be considered evil and scary in other games, but they’re laughably goofy here, and it really works fit the silly atmosphere it tries to create. It is a party game to be played in groups after all, just like most of the other games I’ve covered in this blog. My game will also have its fair share of silly but lovable characters, so seeing how well done and consistent they are done in these games can really help me decide in which direction to take them. They all have their unique own personality, and they all stand out from each other.
The area in which Mario Party struggles the most is balance. This is an incredibly unbalanced game which, outside of the minigames you play throughout the game to win you some point, relies heavily on luck with the roll of a dice determining the outcome of a match. However this is where its erratically designed rules come in, which are the underlying problem: the entire game can swap around at the drop of a hat. If you’re unlucky enough to land on an evil space on the board near the game, it could be cataclysmic for you, ranging from losing half or all your stars, to evening out everyone’s stars between them making everyone tie for that turn. It can be incredibly frustrating for veteran gamers, but in a way that really is the point. When a board game’s luck-based like this, even casual players who hardly ever play games have a chance of winning, it brings the family together to just have fun and not to take the game too seriously, and that’s a respectable decision and the game’s intention. There are plenty more strategic games out there, like Cluedo, for those looking to plan and strategize. My game in particular I’d like to see blend these components and not go to either extreme these two games went to. It will be more heavily focused on skill than Mario party, but not be so draining and cunning like Cluedo.
Overall to conclude, I have to admit I received a lot more enjoyment from Mario Party than I did Cluedo. Perhaps it’s just all the fancy digital graphics that can keep my attention for longer with its colourful visual style and charming characters, however I just felt a lot more engaged playing through it and Cluedo felt almost overwhelming at times with its deep logical system in place. They’re both great games in their own right though, and provide various concepts that I can take forward into my project too! However Mario Party was just a lot more fun to play with friends, and you really have to go into Cluedo with the right mindset.
Following on from this research I started development for this entry and I created health tokens with the numbers 1, 5 and 10 on them to represent a player’s value of health in the game (and they either gain or lose these tokens when they take damage or restore HP). These tokens continue to use the same colour-coded formula as a form of semiotics (so the health tokens for the birds team will be blue, and dinosaurs red, as another step to help differentiate the two more). They also help carry endogenous value for the player and makes the owner want to hang on to their tokens as much as possible, almost as a form of currency. Since if you run out of them there’s a consequence, just like Monopoly’s money which I also researched previously. While there is less overall health in the game which is also designed to be lost at a faster rate than Monopoly money, it will be balanced with less of a penalty for losing all your HP (so when a character dies in my game, they’re out for a turn or two, compared to when you lose all your cash in Monopoly and are out of the game for good). This gives it more of an accessible and family friendly edge, while also not leaving any players out halfway through: as they can all play together until the very end of the game. Here are a couple of examples below:
For this entry I also finished the cards I began to produce last week, and they’re colour-coded like the board and tokens to make them consistent. I then started the long process of creating individual cards, each with a different scenario on them. Likewise their colour-coordination also ties into semiotics, since the player will see the red colour of a card and instantly know that they’ll be in an unlucky situation before reading it. I created 20 cards in total, with 10 being positive and 10 being negative, each containing a different situation. I wanted to have a bit of variety in the deck of cards, but since I wanted this prototype to be ready by Monday, I didn’t make as many that a finished board game would have. Here is an example of both a positive and negative card, and their effects on the player involved:
I asked Tom what he thought about the current number of cards, and variety of situations in the deck. This is his feedback: “You're gonna need more scenarios for the final game, I think. Monopoly has 16 different situations for both Chance and Community Chest in its most original format (though it's been buffed up to as high as 30 nowadays). But for a Thursday prototype? Eh, I'd say 10 would be enough, though perhaps print duplicates, maybe. Will they all be in one card pile?”. I have to agree, for a small taster prototype 20 cards is fine, but I will definitely create more in later blog entries.
After this I began to type up the official rules of the game which will be printed out alongside the game board on paper. I’ve designed these official set of rules to be easily understandable and to not follow my usual ‘flowery’ writing style. They’ve very brief and to the point, outlining as many different aspects of the game that I can, while trying to cover any ‘loopholes’. Fortunately if there are any parts of the game I have missed or overlooked whilst typing up the document, they will be noticed and taken advantage of in the next blog entry when my peers and I test the game for feedback.
That’s all for the prototype development for this blog entry, I’m hoping to get some peer feedback in the next blog entry, since I’ll be going into class for my project supervisor meeting in the morning and will have the rest of the afternoon to work alongside that advice, and to also test physically my board game for the first time. As such I’ve compiled various board game assets to be ready, but a few things (like Tom’s previous feedback for a counter), haven’t been implemented yet and I want to see how this version of the board will be received before I expand on it. I also didn’t start to draw any of the characters for the board in this blog entry, which will be printed out and stood upright onto counters. I will instead begin working on them in the next blog entry once I’ve made adjustments to the board from the peer feedback and testing I conduct.
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