Week 2 Questions, Game Ideas, and Game Review

Alana Tush

Question Set 1

1. What Mechanics would you like to use for a game with a theme that revolves around being the size of a nanometer?
   • I guess some sort of biology game that has little trinkets of protiens, atoms, bacteria, etc.
2. Who are you making games for?
   • I am making games for someone who is interested and curious about how the game works and who can make suggestions for how it can be better.
3. Who will be your play testers outside of class?
   • My friends and boyfriend

Question Set 2

1. Can you think of a game you were able to play without referring to the rules?
   • hide n seek, tag, red rover, four square
2. How do you define what a game is?
   • Mechanics and rules, pieces and graphics, theme/ story
3. What features can make your games more intuitive?
   • having a card game, for example uno, that has many different variations. I would assume mostly everyone in our generation knows how to play regular uno, but having a new variation is more exciting and fun, while still having the same premise.

Question Set 3

1. What was your gateway game? What do you play to introduce others to gaming?
   • My gateway game was brick breaker on my moms blackberry phone 😉
2. What features do gateway games share?
   • Gateway games share easy instructions that can be explained to young kids and still be fun for adults to play (family games).
3. What are the 10 beautiful mechanics and what should you aim for with your own?
   • Kingmakers noblesse oblige, battletech’s heat, set’s set-making, magic’s card tapping, battle cattle’s cow tipping rule, xxxenophile’s popping, bohnanza’s hand order rule, mississipppi queen’s paddle wheels, communication breakdown, constant shuffling. I would say to have 2 or more of these mechanics in a game to make it more interesting.
4. How does luck and strategy factor in to game play?
   • luck is something beyond your control, it might help you or hurt you. Strategy is making plans and decisions during game play that might further your winning status.

Game Ideas thats can be played using cards

1. War (card game) with different characters with an emotional status. The card would have a character with a “happy meter” on the side of them. The higher happiness of the two cards down wins.
2. Uno with shapes and letters
3. Cards with random items that can be found in a classroom. The first person who finds the item and brings it back to the table wins a point.
4. Playing darts but you have to flip a card over and try to hit that number
5. The card game spoons, but the items that need to be grabbed are in a different room. Everyone has to run and try to get there before all the items are taken, and you are out.

Bohnanza Review

1. Was it fun? Yes, the game was very entertaining. When you got the right amount of cards to harvest and get coins, it was exciting. It was still exciting though to make trades and barter for better bean cards.
2. Is it interactive? Yes, this game is very interactive. Everyone wants to see the cards you reveal to make a decision whether to offer you a better bean card or to opt out of trading.
3. Was it easy to learn? This game was fairly easy to learn. Once we played through the deck of cards once, we were all understanding of the premise.
4. Would you replay the game? Yes I would replay this game, our group actually played another round instead of starting a new game because it was fun.
5. Applying the three act structure-
   • act 1- reading the rules to the game and setting up the mechanics (dealing 5 bean cards to each person, setting the field cards on the correct side). Playing a practice round to get used to the premise of the game.
   • act 2- the competition begins.. Trading the bean cards is where all the competition takes place. The people who need the certain bean cards offer something the active player needs to further their status in the game to win.
   • Act 3- At the end of the bean game, everyone is looking how many coins each player has, and tries to sabotage the other players by not trading with them. If you make the decision not to trade, that could mean they wouldn’t get anymore coins to potentially beat you in the game. Everyone harvests their beans to get the max amount of coins at the end of the round.