Sorting Fruits and Vegetables

Ontario Farming Sort                                                   Jason MacKenzie   100428687

For this eighth and final homework assignment I once again teamed up with Jordon Mattison, Alex Golenshchev and Sidd Panchal. Our goal was to create a game that would help teach the players which fruits and vegetables are in season in each different season. To do this, we decided on a simple card sorting game. The ultimate goal of our game is to be the first player to have your section of the deck sorted with the fruits and vegetables that are in season together.

Players start the game by simply splitting the deck evenly among the players. The answer key (kept face down between the players) is used at the end of the round to determine which players sorted their cards correctly. Players are to sort their cards into the four different categories:

• Ontario Summer Fruits 
• Ontario Summer Vegetables
• Ontario Winter Fruits
• Ontario Winter Vegetables

Ontario Summer Fruits and Vegetables

Ontario Winter Fruits and Vegetables

Once the sorting has been completed the players use the answer key to record how many cards they have sorted correctly. Players can also gain bonus points for the following achievements:

• Being the first to sort your pile of cards (+2 points)
• Correctly sorting the most cards (+2 points)

The player that scored the highest wins that round, best of 5 rounds wins the game.

The only issue I can find with the game is the fact that it can only be played so many times. Because it is a game meant to teach the players what fruits and vegetables are available in each season, it would not take long before the players learn the proper sorting for each card. This would mean that the only way to win would be to sort the cards faster than the rest of the opponents. This severely limits the amount of times this game can be played. This could be fixed with the addition of more and more fruits and vegetables (that may not necessarily be from Ontario). With more fruits and vegetables the game play and amount of times it is playable could be extended. Players wouldn't be able to memorize 100 different fruits and vegetables from all over the world so they would have to guess.

Hopefully our game achieves its goal in teaching the players when Ontario fruits and vegetables are in season. If they didn't begin to memorize the proper sorting then the game wouldn't be teaching them very well.

Chaiyya Chaiyya Dance Party                                                    Jason MacKenzie 100428687

For the last of our prototypes in this semester I teamed up with the same group I’ve done all the prototypes with, Matt, Brian, Xin and Nick. The goal for this prototype was to make a big party game based on the Bollywood music video “Chaiyya Chaiyya”.

http://www.intermission.nu/wp-content/uploads/dil-se_chaiyya.jpg

This was an interesting video that took quite a few views to determine some repeatable type of dance. Most of the video was the background dancers doing whatever they wanted and the two main dancers doing similar dances but with large variations. There were only a few small sections where the dancers were doing the same thing, and these sections were at most only 10 seconds long.

For our game, we decided to create spinners that serve as the major playing part of our game.

•  A player spins each of the two spinners four times to determine the dancing moves they will have to use. This begins a ‘round’.
• There are also time stamps found under the sample positions. This shows the time that that move is used in the music video.

The two spinners display the top and bottoms position you will be using

• The player has to keep each top and bottom spins together. For example the first spin of the upper body should be used along with the first spin of the lower body, and so on.
  
• Player then chooses a 20 second segment of the song and must use their four dance moves in any order he/she desires. They then perform their dance moves with the 20 second music clip.
  
• The player is judged by the other players and given a score between 1 and 5.
  
• The next player uses those same four dance moves in any order. They can use any 20 second segment of the video to dance to. They are also judged on their performance.
  
• A round ends once each player has used those four dance moves.
  
• The next player starts a new round and play continues until each player has started a round.
  
• Players then add up their scores from the judgments and the player with the highest score wins!  

The only issue we faced in the designing of this game was finding examples of the dancing from the music video that had a clear, identifying dance, instead of the dancers doing whatever they wanted or some variation on what the main two dancers were doing.

This game could be easily improved if we had access to some type of level maker in a pre-existing dancing game. For example if we translated the dance from Chaiyya Chaiyya into a game like Just Dance and used that to pit two people against each other at once. Not only would this make the game move a lot faster than the ‘one at a time’ game play we have now, it would also allow us to include more than just 20 second clips from the music video.

To improve on this game I think it should be expanded to use more than just one Bollywood dance scene. In my experience a party game (especially ones involving music) can get boring very quickly if there is only one available song to be repeated by up to 8 people. Also realistically, if Bollywood wanted to hire a company to make the ‘ultimate party game’, not only would they offer more than just Chaiyya Chaiyya, they would also be sure to send in some professionals to get the developers interested and knowledgeable about the dancing found in Bollywood movies.

I believe that a game like this has potential, but it is lacking in content and developer expertise. Still, I hope those who play it have some fun mixing up their Bollywood dance moves!

Bigger Gamespace and New Battling

Tic-Tac-Toe with added chance

In order to add a few elements of chance to Tic-Tac-Toe I've changed a few things.

• Players now play on a 9x9 tic-tac-toe grid.
• The winner of the smaller 3x3 sections rolls a d6 and calls “High” or “Low” (or “Evens” or “Odds”)
• If their call is correct they claim that grid as their own.
• If not it becomes one type of “draw” grid.
• “Draws” can be challenged.
• Challengers roll 3 d6’s, defenders roll 2 d6’s, players compare the challenger’s 2 higher die faces with the defender’s die faces  and the challenger’s 3^rd die is ignored.
• If the challenger wins, they now own that grid.
• If the defender wins, the grid remains neutral and it becomes the next player’s turn.

The blank game. It can just be played on a regular piece of paper, just like Tic-Tac-Toe

This adds multiple games that can be played out at the same time, increasing the skill needed to win or defend the regular tic-tac-toe grid. Since players can stop playing in a grid at any time, there is a better chance they’ll be able to distract the player from moves made on one grid by moving to win at a different grid.

This also gives the player that moves second (“O” player) a new strategy to win. Normally, moving first gives that player (“X” player) a slight advantage, but now the “O” player can choose to change to a different grid at any time, thereby moving first within that grid. For example if the “X” player uses the strategy of acquiring two lines that they can use to win, but the “O” player can only block one, the “O” player can choose not to block either but instead  to change grids. This gives the “X” player a choice to place an “X” to claim that grid or change grids so as not to give the “O” player 2 moves in a grid.

"X" player can win if he challenges the center-left draw

Modifying Battle Hexagons

“Battle hexagons” was my group’s territorial acquisition game.

The board stays the same, the changes are to the game play

• The player’s goal was to acquire the largest amount of hexagons in 20 rounds.
• Players collected wild cards if they landed on a “wild” space
• Players could jump between hexes if they landed on a “portal” space.
• Players could use a fair amount of skill to try and trap other players. Since tiles could not be re-claimed, players could easily be trapped and unable to move.

To remix it as a game based entirely on chance, any mechanic based on skill must be removed or altered.

One of the main skill-based mechanics is the ability to trap other players. This can easily be altered to have a combat system allowing players to acquire another player’s territory, allowing them to not be cornered into a small area. The new combat system would be simple:

• Both players roll the same number of dice, if the attacker’s dice are higher, they move into that player’s territory space.
• The player can then roll the die again for their movement, but they can only move half of their dice roll for that turn and only through free spaces.
• If the player needs to acquire more enemy territory they must wait until their next turn.
• If the defender wins the attacker does not move and play continues.
• In the event of a draw, the defender wins.

Another factor is the rounds. I would like to change it to “Play until the board is filled” but I think that will add too much to the game play. If there is no limit but the amount of spaces on the board then a player could keep one open space protected until they have every other space. If two players do this it would extend the length of game play indefinitely, but not in a good way.

I think it is best to keep the goal as “the winner is the player that acquires the most territory in 20 rounds”. That still keeps an incentive to block your opponent’s path just to slow them down.

The only other factor in Battle Hexagons is the cards. Since these are already randomized they do not need to be changed.

Overall, I believe that allowing players to take one another’s territory will lead to more exciting game play.

Peace of Art

Starry Night - Dreamscape

Vincent van Gogh’s Starry Night was painted in September 1888 in Southern France and sent it to his brother, Theo, with some other paintings in September 1889. It is currently in the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and has been since 1941. It is one of van Gogh’s most popular and recognizable pieces.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/ea/Van_Gogh_-_Starry_Night_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg/300px-Van_Gogh_-_Starry_Night_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg

Originally van Gogh did not like the painting, he wrote to his brother:

“The olives with white clouds and background of mountains, also the moonrise and the night effects, these are exaggerations from the point of view of arrangement, their lines are warped as that of old wood.”

http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/20/607.htm

An interesting fact about this painting is that although it is a painting of the night landscape van Gogh painted it from memory during the day! This may not seem like such a big deal when the mountains, the landscape and the village were all right outside his window; but when I think about the colours he also had to remember, the dark blues of the mountain and just the difference the nighttime atmosphere can create and how well he replicated it, it’s pretty amazing!

The game:

To turn this amazing piece of artwork into an artistic game, myself and the rest of the Sharpie Farms group decided to make a kind of relaxed collection game based on the agreed peaceful feeling we felt this painting portrayed.

The pieces and their movement:

To achieve a feeling of peace we decided that the game movement should have a free-floating feel. We designed clouds to represent the game pieces and we gave the game a few simple mechanics to affect the player’s movement. These mechanics start with a player drawing a card:

• On this card is something they have to describe, it might be a sheep, a cloud or a waterfall but the player that draws it has to describe it.
• Once it’s described, the player to the left has two chances to guess.
•  If they don’t guess it the guessing continues clockwise.
• If no players guess a card’s description correctly, the player who is describing it can either to lose 1 star or be unable to participate in the next guessing phase (Player will be unable to guess the object on the next card is being described. If the Player elects to lose a star, they place their star on the current node they are on.  To pick this star up again, they must mode off the node then back on).
• That card then gets put into the discard pile and the player on the left draws a card.

• If a player guesses correctly they get to move 1 node in any direction. They then draw a card to try and describe to the other players.

We thought that this would bring a calm feeling to the game to get players to describe calm things. We also liked that it adds a type of movement other than dice.

The board:

For the design of our game we took the starry night painting and thought we could make it an even “starrier” night by adding the full Milky Way galaxy. Following that, we used a silver pen to create the nodes and the paths between nodes. We highlighted the starting nodes (in the village) with blue marker and the nodes that stars will be placed on with red marker.

We also gave the stars and the photo of the galaxy a blurring filter to try and match the brush strokes in van Gogh’s painting and I think it helped to bridge the gap between the painting and the photo.

I hope everyone who plays will feel calm and relaxed, while still having some fun collecting stars right out of their own starry night.

Betters, Bluffers, and straight up Liars

Liar's Dice

This week’s assignment was to take the game Liar’s Dice (which most people know of as the dice game from Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest) and change the rules around to get rid of and “positive feedback loop”.

http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20080417015307/pirates/images/3/32/Dice.JPG

Now a positive feedback loop is something within a game that:

• Destabilizes the game.
• Causes the game to end faster.
• Emphasizes actions made earlier in the game.

There are also “Negative feedback loops” that:

• Stabilize the game.
• Cause the game to last longer
• Emphasize actions made later in the game.

Our job was to identify the positive feedback loop in Liar’s Dice and add new rules using negative feedback loops to eliminate the positive feedback loop.

First, an outline of the rules of Liar’s Dice:

• Players: 2 - 6
• Each player starts with 5 dice and a cup.
• Players roll their dice and keep them hidden from other players.
• A one is counted as a WILD dice; it can have any value from 2 to 6.
• The first player makes a bet based on their dice and what they think the other players rolled. (ex. 6 fours)
• Each player after them must bet a higher sum than the previous bet (ex 7 fours, 6 fives etc.) until someone calls a player’s bluff.
• Bluffs can be called only on your turn and only on the person before you, after he bet.
• Once a bluff is called, all players reveal their dice.
• If it was not a bluff (i.e. There were more dice of that kind that could have been called, or exactly as many dice that were called) the player that called it a bluff loses one of their dice.
• If it was a bluff (i.e. There were not that many dice rolled) the player who bluffed loses their dice.
• Play continues until only one player remains.

The positive feedback loop in Liar’s Dice is that once a player begins to lose dice it becomes more likely that they will continue to lose dice. They will continue to lose dice because once one is lost they have a smaller percentage of dice that they are able to see and use to make an educated bet or bluff.

For example: The player loses a die --> the player has more chances to lose --> the player loses a die --> the player has even more chances to lose and so on...

We added mostly simple rules to eliminate the positive feedback loop. Our rules are:

1. Limit the number of players from 2-6 to 2-4 to allow less competition.
2. Increase the number of dice to 7 per player.
3. Adding the “house cup”. This cup has 7 dice that all players can see to add to the guessing pot. (The player must bet more than what is shown by the house cup. For example: if the house cup is showing 3 twos, 2 threes, 1 four and 1 six, then the player can call 4 twos or 3 threes etc.).
4. Finally if a player only has 1 die, they can gain 2 of their dice back if they correctly catch another player’s bluff.

With the addition of these rules we had to have a few play-through's to see how the new rules affected the game play. 

1. This rule was just a simple rule to reduce the number of players, creating less competition for upping one another's bets. This makes it easier to place bets because the bets will not raise as quickly as they would with 6 players.
2. This rule simply add more dice, making a longer game, and the ability to bet higher.
3. This is a lengthy rule with a simple concept. The "house cup" allows players who have lost most of their dice to still have a general idea of what kind of bets or bluffs to make.
4. Finally, this rule allows players to regain some of their lost dice. It is hard to accomplish but when it works it helps to extend the game play.

I hope everyone in class enjoys our addition to Liar's Dice. I'm not bluffing, have fun, but be careful who you challenge!

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mbt8223QJJ1rcjxzvo1_500.gif

Extra! Extra! Read all about it!

Paperboy Card Game

Paperboy was created in 1984 for the Atari System 2 upright arcade system. In this game you play as a paperboy delivering papers to subscribers, not delivering to non-subscribers, and avoiding obstacles. The game is won by perfectly delivering your papers to your subscribers throughout the 7 levels (Monday to Sunday).

For the purposes of our card game we have 6 different types of cards. There are newspaper cards, coloured houses, grey houses, cars, kids on skateboards, and kids on trikes. Each card has different rules:

Newspaper Cards: These are your main cards. They are used to collect points by combining them with Coloured House cards, or lose points when combined with Grey Houses.

Coloured Houses: these are subscriber`s houses. They need paper delivered to them either in the player`s hand or placed into the pile for the other player to compete for. When a coloured house is placed down, any other player can score the point. To score, the newspaper they have must be delivered quickly. Once the paper has been delivered they keep the combination to keep track of their score.

Grey Houses: these are non-subscribers. These houses do not get paper delivered to them.  If a paper is delivered that player keeps that combination as a -1 to their score and there is one less newspaper in the deck.

Trikers: these kids constantly get in the players way. These cause the next player to lose their turn.

Skateboarders: these troublemakers steal all of the current newspapers the next player is holding. These newspapers are placed at the top of the discard pile and the player must draw the same number of cards they lost before they play a card.

Cars: these combine the troubles caused by trikers and skateboarders. The next player loses all of their newspapers and their turn is skipped. They do NOT draw any number of lost cards from the deck.

Play continues until there are no newspapers left to deliver and the player with the highest delivery rate wins.

There were a few issues creating this game. First of all, it is difficult to take an established idea, a game that already exists, and create a brand new type of game from it. One of the biggest issues was creating a reason to play coloured houses. I believe this was fixed with the delivery competitions, though I`m still not sure if players will want to play coloured houses unless it is the only thing in their hand.

We also found that there would be no point to have coloured houses if the player could not combine them in their own hand. If the player was expected to place them to continue play without any possible reward for themselves they would quickly realize that they were just giving points to other players.  

The grey houses were another difficulty. These cards would make more sense in a game built more like ‘War’. For example players would have to react more quickly to the image of the house to gain the point; they may not notice it is a grey house until it’s too late. This is mostly fixed by the ‘War’-like idea of delivery competitions. This makes players react more quickly to the image of the house and more likely to place a newspaper on the wrong type of house.

The rest of the cards are simple cards to annoy the player after you, causing players to lose a turn or drop all of their newspapers.

Since the goal is not to be the first to get rid of all of your cards I think this will make an interesting game. I hope everyone enjoys our rendition of Paperboy!

Land Ho!

The Island, The Treasure, The ... Fruit?

For the latest Game Design project, I was once again recruited by Jordon Mattison, Alex Golenishchev and Sidd Panchal. After wrestling Jordon away from his polygons (his first game was “Battle Squares”, followed by our last game “Battle Hexagons”. I think there was a pattern emerging...) Alex presented an idea of pirates on a desert island collecting treasures, and Natives on that island collecting resources. 

After a fair amount of brainstorming the inner workings of the game we all split off to create… The Island Adventure!

4, 8, 15, 16, 23... Wait wrong island!

On the island you play as either a Pirate or a Native. The available roles depend on the number of players.

• 2 Players: 1 Pirate, 1 Native
• 3 Players: 2 Pirates, 1 Native
•  4 Players: 2 Pirates, 2 Natives

Each player chooses one of 4 starting locations (2 for Pirates, 2 for Natives). Players travel around the board using a 6 sided dice. They can travel in any direction they want to collect treasures from the “Items” spaces. Once a Player has 5 cards in their hand they are unable to draw any more until they discard one first. Players must take their chances, while they could easily discard a Banana to find a Gold Chest, they could also just find Sand.

If 2 players land on the same space they can steal cards from one another. They fan their cards out to their opponent (keeping the face of the card hidden) and both players simultaneously draw 1 random card from the opponent’s hand.

After 20 rounds the players tally up their scores to figure out which player has attained the most valuable items. This can be done in two different ways at the same time.

        1.   Using the value system

The value system uses the value of each item as displayed on the cards. The value of the item depends if the player is a Native or a Pirate (Natives have no use for a Gold Coin, just as Pirates have no use for a Coconut). The value of the players cards are only calculated if it is necessary for a combination or a player has no combination.

The item values are as follows:

Items                                    Pirate Value       Native Value

Native Knitting Set                         0                           4

Coconut                                        1                            5

Banana                                          3                            7

Watermelon                                   5                            9

Pineapple                                       7                           10

Dragon Fruit                                  8                           13                                                                                              

Pirate Scope                                 4                            0

Ivory Carving                                5                           1

Treasure Map                               7                            3

Gold Coin                                     9                           5

Gold Chest                                   10                          7

Diamond                                      13                           8

Sand                                             0                           0

Sailor's Skeleton                            1                           1

Water                                            2                           2

Fire                                               3                           3

Cloth                                             4                           4

Rusty old pistol                              5                           5

Gun powder                                  6                           6

Rum                                              7                           7

                                                                                                                                             

Cards Natives will want

Cards Pirates will want

Cards equally useful/useless by Pirates or Natives

         2.    Using the combo system

The combo system is used to boost players score if they collect a certain combination of items, much like in poker with the “4 of a kind” and “Royal Flush” and all that. Although our Island Adventure uses quite a few more combinations that poker, they are:

Combos                                                                                                      Value
5 fruit - "Eating Good Tonight"                                                                x1.5 hand score
4 fruit, 1 Dragon Fruit - "Eating Good Tomorrow"                                    x2.0 hand score
2 Watermelon, 2 Pineapple, 1 Dragon Fruit - "Eating Good All Week"     x3.0 hand score
2 Banana, 2 Pineapple, 1 Dragon Fruit - "Eating Like A King"                 x5.0 hand score
5 treasure - "Good Haul"                                                                           x1.5 hand score
4 treasure, 1 Diamond - "Excellent Haul"                                                  x2.0 hand score
2 Gold Coins, 2 Gold chests, 1 Diamond - "Amazing Haul"                       x3.0 hand score
2 Treasure Map, 2 Gold Chest, 1 Diamond - "Perfect Haul"                      x5.0 Hand score
4 Coconuts 1 banana - "Suggestive Eating"                                             40
4 Ivory Carving 1 treasure map - "Promise of Fortune"                            40
5 Watermelons - "Melon Party!"                                                              50
5 Gold Coin - "Rolling in Gold!"                                                              50
4 Gold Coin, 1 Gold Chest - "Money, and a place to put it"                    60
Gun Powder, coconut, fire - "Explosive Nuts"                                          Combo counts as 15
Fire, Cloth, Rum - "Molotov"                                                                    Combo counts as 20
Sailor's Skeleton, Gold Chest - "Dead Man’s Gold"                                +5 to hand
Gun Powder, coconut, cloth, rum, fire - "Island Demo-kit"                        30
5 Sand - "I like sand"                                                                                26
Rusty old pistol, Sand, Fire, Water, Gun powder - "Fixed Pistol"               30
5 Native Knitting Set - "Staying Warm"                                                     100 if Native
5 Pirate Watch glass - "A Way Home"                                                       100 if Pirate
Dragon Fruit, Diamond, 3 Rum - "Lucky Mans find"                                 120

Some rules can be confusing at this point such as the “Combo counts as 15” or “+5 to hand” so I explained it in the general rules document.

Players can have combos within their hand (such as the “Molotov” which will count as 20 points), following that, the player adds the value of the last 2 items in their hand to get the total value.

In some cases players can have multiple combos. For example you are a pirate with a “Molotov” and “Dead Man’s Gold”, in this case the Molotov counts as 20 points, the Sailor’s skeleton is 1 point, the Gold Coin is 9 points, and the “Dead Man’s Gold” adds 5. Your total would be 35 points.

One Minor Issue

The only thing I don’t like about our game is how (as I've noticed with a few of games each group has made) is the rule that “After a number of rounds the game ends”. There’s no explanation as to why the game ends and it takes away any end goal, making the whole experience seem pointless. But at the same time I believe the game would be far too massive if we kept the collection going until someone was somehow able to escape the island.

My goal for the future is to try and put a stop to this pointless "end of game" rule. It’s easy enough to tweak the theme to incorporate some threat that will end the game in so many rounds. That would make much more sense than just ending the game.

The ending of the game can be easily fixed by adding some bad guy wanting to destroy the island and either paying him off (Pirate) or getting help from the island gods (Native)... There I more or less fixed it, but at the moment it's not worth reworking the items around this idea.

Aside from that I think this game is great and I hope everyone enjoys their own Island Adventure!

Pride, Prejudice and some Pirates

The original Pride and Prejudice was written in 1813 by Jane Austen. It follows a web of marriages  attractions, crushes and family benefactors within multiple families. To help me understand it I used a character map I found here: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/Pride_and_Prejudice_Character_Map.png

In our board game players choose one of the main female characters based on a colour, Elizabeth Bennet (Blue), Lydia Bennet (Green), Jane Bennet (Yellow) and Charlotte Lucas (Red). Each of these women have their male counterpart that they will marry, according to the novel.

On the board there are 40 Random Tiles. They are:

• 5 "Affection Points +2" Tiles (Player keeps this tile and adds 2 affection points to their total)
• 27 "Affection Points +1" Tiles (Player keeps this tile and adds 1 affection point to their total)
• 4 "Male Counterpart" Tiles (Darcy, Bingly, Wickham and Collins)
• 1 "Mother Bennet" Tile (Player loses a turn)
• And 3 "Pirate Tiles" (All Random Tiles are removed to be shuffled and replaced. The player that activated the Pirate Tile takes 3 of their +1 Affection Tiles from their collection to be shuffled and put back onto the board)

Once a player has amassed 10 points their goal is to find their male counterpart. They can keep any other points they come across to throw off other players. Once a player has earned enough points to attain their counterpart they win the Bennet Dowry either themselves or, in Charlotte's case, through her husband.

Each player moves along with the roll of the dice and follow the rules of the random tiles they come across.

The reason we have Pirate Tiles is a hint at Keira Knightley (pretty obvious considering we used her picture as the pirate symbol). Knightley played Elizabeth Bennet in the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice  and Elizabeth Swan in the Pirates of the Caribbean. 

These tiles also give other players a chance to take back some points. Otherwise, because we only have 37 points available (10 for one player and 9 for the other three), the game would only last until the first person achieved 10 points.

During the creation of this game we faced 2 issues. 

The first issue was a general issue with our idea. We had originally thought that the game should be based around the men earning the attraction points to get the women. While creating the game (after watching the movie), we realized that because the Bennet family was not terribly wealthy, the girls would have to accept any proposal they were faced with. This would counteract the game dynamic of earning they girls affection. So we quickly changed the game so that the players played the girls seeking the attraction and proposal of the men.

The second issue we faced was a physical issue when we started making the "Affection +1" Tiles. We used permanent marker and it started to bleed through. This was an issue because as soon as someone saw which tiles had green writing they would know which tiles to head for. We quickly solved this problem by gluing a second piece of construction paper to each tile. This not only hid and permanent marker that had bled through the first piece, it also gave the tiles a thicker, more comfortable feel.

I am looking forward to hear what people think of Pride, Prejudice and Pirates!

As for all the picture we used in our game:

Mrs.Bennet: http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/content/images/2007/03/19/mrs_bennet_396_396x222.jpg

Mr.Darcy: http://images4.fanpop.com/image/photos/16100000/Colin-Firth-Pride-and-Prejudice-Darcy-colin-firth-16177740-1600-1200.jpg

Mr.Bingly: http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/content/images/2007/03/19/mr_bingley396_396x222.jpg

Mr.Wickham: http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/content/images/2007/03/22/lydia_wickham_1600x1200.jpg

Mr.Collins: http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb57524/humanscience/images/b/bd/13_collins_Pride_and_Prejudice.jpg

and Keira Knightley (Pirate): http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mLcHEKw2qw0/Tnjc40RhqxI/AAAAAAAABrc/Bf3HhqDvZwA/s400/Swann+Pirate.jpg

And They're Off!

Race to the Finish

In the first tutorial I met up with Jordon Mattison, Alex Golenischev and Sidd Panchal to play each of our Race to the Finish games.

First up was my game, University Life.

My game was University Life. A mix of Snakes and Ladders and The Game of Life. Players roll and collect or lose "Study points" as they land on spaces. They can also be fast tracked to spots further on the board. Players must earn enough Study points to complete and Tests they come across. They also must stop when they reach the midterm and final and add their study points to a roll. If they haven't collected enough Study points they are sent back to earn more.

Some problems I faced were when I decided to put in a massive fast track. This was a problem because Jordon is extremely lucky. He landed on the fast track to the final and failed once. Soon after he landed on the identical space and already had enough study points to pass the final. Winning in less than 10 turns.

Other than that, I realized that my game could use more spots where the players can gain Study points and less "Project squares" where players lose a turn. I would also lower the Study points needed to pass the midterm and final and get rid of the massive fast track that Jordon used to win.

Next up was Alex's game, F1 Racing.

Alex's game was a Formula 1 racer where players took turns at a very fast pace, each roll of the six sided dice could land you on an off ramp to a short cut, a square that had you move 5 or 10 on your next turn, an oil spill that made you lose a turn or a set of tools where the player rolls to see how many turns they lose.

This game would've been a lot easier to figure out if the board game board was bigger and had a legend of the icons on the side. Otherwise it was another very fun game that I lost.

Third was Sidd's game, Even or Odd.

Sidd's game one of the more confusing games of the day. But as we went along we began to understand the player switches and chance spaces and it quickly became a very fun game. The player switches would change each player's location with the person to their left so (as it happened a few times) the player in 1st might become 3rd, 2nd might become last, 3rd might become 2nd, and last would move to first.

The only real issue we found (after we recovered from the initial confusion), was when we came to splits in the path with and small "E" and "O" in the corners. (Seeing as this was the main design for the game "Even or Odd" it probably should have been more clearly defined). At these spots, depending on your roll (even or odd) you would follow one path or the other. The issue was, the letters did not match up to the path you were to take. Also because the paths were not clearly defined it was possible to get stuck in almost infinite loops.

We had some fun working out the right way to play this game and I ended up getting 2nd place (Thanks to a Player Swap!).

Finally Jordon's game, Battle Squares.

Battle squares was The kind of game you play once or twice without really understanding what's going on. There are many rules to the battling but it's an decent idea. I think it just needs some design work, maybe a quick guide to battling.

On the board there are 4 different colour squares, red, yellow, blue and the big green squares. Every player starts with 1 equipment card. Red squares give the player an equipment card, blue squares give the player effect cards to be played on their turn, yellow do nothing and green cards are the battle squares, you battle with another player that has landed on or passed the green square.

Players also have the ability to "save" their progress at the beginning of their turn in case they get into a battle and lose they wont have to return to the start.

As for battling itself it initially seemed like a lengthy process, but it gets easier as you play:


To battle, each player selects 1 equipment card, and put the others back down. You show each other the equipment card at the same time. In order to determine who wins:

1. Look at the Special conditions, if they are met as described, that card wins and the battle is over. If not...
2. If the attacker (player who initiated the fight) has a higher attack on their card than the defender has defense, the attacker wins.
3. If the attacker has less attack than the defender has defense, the defender wins.
4. The defender always wins in a tie.

At the end of the battle, the used equipment is discarded and shuffled back into the deck if and when you need more equipment cards.


This game is not hard to understand once you get into it. It just has a lot of rules and procedures to get used to very quickly.

All in all, I enjoyed our games, some need a bit of tweaking but that's what the play-testing is for. I would definitely be willing to play revised versions of these games anytime.

Battle Hexagons

Battle Hexagons

For this territorial acquisition game I joined Jordon Mattison, Alex Golenischev and Sidd Panchal to create a roughly Portal based game.

The object of our game is to gain the most hexagons after 20 rounds. To move, each player rolls two six-sided die on their turn.

Players can acquire hexagons by moving across them. Any hexagon they pass in their roll is claimed and coloured in using their dry-erase marker. (For this prototype we used coloured pencils)

Players cannot re-claim hexagons from other players so there is the chance that a player can be cornered, thus unable to move. So don't get trapped!



These are “wild hexes.”  When you cross them, draw a card from the wild pile.  This hex is now claimed, and you may walk across it 3 times before it becomes spent.

These are “Portal hexes.” Once used, you may travel to any non-claimed portal hex.  Once used, it can only be used to travel back and forth between portals.  Any further portal hexes acquired can be linked into the player’s portal network.

 

These are blank hexes. You claim them by walking over them with your player piece.  Once claimed, no other player except for you may walk over them.

Also included in our game is the deck of Wild cards that are drawn when a player lands on the "Wild Hex". The only wild card a player can keep in their hand to be used later is the "No Chance" card, which can be spent when the player doesn't want to draw a wild card.

Games in class: UNO!

In Friday's class I joined up with a group of 8 to play a game I hadn't played in a very long time, Uno!

http://www.areyougame.com/images/items/MA41001.jpg

Uno is a simple card game for 2 to 10 players. The rules sound slightly complicated with many special cards, penalties, challenges and small rules to remember, but once the game gets going it is all easy to remember.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/45/Uno.jpg/300px-Uno.jpg

Cards:
There are 15 different types of cards that can be played:

• Numbered cards: 0 to 9, these are the basic playing cards found in the four different colours. In order to finish their hand, the player must play one of these cards.
• Skip cards: These are found in the four different colours. These cards skip the next players turn.
• Draw Two: These are found in the four different colours. The next player must draw two cards and cannot place any.
• Reverse: These cards reverse the direction of play.
• Wild: These black cards can be placed on any other card. The person who played this card chooses the new colour. These cards can only be played when the player cannot place any other card.
• Wild, Draw Four: These black cards function like Wild cards with the addition that the next player must draw four cards and cannot place any.  These cards can only be played when the player cannot place any other card.

Rules / How to play:

Along with the special cards that extend the gameplay, there are general rules of play that are easiest to outline while explaining how to play.

• Each player is dealt 5 cards. The dealer then flips the top card of the deck to show the colour and number to start with, this is the discard pile.
• Players can place a card in the discard pile only if the match either the colour or number of the card at the top of the pile (ie the last card placed).
• If a player cannot play any card they draw one from the deck without placing a card.
• Following the rules of any special cards played, play continues until someone runs out of cards.
• Prior to that, any player who has a single card in their hand must say "Uno". If they don't say it and another player catches them the must draw two more cards from the deck.

The group I was in played Uno in a non traditional way according to the official rules. Normally, to make a game last multiple dealings, when one player plays there last card everyone else tallies up the value of their cards (Wild Draw Four is worth 50 points, all other special cards are worth 20 and number cards are worth their face value). Each person's amount is awarded to the player who just played their last card. The game ends when a player reached 500 points. This seems like a good way to extend the gameplay for people who looked up the official rules. But because we only played Uno for 30 minutes, the group I was in competed for first place, then second, and so on.

Things I noticed and what I would change:

I noticed a few interesting thing while playing Uno. One thing I noticed was that personally, I paid more attention to playing the matching colour than the number. I know that the only reason to place a number card is so that you hope that the colour stays so you can get rid of some more cards of that colour. I think this is a good game mechanic in a way. In a way it takes the pressure of strategy off and allows you to have more fun just getting rid of as many cards as you can. It wouldn't make such a fun and easy to play game if you had to carefully think about each card you are placing. 

Something I noticed that I didn't enjoy very much is the fact that at times Uno feels like it is only being played between the few players you have to react to and the few players your move affects. Whatever the players across the group from me played had completely changed by the time my turn came around. Although it was still fun to watch the seemingly endless circles of reverse cards and players repeatedly getting hit with Draw Two or Draw Four cards, at times it felt like the whole point of playing with more than three people was lost. I think that would be the thing I would change in Uno. As a designer I think there would be some way to mix up the gameplay to expand the feeling of a group such as adding Skip Two, or even Skip Three cards. Another card that I think would be interesting is a Wild Next Player card where the one who places chooses the next player (other than themselves), and play continues from there. Also the player who plays the Wild Next Player card loses their next turn (so that they will not just choose the player next to them and get almost two turns in a row.)

Those are only small issues and I think Uno is still a great game none the less. I will definitely be willing to play it much more often in the future, maybe even make my own cards for it!