Print and Play News Blog

Thursday, June 9, 2016

Interview with Orkhan Yusifov - Flag-Runner

Could you describe your game from a game mechanics point of view?
The game is based on rolling dice and moving on the grid in addition to strategic thinking, planning and movements.

What were your design goals with the game?
To create something that will be loved by a group of players, if not by majority. If successful, to publish for the public eventually.

How long have you been working on your game?
Four months

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Interview with Jim Bourke - Battle for Arnhem

Could you describe your game from a game mechanics point of view?
The game is traditionally of the "I go then you go" style of games. Players take turns moving their pieces. A single die is used to resolve combat. As in most wargames, units have different capabilities. Battle for Arnhem is a very easy game to learn but it takes many plays to see the correct strategies for each side.

What were your design goals with the game?
Create a complex, layered game in two pages of rules that successfully recreates the flow of the historic battle.

How long have you been working on your game?
At least five years, in various iterations.

Finish the sentence: “If you like , then you’ll probably like my game” and perhaps let us know, what the similarities and differences are.
Battle for Moscow. This lightweight wargame is a great introduction to the wargaming hobby. The similarities are that they are both lightweight wargames with a traditional rules base, but there are many differences as well. I strove to create original rules that I think make my game much more fun on subsequent plays.

Interview with David Thompson - Castle Itter

Could you describe your game from a game mechanics point of view?
During a game of Castle Itter, you take the role of the force that defended the castle from 0400 - 1600 on 5 May 1945. The goal of the game is to last until a deck of SS cards is depleted, without allowing SS Counters to reach the castle. Additionally, you score points for each Defender that becomes a casualty - the lower your score at the end of the game, the better.

Castle Itter is divided into turns. Each turn consists of the following:
- Take five actions with Defenders
- Play three SS cards.

During each turn you take five actions with your Defenders. You can only take one action with a Defender on a turn. The actions include:

- Attack
- Suppress
- Move within a location (Free Action)
- Move to a new location
- Special Actions (Command and Escape)
- Recover
- Remove suppression

Once you have completed your five Defender actions for the turn, reveal three SS Cards from the SS deck, one at a time, resolving the effect of each one before moving to the next. After all three SS Cards have been resolved, the turn is over and the next turn begins with five new Defender actions.

There are four different categories of SS Cards, based on the card effect:

- Attacking Defenders
- Attacking a Location
- Placing SS Counters
- Suppressing Defenders

What were your design goals with the game?
I had two main goals: first, I wanted to expose players to the rich, interesting story of this little-known but very intriguing battle. Second, I wanted the game to evoke the emotional experience and tension the defenders felt when desperately defending the castle.

How long have you been working on your game?
I originally brainstormed and conceptualized Castle Itter in late 2015. However, other priorities forced me to wait until January 2016 for the initial design effort to begin.

Finish the sentence: “If you like , then you’ll probably like my game” and perhaps let us know, what the similarities and differences are.
If you like Victory Point Games' States of Siege series of games, then you’ll probably like my game. During the design process somewhere around 10 people suggested I reach out to VPG as a publisher for the design. The game deviates from the SoS in many regards, with the most obvious being the scope of the battle (Castle Itter is extremely tactical, whereas many of the SoS games are operational or strategic in scope and scale). It also introduces many mechanisms not found in the SoS series, such as suppression, new methods for introduction of adversaries, a unique action selection system, etc. However, the core concept of defending an area against an advancing enemy is one in the same.

Interview with Eddy Sterckx - Waterloo Squares

Could you describe your game from a game mechanics point of view?
During the game players construct and modify a deck of cards which act as a command deck for units they want to move and fight with on the board. So it's a deck-building wargame.

What were your design goals with the game?
Make a low-complexity wargame that still gives gamers a good feel of the challenges both sides faced and has a historically plausible outcome. The deck-building mechanic as first seen in A Few Acres of Snow seemed like a good fit for simulation the command and control problems generals faced in those days.

How long have you been working on your game?
Like most game designers I always have a few designs "in progress" - sometimes you get stuck with a design and it goes on the backburner for months or even years. In contrast to that Waterloo Squares came together pretty quickly, also thanks to my play-testers who seemed to like the game even in early beta.

Finish the sentence: “If you like , then you’ll probably like my game” and perhaps let us know, what the similarities and differences are.
If you like the simplicity and low-unit count of a game like Manoeuvre combined with the deck-building / order delay mechanic of A Few Acres of Snow, you'll like this game. And it's free too :)

Interview with Charles Ward - HAZE ISLANDS

Hello! Welcome back to the PNP News! This post is part of a series of interview that I'll be conducting with game designers who are participating in board game design contests on Board Game Geek. Today, I'll be interviewing Charles Ward who designed the game HAZE ISLANDS for the 2016 2 Player PnP Design Contest.

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your gaming history?
Playing games does give me a brain workout, but instead of feeling fatigue I'm all the more inspired and stimulated. On the other hand, designing games is much more challenging. It's a different kind of brain work out and allows me to be creative with the design (look and function) of the game. Finally, self-publishing my creations puts me in a different mindset all together. I have to keep a cool head to think out and execute a business like plan. But emotionally, I get to see people enjoying my game, and also see my games fail miserably in the video review department. It's interesting to see my ego being boosted and bruised. In the end, we really don't need egos.

What is your favorite PNP game?
I love simple, abstract strategy games like Autumn, Seeker 9, Murder's Row and hard games like Land 6, Farlander...

How did you first discover PNP design contests?
In 2013 I found myself making things that looked like games to improve the English classes I teach here in Japan. That lead me to research more about games, which took me to BGG and the PNP contests. It has been a real pleasure to rediscover games and see how they have changed since my childhood. With a son of my own now, I'm slowly growing a collection to enjoy with friends and family.

Could you describe your game from a thematic point of view?
HAZE ISLANDS is a pirate game. You are the captain of a ship and crew, and your goal is infamy. There are many adventures to be had, they will give your the reputation you are looking for. But there is danger. Other pirates might attack you when your ship is low on crew to steal your hold and put you out of the race. Then there is The Doom, a creature unknown, that strikes at night growing stronger as the week goes on. Kill it or run away. No time to waste.

Could you describe your game from a game mechanics point of view?
Players (1-3) use a deck of map cards to take actions (such as sail, scout new islands, deploy pirates, raid for resources, complete adventures). Most of the cards start in the first players draw deck, as the first player discards them, they are passed to the next player draw deck. So as a round progresses, everyone will use approximately the same number of cards.

However, cards are used to form the locations. So the more locations you explore, the less cards there are to go round. When the cards run out the round ends and The Doom increases in strength and attacks the nearest player. Each time The Doom can travel further, so players like to explore, but that thins out the deck making the rounds shorter. Also having cards in hand reduced the deck.

Players are also in a race to complete adventure with cards from their hands and pirate crew they deployed (worker placement). There is a risk that they wont come back until you need them, so if someone takes the adventure you require, your pirate wont be able to come back until you need to spend that resource. Also, pirate tokens are hit points that you can take if The Doom attacks you.

All this mayhem and yet there is no player elimination, instead there are role changes. If you are sunk by a player you become a castaway looking to poach another player's ship. If you are sunk by The Doom you become a Ghost Ship and can hinder other players and help The Doom attack them, giving you a chance to revive your ship and break the spell you are in.

The Solo, Friendly, Competitive, and Cooperative modes, a 54 card build, a 20-60 minute playtime, some gorgeous art, an awesome rulebook, and the swashbuckling theme make HAZE ISLANDS a nice little game.

What were your design goals with the game?
My design goals for the game were to improve upon the last attempt (HAZE CITY) at designing a game where "you need something to solve a problem at a location before time runs out". The added tension of The Doom, the player interaction of the semi-shared deck, and the special actions have all been added as the design took shape.

Second to this I wanted to make the game publishable with AMAZING art and an AMAZING rulebook.

How long have you been working on your game?
HAZE CITY started in October 2015, so I guess that would be the start date for HAZE ISLANDS too since it borrows a lot from the innovative card design. The idea was to create a grid of cards, but since the cards are not square you would combine 2 cards to form a square. Part of the bottom card was covered so you could modify the quest/event/resource at that location with that one card by rotating or flipping it, offering 4 possible changes (2 per card side).

Finish the sentence: “If you like , then you’ll probably like my game” and perhaps let us know, what the similarities and differences are.
If you like Zombie in my Pocket but want to have a lot more meat on your bone, then you’ll probably like my game. I guess, at a stretch, 1 game of Zombie in my Pocket is 1 round of the 6 rounds of HAZE ISLANDS, then multiply that by 3 players. You are going to need a pocket 18 times bigger for this game.

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

Interview with Desmond Meraz - Designer of The Fool's Journey

Hello! Welcome back to the PNP News! This post is part of a series of interview that I'll be conducting with game designers who are participating in board game design contests on Board Game Geek. Today, I'll be interviewing Desmond Meraz who designed the game The Fool's Journey for The 2016 Solitaire Print and Play Design Contest.

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your gaming history?
"I have primarily been an avid enthusiast of the abstract strategy board game Go since 1998. I was originally exposed to the game through its depiction in Darren Aronofsky's first major film, Pi. I was captivated by its aesthetics and visited game stores in the hopes of locating a copy. I eventually found a flimsy cardboard set with tiny ceramic stones and proceeded to teach myself and a friend how to play after chancing upon a copy of Kaoru Iwamoto's book "Go for Beginners" in a thrift store. Intimidated by the use of a handicap, my friend eventually lost interest as my skill at the game improved through frequent study and practice. I continued to read Go books, acquire higher quality traditional game equipment, play via online Go servers, and created the infrequent Shusaku Go Club which I periodically reestablish when I move to a new city. Over the years I have come to appreciate the therapeutic value of Go and teach the game to clients during group and individual counseling sessions. I have also recorded my impressions of the symbolism and spiritual possibilities of the game in an essay entitled "The Way of Go." Within the last year, I have gradually started to broaden my gaming horizons after becoming smitten with the iOS game Card Crawl by Arnold and Weibke Rauers. Arnold listed among his influences Scoundrel by Kurt Bieg and Zach Gage, Donsol by John Eternal, and Royal Assassin Solitaire by Mark Brown. I immediately began to track down these and similar games and my inquires repeatedly sent me to the Boardgamegeek site as the principal repository for all things gaming related.

What is your favorite PNP game?
My favorite PNP game that actually uses printed components is Dice of Arkham by Mads L. Brynnum. I have a history of appreciation of H. P. Lovecraft's stories and these serve as the setting for a very compact and enjoyable experience. I originally started collecting dice just to be able to play this game. It also served as a springboard to the appreciation of other PNP games with similar mechanics. I would love to see someone apply this formula to Robert Chamber's Carcosa Mythos which was one of the precursors to and primary influences upon the Cthulhu Mythos. I may just have to try my hand at crafting one myself.

How did you first discover PNP design contests?
While searching for playing card games similar to Card Crawl, I found that many of them emerged from the Print and Play design contests. I gained increasing exposure to the contests while scouring the boards for weeks and collecting my findings in the "Thematic PNP Solitaire Card Games" geeklist. This activity also exposed me to dice games and I soon proceeded to make a similar investigation and compile my findings in the "Thematic PNP Solitaire Dice Games" list. The enthusiasm and friendliness of the participants (as of the Boardgamegeek community in general) was infectious and it soon became evident to me that I too wanted to participate in one of these events.

Could you describe your game from a thematic point of view?
The Fool's Journey makes use of a complete deck of Tarot cards. It takes its theme (and name) from a common motif built into the deck itself. In addition to the four suits similar to the standard deck of playing cards, there are 21 numbered and one unnumbered trump cards featuring evocative and highly symbolic images. The unnumbered trump is named the Fool and it traditionally depicts a disheveled vagabond traveling with a bindle dressed after the fashion of a court jester. There is a lengthy precedent within the history of the Tarot cards for interpreting the trumps as representations of various stages in a spiritual journey or adventure undertaken by the Fool.

Could you describe your game from a game mechanics point of view?
Mechanically, it is a straightforward dungeon crawler in which the swords are weapons, batons are shields, cups are potions, coins are gold, royals are allies, and trumps are monsters. Aces could represent spells. The dungeon crawling mechanics are transposed very naturally into the adventure theme. The central element is the identification of the trump cards with the stages or "challenges" of the journey. In the adventure motif, the Fool must use his volition or will-power (swords), interior reserves of strength (batons), and vitality (cups) to overcome challenges (trumps) while taking risks (aces) and accumulating the wisdom of experience (coins) to make use of mysterious helpers (royals). A subtle thematic element is additionally incorporated into the gameplay layout which is divided into past, present, and future after the manner of the use of the Tarot cards as a fortune-telling or divinatory device.

What were your design goals with the game?
My design goals were to incorporate all of the cards of the deck, create something that was balanced and beatable, and utilize the native properties of the deck as much as possible. Although certain games such as Scoundrel seem to achieve the height of elegance with only a selection of cards from the standard deck, I have always found this limitation somewhat disappointing and so planned on using the entire deck from the very beginning.

Making the game balanced and beatable is still an ongoing project. Achieving balance in a game with random elements seems to be part planning and part luck. The initial planning involved doing some basic mathematical calculations to determine what kind of mechanisms would be needed to bridge the gap between the value of the Challenges and the Fool’s limited resources. I settled for incorporating special properties into the Aces and Royals for shuffling (essentially postponing difficult challenges) and doubling in order to bridge the value gap. Using a currency to purchase the latter feature simultaneously tempers it while increasing the importance of strategic choices. So far I am receiving positive feedback on the win/loss ratio showing that the game is challenging while still being achievable.

Finally, I also tried to incorporate the native values and properties of the cards as much as possible in order to keep the game simple and intuitive and also to retain a semblance of the feel of traditional Patience games.

How long have you been working on your game?
I first conceived of the game very suddenly one evening in early February of 2016. I did my initial calculations the following day and developed the mechanics of the Chance, Wisdom, and Helper cards the day after that. I have been slowly refining the rules to account for different situations as they arise during gameplay ever since that initial creative impulse.

Finish the sentence: "If you like , then you’ll probably like my game” and perhaps let us know, what the similarities and differences are.
If you like Scoundrel, Donsol, and Card Crawl, then you will probably like my game. These three games served as the primary inspiration for The Fool's Journey. They are all based on variations of the use of a standard deck of playing cards with a dungeon crawling theme and mechanic. Scoundrel uses only a selection of numbered cards from three suits associated with potions, weapons, and monsters. Donsol uses all 54 cards associated with potions, shields, and monsters. Card Crawl uses a highly modified deck of 54 cards including a selection of numbered cards from four suits of potions, coins, swords, and shields, and additional cards representing monsters and spells. All of these games play out in four card rounds.

Mechanically, The Fool's Journey is most similar to Card Crawl. My original impetus for creating the game was the desire to play Card Crawl with a physical deck of cards. I had the thought of using the tarot trumps as monsters and the basic mechanics and theme seemed to correlate naturally to the native values and properties of the deck. The main differences between the two are the theme, type of deck, the use of all cards in the Fool's Journey, and the use of special cards. The primary aim of Card Crawl is to accumulate gold which serves as the score and may be used to buy a variety of special cards each with unique functions that may be incorporated into future games. The aim of The Fool's journey is to complete all challenges and it makes use of only two special card functions, reshuffling and doubling, the latter of which requires coins to implement during play.

Overall, each of these games is very unique while applying its own idiosyncratic variation of a similar mechanic. I am very pleased with the result of The Fool's Journey and made an effort to notify the designers of these other games prior to entering it into the contest to let them know that their work and creativity served as my primary inspiration and that I intended to make that fact well-known. They all provided positive and encouraging responses. It is especially satisfying to learn that the designers of my favorite games are also genuinely nice and friendly people.

Interview with Niklas Hook - Designer of Moogh

Welcome to the first in a series of interview that I'll be conducting with game designers who are participating in board game design contests on Board Game Geek. Today, I'll be interviewing Niklas Hook who designed the game Moogh for the The 2016 9-Card Nanogame PnP Design Contest.

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your gaming history?
I have a background in design and advertising. I been involved in a lot of online entertainment/gamification projects. I always loved games but only jumped at designing them about 2 years ago. I have never published a game. but participated in a couple of bgg contests. Also with Fools of the feas for the 18 card and Childrens game design contest.

What is your favorite PNP game?
I don't have much experience with PnP - but I loved the PnP of Secret Hitler before it was released.

How did you first discover PNP design contests?
I came from BGDF.com where I only participated in 500 words game contests. It lead me to the Bgg. I never tried PnP before.

Could you describe your game from a thematic point of view?
I think theme was the main driver in the development of this game. I was probably influenced by the ads of ubisofts prehistoric game (primal fear?) which I did not try yet. I unfolded the historic theory about either puching Mammoths off a clif or driving the up against a cliff in prehistoric hunting.

Could you describe your game from a game mechanics point of view?
The mechanics evolved from the competition rules. Using very few components. I wanted a coop experience where you need to corporate but when you do you always give your opponent an advantage - making it hard to actually win. Also the AI of the Moogh is predictable - like the cavemen are so experienced in hunting that they have a feeling of the Mammoths actions.

What were your design goals with the game?
I'm not sure I remember anymore. I think to capture the feeling of trying to down a wild and BIG beast.

How long have you been working on your game?
4 months or so? I started the competition with another game I am less proud of (but am planning to improve.)

Finish the sentence: “If you like , then you’ll probably like my game” and perhaps let us know, what the similarities and differences are.
umm I have no idea. maybe Colt Express - in a tiny scale. Very thematic and players who like slight control but find it funny when things go crazy by randomness..