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Game Test: Cat Rush

too many Food cards needs more Attack cards
sometimes not able to play due to having only food cards with full health
needs more players than 2 to be more interesting and involved
abilities are fun but game breakers if not enough players
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Game Test: Cat Rush

We were confused on how to start the game, nothing happened until a player was attacked

There are too many defense cards and not enough attack cards

A certain amount of cards each player should have at all times would help

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Game Test: Evil Uno

The game lasted very long and felt never-ending

There was not enough cards to play

A separate pile for the person eliminated would help

Less draw cards would also help

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5 new Simulation Ideas

1. The “Burnout” Triage

  • Core Idea: You’re a moderator of a highly stressful online crisis community.
  • The Challenge: You have to categorize incoming DMs as crises, emotional dumping, or trolling.
  • The Goal: Help others while constantly maintaining your own “Battery Life” to avoid burnout.
  • Main Takeaway: A simulation of the heavy emotional labor involved in digital support work.

2. The “Side Hustle.”

  • Core Idea: You’re running an ethical “slow fashion” business in a “fast fashion” world.
  • The Challenge: You have to source your materials ethically, like using deadstock fabric, and deal with shipping delays.
  • The Goal: Survive social media “cancel culture” from delays and high prices.
  • Main Takeaway: It shows the difficulty of prioritizing ethics over profit in a global economy.

3. The “Guerrilla” Urbanist

  • Core Idea: You’re a secret community activist working on improving your neighborhood without permission.
  • The Challenge: “Illegally” install things like a DIY bike lane, seed bombs, and unauthorized benches.
  • The Goal: Improve the neighborhood by lowering the “neighborhood temperature” while avoiding the authorities.
  • Main Takeaway: A simulation of community-led activism outside of the slow, top-down government bureaucracy.

4. The “Ghosted” Remote Op

  • Core Idea: A two-player commentary on the state of remote work.
    • Player 1 (“New Hire”): Stuck in a broken, surreal VR corporate training experience with weird glitches.
    • Player 2 (“IT Support”): Has to fix the connection using an outdated, 10-year-old manual.
  • The Goal: Player 2 has to guide Player 1 out of the experience before they get “fired” (disconnected).
  • Main Takeaway: A commentary on the isolation and weird lack of human connection in corporate remote communication.

5. The “Rage-Bait” Architect

  • Core Idea: A game about you, the “Engagement Hacker,” making viral videos for a video creator agency.
  • The Mechanic: Cut your videos to be as “Rage-Bait” as possible to exploit the algorithm and go viral.
  • The Goal: Reach 1 Million followers.
  • The Twist: Your success fills the “Global Anxiety” bar, and you start to see the negative effects of your content in the in-game news.
  • Main Takeaway: A simulation of digital complicity and the cost of going viral.

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Revised Rules:

Life Advice: Game Rules & Directions

Type: Party card game
Players: 4-8
Time: 15-20 minutes per session
Goal: Win rounds by submitting the worst possible advice for real mental health struggles

Components

  • Prompt Cards: Describe real mental health situations (e.x, anxiety, burnout, imposter syndrome, loneliness)
  • Advice Cards: Wildly unhelpful, tone-deaf, or cliché advice
  • Reality Check Cards: Highlight what actual helpful support looks like

Setup

  1. Shuffle Prompt Cards and place in a face-down pile.
  2. Shuffle the Advice Cards and deal 3 cards to each player.
  3. Shuffle Reality Check Cards and deal 3 cards to each player.
  4. Decide who will be the first Judge (can be the youngest player, or randomly).

Gameplay

Step 1: Draw a Prompt and Advice

  • The Judge draws the top Prompt Card and reads it aloud to all players.

Step 2: Play Advice

  • Each player (except the Judge) selects one  Advice Card from their hand that they think is the best.
  • Cards are submitted face down to the Judge.

Step 3: Judge Chooses

  • The Judge shuffles the submitted Advice Cards and reads them aloud.
  • The Judge selects the most realistic Advice, awarding the Advice Card to the player who submitted it at the end of the 2nd Judge’s pick. Those will be kept in their own separate “won” pile to be used at the end of the game.

Step 4: Play Reality Check

  • Each player (except the Judge) selects one Reality Check Card from their hand that they think is the most helpful within the chosen situation (Prompt Card + Advice Card).
  • Cards are submitted face down to the Judge.

Step 5: Judge Chooses

  • The Judge shuffles the submitted Reality Check Cards and reads them aloud.
  • The Judge selects the most useful, awarding the Reality Check Card to the player who submitted it. Those will be kept in their own separate “won” pile to be used at the end of the game.

Step 6: Refill Hands

  • All players draw back up to 3 Advice Cards.
  • All players draw back up to 3 Reality Check Cards.

Step 7: Rotate Judge

  • The role of Judge passes clockwise for the next round.

Winning

  • Play 5–10 rounds (or as long as desired).
  • Players add up their points
    • Winning advice cards are worth +3 points each 
    • Winning Reality Check Cards are worth +5 points each
  • Player with the most points at the end wins.
  • Optional: Debrief together to discuss insights about listening, empathy, and mental health at the end of each round
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More Game Ideas

Silly goose(Im gonna bring this one into class Thursday)

Its a similar game to cards against humanity except theres three different cards the players use. Those being a problem, excuse, and evidence card. A problem card is drawn at that beginning of every turn and is then played in the middle of the table. Every player then plays an excuse card to go with the problem. After everyone votes on “the best defense” and “the most guilty,” the player that gets the most guilty card gets the goose token. Next round everything plays out normally other than the fact that the player holding the goose token gets to give out an evidence card to go with any of the excuses out on the board. If you dont convince the other players that your not the most guilty, you keep the token. Other wise someone else will get it and repeat the same thing you just did. The game ends by a player holding the goose token for more than 5 rounds or if a player gets the best excuse 10 times. Still trying to play around with the rules a bit more but thats what I have for now.

Bug Clicker game

This is a game I worked on previously but I want to work more on it to make it a better game. To put it simply, you click the lantern fly and gain points. You can use the points to purchase items to make your clicks worth more. Essentially thats it. I want to add more to the base things I have in it right now.

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Question Set Week 3

Chapter 1

  • how does mary flanagan’s definition of game differ from chris crawford’s as well as the definition crafted by katie salen and eric zimmerman? Chris Crawford, Salen, and zimmerman talk about games in a very structural, rule based system where people engage in artificial conflict, however, mary flanagan dives deeper in to the context of what games “live” in and the environment they reflect – she argues their artistic, social and activist dialogue, they are “cultural practices embedded in politics, art, and power.”
  • what is an activist game? an activist game raises awareness about something bigger, whether it’s political, environmental, etc. They critique, model inequality, and purposefully create structural problems for players to experience

    Chapter 3
  • go and chess are examples of games that feature “perfect information”, what other games share that feature? Checkers, Cornhole, Mancala, etc
  • why might chance or gambling games hold spiritual or religious importance to ancient cultures? Randomness and chance was reflected as the will of gods often times
  • when was the earliest battle between government/ religious groups and games? what modern games can you think of that have been banned or demonized? gambling and dice games were battled especially – Pokémon was looked down on by a lot of people for a while, as are games with questionable moral and ethical boundaries like GTA- I’ll be honest I don’t know of any games that were straight out banned
  • what is a fox game, and what would be a modern example? a fox game is where there is one player that has more power or abilities than the rest of the character. Examples of these games include Among Us and Luigi’s Ghost Mansion (amazing game as a kid),
  • what was the purpose or intent of the game: Mansion of Happiness? To have a game that taught children virtues and the difference between good and bad morals and how to work hard and ethically
  • Why do artists from the Fluxus and Surealist movements play games? Why did Surrealists believe games might help everyone? The both believed that games take people outside of the here and now; they connect to art and hidden creativity and reject accepted rules of thought and systems of the world – Surrealists believed games would help everyone by freeing your imagination
  • Changes in what can signal profound changes in games? How were pinball games reskinned during WW2? Lots of different choices can change game: themes, players, materials, rules, representation of power, etc. Pinball games were reskinned with military propaganda and patriotic themes
  • What statements did Fluxus artists make by reskinning games like monopoly and ping pong? They wanted to question things people accept on a regular basis – exposing systems and asking questions
  • How are artists like Lilian Ball, Marcel Duchamp, Takako Saito, Yoko Ono, Gabriel Orozco and Ruth Catlowusing war games? they manipulate familiar games to critique power and expose absurdity of conflict
  • Why is it important for players to have agency in a critical or serious game? Having free choice and the ability to do things makes it a lived experience rather than a lecture – it allows the player to fully experience the message
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Game Ideas around Empathy

  1. Impairment: Each player either can’t 1 – see 2 – hear – 3 touch normally 4 – talk and you play a simple game (like Uno or something) and then reflect on the experience and switch “impairments” to feel what they other person goes through
  2. Similar to the above game but specifically finding empathy for people who have a hard time with too many stimuli (autism, adhd, etc) Each player adds or takes away a noise/distraction each turn as well as playing the game and can give or take “relief” from the chaos to understand the need for sensory rooms or quiet spaces
  3. A game that has to do with learning to be empathetic for language differences – I feel like especially in the U.S. people immediately form opinions about people based on their accent/language difference. Creating a game where people have to live in that reality and deal with those differences would be really intriguing – i have ideas like a card game but everyone has different sets of words with part English/part foreign language and they have to play with those differences
  4. Dealing with Grief – card game where players work through people dealing with any sort of sadness – the cards reveal scenarios for each player and each player must give correct responses and learn to interact with grieving people “correctly” and empathetically
  5. Interactive/Physical Game – being understanding towards elderly people is the message the game is meant imply – basically a relay game except players are assigned ages which inhibit how fast or slow they can walk/run/move to the goal and how they interact with other players
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Prototype Response – Week 5

Bad Advice – Christine’s game

What made the experience fun or not? The content was intriguing – I like games with objective responses to fun prompts

What is the motivating factor to get or keep players playing? to see what the new prompts would say and new advice cards would match up to the prompts

what was frustrating about game? Just the rules not being fully developed so we had to assume the rules and make them up as we go

Is the game persuasive, and what is it trying to get you to do outside of the game? I wouldn’t say it’s persuasive per say but it makes you think about hard challenges in people’s lives and how to deal with them better or how not to deal with them

What is the game’s metaphor and which of the game’s mechanics standout? The metaphor is dealing with people’s mental and situational problems – the mechanic of being rewarded for bad advice and then giving good advice to counter it is intriguing

How does the gameplay make you feel? Who does the game make you feel empathy for? There was a lot of the gameplay that we assumed from similar games since the rules weren’t written super clearly so when it is written well it’ll be a smooth gameplay – it let me have fun but also makes me think of real-world situations and how I’d actually deal with them, it makes you feel empathy for the person going through these things

Is the game an activist game? If so what does the game play advocate for? I’d say yes it is an activist game, it’s advocating for people who are struggling with mental health issues or just going through difficult times – it’s helping people know what to do and not to do

Describe the game in 3 sentences or in the form of a haiku
advice, good or bad
help people who struggle
others will determine

Star Sailor – Meredith’s game

  1. What made the experience fun or not? it’s succinct and makes sense – a cute idea that is not overly complicated
  2. What is the motivating factor to get or keep players playing? trying to get to the end to win
  3. Is the game persuasive, and what is it trying to get you to do outside of the game? If it is persuasive, it is very subtle – i think the metaphor is ethical consumption of resources vs. destroying nature to what extent to survey but it’s space themed so it’s a little abstract
  4. What is the game’s metaphor and which of the game’s mechanics standout? ethical consumption of resources vs. destroying nature to what extent to survey but it’s space themed, the mechanic of blowing up planets for resources is intriguing from the metaphors standpoint
  5. How does the gameplay make you feel? Who does the game make you feel empathy for? It was intriguing, it made me want to know what blowing up a planet would do, it didn’t really make me feel empathy just wanting to find out how fast I could run out of resources without blowing up planets
  6. Is the game an activist game? If so what does the game play advocate for? Slightly – I think it was intended to be an activist game about resource management and ethics of destroying the environment to advance
  7. Describe the game in 3 sentences or in the form of a haiku.
    Spaceships through space
    Fuel is gone planets are gone
    Trading fuel for food