Tag Archives: #Goals

Game Development, Lessons Learned

#25: ADSftK Designer Diary 1 (Design Goals and Physical Components)

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As promised, I am going to start rolling through the MANY things I learned from The Game Crafter‘s “Time” Design Challenge. The entry I eventually submitted (at the last possible minute) is A Dragon Show for the King and the lessons are plenteous.  *I promise to try and keep this brief and to the point 😉

I guess the most logical place to start is the beginning. The contest began about 2 months ago. I found out about it with roughly 50 days left. Fear and doubt had no place in my mind because it was racing with the potential of a game which used time as a resource – not a simple timer or “clock”, but as something which could be manipulated for the players’ benefit. My Idea Notebook went everywhere with me for a week because I could not stop the flow of game concepts. Sometimes it was just a possible mechanic. Other times the thoughts involved an entire thematic idea. There were so very many  options to choose from – even some great ideas from my friends.

With time running short, I had to make a decision on ONE project to build up and publish, though. Here are the associated design goals I was cooking through:

Contest Requirements:

  • Time as a resource
  • Cost cannot exceed $24.99
  • Publish Ready: logo, backdrop, shop ad, action shots, description, cool factors, all images proofed, and have packaging
  • Must be new and must be (legally) yours

Personal Goals:

  • Small / easily transported (because of the dwindling clock and monetary restriction)
  • Lightweight / easy to learn (because it’s small)
  • Easy / fast set up and break down
  • Good player interaction
  • As many players as possible (because interaction is more fun with more people)
  • An element of randomness to improve replay value
  • Players should feel like they have control over their end-game
  • No player elimination & hidden score (so the game can be fun all the way to the end)

Now, with the exception of the first 2 points, these personal goals are generally how I like to design anyway. Honestly, I don’t even write this stuff down. It’s just how I filter game ideas as I’m preparing to work on a project. So, with all of that in mind I reviewed my ideas and went with the most exciting and “complete” one I had: a drafting game where the chosen cards had to “cook” for a set number of turns. After the cards processed they were turned face-down in a score pile to hide the actual score until the end of the game. Some cards would have abilities which sped up or slowed down the progress of other cards. Some of those abilities would specifically mess with other players.

Why was that the most exciting? Didn’t you have something bigger / better in that book? Well, let me tell you. . .

I love drafting games. Teale Fristoe at Nothing Sacred Games gives a wonderful breakdown of many reasons to love the format. Primarily, I wanted to keep this a drafting game because it utilized randomness in a way to give players a different view of the game play after play, while still allowing a level of control over how the game panned out. Depending on how the draft is structured, you could have a built-in clock to end the game in a set number of turns – thereby giving me control over how big and how long the game was. Because I knew how many turns I wanted the game to last, adding more players simply involved adding a known number more cards. Finally, as Mr. Fristoe points out, a huge benefit of drafting is simultaneous play. Thereby allowing me to add up to 6 players to the game without drastically increasing play time.

The first iteration was actually quite easy to build. The challenge, really, was in determining how many cards I would need. Ideally, I’d be able to fit this whole thing into a tuck box. However, I wanted at least 6 players to be able to play and, as I just mentioned, adding more players meant adding more cards. So, the total number needed to divide evenly into player groups (i.e. 2, 3+, 5+) to allow for easy set up. Secondly, the number of cards divided by the number of players determined the number of turns for a game. Too small a card pool and the game would be extremely short. Too long of a game and players would start with an unwieldy hand (imagine on your first play through holding and sorting 30 cards all at once).

My gut told me that I wanted a 2 player game to last between 10 and 14 turns. This should allow just enough time for players to get themselves into trouble and race down to the finish line without feeling overly long. Whatever I decide for 2 players would be my foundation – no other group would have fewer than this number of turns. After doing a tiny bit of math and a lot of intuitions 😉 I settled on 24 cards. This gave 2 players 12 turns to work their magic. It also multiplied beautifully: 3 players would have 16 turns each, 4 players 12 each, 5 players 14* each, and 6 players 12 each. The one acceptable complication being 5 players. In the end, I put some REALLY strong and crazy stuff in those 24 5+ player cards. So, losing 2 wasn’t really a problem.

This means that the total 6 player capable version would only involve 72 poker size cards. Yay! Small game? Check! Easy set up? (Shuffle together up to 3 complete sets of 24 cards depending on the size of your group.) Check!

That pretty much covers design goals and how I determined the physical details of the game. Tune in next week when I’ll start covering more of the virtual aspects of the game, like: player interaction, time as a resource, theme, etc. In the mean-time, have a great week!

A Little Backstory, Lessons Learned, Top-Deck

#18: Where the Bonus Began (Part 2)

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I walked into a game store which seemed vaguely familiar. The place was packed with people buying, showing off goody bags, talking, and playing with a palpable excitement. As I pressed through the crowd, I had to duck around vertical banners for a new game that I didn’t quite recognize. On the tables were little stands advertising the same game. They featured images of post-apocalyptic characters and proclaimed “Now available”. Looks like I walked in on a launch party! Gamers were laughing all around me, shuffling cards, nudging friends, and having a great time.

A large crowd at the back of the store caught my attention, so I moved that way. As I drew near, I could see an opening centered around 2 people facing off across a table. Listening to the copious side-talk, cheering, and jeering, it was clear this was an important game. “This is for the championship!” Oh.
Wasteland
On my left side was a wiry man confident that he, with superior skills, strategy, and sharp tongue, had the game in hand already. His serious demeanor was echoed by the cards in his deck – they looked like pages out of a “Mad Max” comic book. To my right was a heftier young gamer who seemed happy enough just to be there. A whimsical, lighthearted nature was made overt by his big smile and the colorful images of little anime-style monsters on his deck. This truly was a showdown – between a killer out to show that he’s the best and a goodly kid just having a fun day.
Pocket Monsters
I had seen this game played out across several Slots, progressively earning more points and jockeying for the top position. After a bit of back-and-forth, these two used all of their actions to discard their hands and remove all but the last Slot in a show of ultimate cockiness. Without a hand, these would-be-champions could only top-deck a card for the last slot. Wiry Guy was mocking and trash talking while Happy-gamer was quite and sure. They both played the top card from their decks. . .
And the store errupted! People were cheering for Happy-Gamer and clapping him on the back while others oooooh’ed at Wiry Guy’s epic loss. I couldn’t help but feel excited for Happy-Gamer. At the same time I was dumbfounded by the joy that filled this little building.
That was a great game. I should definitely make. . .
And I woke up.
*To read the rest of this story, click part one or part three.
Game Development, Lessons Learned

#6: Setting Goals

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For just a little while, let’s talk about goals.
I never did like them. In high school and college there was always at least one teacher each year who wanted to cover the subject. I’d do the classwork but never implement the information. Until board games came along and taught me the value of planning ahead.

A project fell into my lap a few weeks ago. Like usual, I mentally ran through the different pieces which needed to fall into place for completion. At the end of the day, I was surprised by my excitement for the coming week. It turns out I had accidentally set course, medium, and fine goals for myself, and was genuinely enthusiastic about plodding through it. The tiered goals were encouraging because they involved different amounts of time, different levels of “busy” work, and varying degrees of detail. Thus, I could pick which goals to address based on how much time and interest I had.

By now you are probably wondering what I meant by course, medium, and fine goals. Course items may require significant blocks of time (because they often include building blocks for the rest of the project) but little detail. Fine, on the other hand, requires significant attention to detail and, often, a lot of time because this is where you are fine tuning and putting the finishing touches on your project. Medium items are usually more fun for me, and typically involve the least time but are great in quantity since they allow you to transition from Course to Fine.

    If you were painting: sketching the general composition and blocking in the colors would be working in the course realm. Refining colors, shapes, and values would be medium work. Adding details and adjusting color highlights would be the fine work.
For graphic design: course goals would involve determining how much information needs to be presented and the dimensions of the end result (poker card, jumbo card, game board, etc.). Medium would entail finding the optimal arrangement so it is easy to read or ensuring the image is clearly the focal point. Fine work is adding textures and shading to pretty it up.
When writing a quick project, like a timed essay: course would be the brainstorm. Medium would be laying out the outline. Fine corresponds to writing out the complete essay. Or, for those of you used to long term projects, like research papers, the course work would be brainstorming and researching your topic. Then, of course you write the outline. Then, the medium work would involve writing the rough draft and having it edited and reviewed. Finally, crafting and writing that perfect final draft is your fine work.
For game development, course would be building the general concept – what the game is about and/or primary mechanics. Medium is where you build prototypes, write basic rules, and play test. Then, you blind play test. Then you play test some more. At last, you’ll reach the fine work of final game balance adjustments and cleaning up the rules to improve clarity.

 

Now, why on Earth does all of that matter?
Setting goals obviously makes your process more efficient by designating a road map to the finished product. Setting tiered goals keeps you interested in the process and allows you to make better use of your limited time.

 

I completely understand the desire to jump on top of your project and just work through it as fast as you can. It feels great cranking through that raw excitement, but it WILL eventually wane. Working on pure excitement is tiring (as you probably have found). People who jump from project to project, idea to idea, without ever finishing them typically do so because they have no plan. They work until they run out of energy and then move on to the next thing that excites them.

 

With set goals guiding you to the end, you can stay on track and rate your progress. Having that road map on hand allows you to see exactly what’s left – instead of running along loving how much fun this one painting is, skidding to the finish line exhausted but satisfied, and then being discouraged because you just did the math and found you have to do it 5 more times. If your steps are written down, you can also easily see how far you’ve come. As I mentioned in this post, reminding yourself of just how much you have already accomplished is vital in maintaining excitement and interest in your project.

 

After the beginning stages of your project, you’ll develop a good feel for how long certain steps are taking you. So, you’ll begin to be able to somewhat accurately look at your goals and gauge how long different sections will take. When working, you usually know how much time you have for that day (like a 30 minute lunch break or 4 hours after church). Therefore, you can pick and work on pieces of your project based on how long you expect it to take, how much uninterrupted work you expect to have to put in to finish that piece, how much interest you have in that section, or even how many other goals require this one to be finished first. Finally, that road map will keep you from missing or forgetting steps along the way. Remember that painting from earlier? Imagine if you sweated your way through 3 days of perfection. Along the way, you got lost in the process, went with what “felt right” and “looked good” and now your finished painting’s composition does not meet your project’s requirements. For graphic designers, it can be quite easy to put in hours of work building a gorgeous layout. What if it’s extreme detail, texturing, and vivid colors render text unreadable, or draws attention away from the art you spent all that time trying to frame?

 

Hopefully, by now, I’ve made a better case for goals than, “You should, because it is best.” I wrote this specifically for others trying to, like me, do the ridiculous task of designing games from concept, to art, to design, and off to publishing. Therefore, this was written with the idea of a long-term, multistage project. I pray that even if you aren’t running game company all by your lonesome these ideas and explanations will help you.

 

How has goal planning helped you through big projects? What’s your take on tiered goals?