Previously I shared a few resources for Project 4 (Creating a Board Game). Today I want to clarify my expectations for the project and make sure that you all have a group to work with (though you are more than welcome to work alone).
Grading Criteria:
- The game is actually playable
- The game has instructions. Instructions should include:
- Objective
- Component Description/Glossary (if necessary)
- Set-up
- A round of play (player turn, etc)
- The game speaks to 3 of McGonigal’s 4 criteria for a game:
- Goal
- Rules
- Feedback (what I reframed as strategy or meaningful choice)
- Voluntary Participation
Chet raised a question as to the quality of the materials. I’m looking for something that shows investment and development. But I recognize not everyone is a craftsman or an artist. Still, given the availability of digital tools, you should have something that looks nice. Cards should be printed on card stock. There’s plenty of online software to help print card backs. If materials are hand-drawn, and not digitally printed, then they should be clean and polished.
The rules are important. On Tuesday, December 2nd we will play test games in class. This will be a usability test. We will give a group your game and instructions and they will report on playability. SO YOU NEED TO HAVE A FUNCTIONING VERSION OF YOUR GAME BY THE 2nd. That will give you two days to make revisions before I grade them on Dec 4th.
Here’s what I need from you in class today: each group (or person, if you are working alone) needs to create and share a Google Doc that:
- States the names of all members working on the project
- Gives a short (100 word max) description of the game. Think: marketing, what you might put on the back of the box
- Gives a “pitch” for the game. I want a single sentence, followed by a short (150 max) description. Think: genre, how you would describe the game to a potential investor.
When we look at these pitches, what we see is that they all in some way address making a comparative–they place the project in the context of a genre (it’s like Alien’s underwater…). This is what you want to do: to either fix an existing game, or talk about how your game reskins/conceptualizes an existing game.
Take my favorite game, Dominion. Dominion is in some ways a hard pitch, because there wasn’t any other “deck building” game in existence at the time. Now there’s many. But the pitch might have been: “People enjoy deck-building. Dominion turns deck-building into a game.” It is simple, to the point.
Or, think of the Fantasy Flight’s recent revision of the Descent board game: “People love miniature games, but often they are too complicated or too long. We transform a 4 hour game into a 45 minute experience.”
