Week 9 Remixing & Modifying: Tic-Tac-Foot & Tyrannical Oil Monger

This week we had to modify the game of Tic-Tac-Toe so that there is an element of luck.

I made a couple simple change that I have found through playtesting make the game more interesting and still add that element of luck required for the assignment.

Name of the Game: Tic-Tac-Foot

Number of Players: 2

Time to Play: 15 - 30 minutes

Setup:

1. 5x5 Grid (as opposed to the 3x3 grid)
2. One player is Xs the other is Os.
3. Get a coin. Tails represents X. Heads represents O

Rules:

• Who ever gets 5 in a row of their shape wins.

One Round:

• Flip a coin to determine which shape you will draw on your turn. If its heads you have to place an O on the grid. If its tails you have to place on X on the grid, regardless of what shape is yours.
• This means a player can be the shape X but if they flip a coin on heads they have to place an O on the board.

Playtesting:

I found that during playtesting the game actually took longer to play than regular Tic-Tac-Toe, not only because of the size of the board, but because when a player had to place the opposing player's shape on the board they took more time to think about where they were placing it. Because of the element of luck it also means that players can't do the same thing every time they play (like in regular Tic-Tac-Toe). The size of the board was important because at 3x3 the game ended too quickly with my rule change, but the 5x5 dimensions suited it perfectly.

We also had to modify a game we previously made in class to shit the focus of the original game entirely to either skill or chance depending on the original focus of the game. I decided to change the focus of the territorial acquisition game Moazzam Pathan and I made, Supreme Oil Monger, such that it is based entirely on luck.

Name of the Game: Tyrannical Oil Monger

Number of Players: 2-4

Game Bits: 4 sets of pipes (150 tiles each); 1 for each player. 12 wells

Time to play: 30 - 60 minutes

Object of the Game: Connect the refinery to the most oil wells with your pipes to win.

One change that I've made to the board is that the spaces alternate between grey and white like a checker board.

Setup:

1. Players pick their colour and take their set of pipes.
2. Split the wells evenly between each other
3. Place wells on the board. Wells must be at least one space apart, and there can only be one well per quadrant.
4. Each player must shuffle their set of pipes. 

How to Play:

  2 Players:

1. If it is your first turn draw 5 pipes. Otherwise draw until you have 5 pipes.
2. Flip a coin. Heads is grey, tails is white. You may place your next piece on the space of the corresponding colour.
3. Place those pipes on the board. Your first pipe must be placed such that it is connected and adjacent or touching corners to one of the spaces around the refinery located in the centre of the board. After connecting your first pipe to the refinery, you may connect an additional pipe directly to the refinery, or choose to do so later on. 3 of 5 pipes must be placed on the board

 3/4 Players:

1. If it is your first turn draw 4 pipes. Otherwise draw until you have 4 pipes.
2. Flip a coin. Heads is grey, tails is white. You may place your next piece on the space of the corresponding colour.
3. Place those pipes on the board. Your first pipe must be placed such that it is connected and adjacent or touching corners to one of the spaces around the refinery located in the centre of the board. After connecting your first pipe to the refinery, you may connect an additional pipe directly to the refinery, or choose to do so later on. 2 of 4 pipes must be placed on the board.

NOTE:  Your pipes must be placed such that it is touching another pipe. Pipes can be oriented in any direction. More than one person can connect to a well.

Pipes are still drawn from a deck to maintain the element of chance, however players no longer choose exactly where to place their pipes; a coin is flipped to determine what color space the player's next pipe can be placed on. The only choice I have left for players is the option to choose which pipe to place. If I took out this choice, there would no longer be any meaningful decisions in this game.

Playtesting:

During playtesting I found that the game was now indeed more based on luck now. It was much more difficult to place pieces in such a way that everything connects. At first the rule was that all pipes must be placed on the board. I playtested this way once and found that it was too difficult to the point of frustration. I decided to adjust that rule to give the player a little more freedom, and made it so that they only have to place a fraction of the pipes they have. This way, the game was still based on luck, but the player also still felt they at least had some control and made them feel less frustrated.

Week 8 - Prototype 2: Save Our Stars

Name of the Game: Save Our Stars

Number of Players: 2-5

Time to Play: 30-60 minutes

Object of the Game: Return all the stars to the Sky

For this prototype we were asked to make a board game that invokes a starry night or nocturnal atmosphere, similar to the painting Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh. This wasn't the first time I had seen the painting, but I never knew the history behind it, and all I knew about Vincent van Gogh was that he cut his own ear off and was in an asylum at some point in his adult life. Either way, this didn't change what I felt when I saw the painting. As most people would I looked at the painting of the sky, the swirling brush strokes having caught my attention, then the firey elemental part  in the front caught my attention as well. Next was the church being the tallest building in the painting of a small village. The village really caught my attention; it brought back memories of memorable starry nights. All I could think about was how when I went to the cottage and went camping how visible the stars were compared to the city. That just made me think about those trips and how people escape to these small quiet places to be together and enjoy themselves.

We decided to use the idea of a team or community to create our game in such a way that players can play however they want, but they are also all working to a common goal as a team. We want players to feel what it is like to be in a team of different people working together, we intended the emotions to come out through dynamics and we structured the game in such a way that we knew what dynamics would arise.

To simulate the nocturnal atmosphere we gave our game a short story in which the stars have fallen from the sky, and the players are working together to put them back in the sky. To make the players feel like they needed each other we introduced the black hole.

The black hole would suck stars out of the sky at random. To stop this from happening a player would have to go and close the black hole, but this is risky since the player can get stuck in the black hole, and only another player can save them. A player can choose not to go close the black hole, but then the black hole will continue to take stars from the sky.

While playing the game it reminded me a lot of times when you need to make a difficult choice that involves other people. You can be selfish, but this may upset other people and result in something bad happening to them. You can be selfless and always help others, but this makes other people's problems your own.

To be honest it reminded me a little of how UOIT Game Dev is structured in terms of teams; we all rely on one another and at the same time we have our own individual goals. I found that the art and emotion in our game was in the dynamics that we intended the players to experience.

Alternatively we could have created our game in an opposite way. We could have created a one player game, and this player is working alone to complete a seemingly insurmountable task, and we could have designed it so that it is nearly impossible to win. This would have invoked more feelings of frustration and loneliness, but it would not have allowed players to experience what it means to be a team, rather it would make them wish they had a team.

Setup:

1. Each player picks an avatar (from the colored gems).
2. All players start from in the center (the Sky) of the board.
3. Place 5 star gems in the center (the Sky) of the board.
4. Place star gems along the outside of the entire board.

How to Play:

• Roll a die to move around the board in any direction.

Rules:

• When you land on a spot with a star on it, physically pick it up and keep it with you in your inventory. 
• You can hold a maximum of five stars at any given time.
• At any time you can also return to the Sky and put the stars you have in your inventory in the Sky
• To place stars in the Sky you must stop there; if you rolled a six but only moved two spaces to arrive at the Sky space to unload your stars, your turn ends.
• When a player rolls a six a black hole appears on an empty space on the board furthest from all the players. 
• There can only be a maximum of five black holes on the board at once.
• The player that cause the black hole to appear also takes a black hole token. 
• As long as this black hole is on the board, the player keeps that black hole token. When it is their turn again (and for all turns hereafter) they must roll a die for the black hole; if they roll an odd number a star is taken out of the Sky (center space) and taken out of play (off the board).
• To destroy a black hole, a player must go to a space adjacent to it or the same space as the black hole and roll a die for himself and the black hole. The higher number wins. If the player loses, they are sucked into the black hole, all the stars in their inventory are taken out of play and that player can no longer move or battle. If the player wins, the black hole is destroyed and any player who was sucked into the black hole is revived.
• If there are no more stars in the center of the board (meaning the black holes sucked the last star out), the game is over and all the players lose. If all the players are sucked into black holes, all the players lose. If there are no more stars except for the ones in the center of the board, the game is over and all the players win.

Art In Games:

To me art is anything where I feel something significant when I experience it or if it brings back a memory that I personally find significant. I know that this is vague, but it's difficult to explain. 

For example, when I played the game Heavy Rain, I felt very connected to the characters in the story because I was essentially determining their fates. I cared and felt responsible for whatever happened to them. I would compare this to when you get attached to characters in a TV show or a book, except a more powerful connection. 

When I played the game Flower, I couldn't believe just how much fun I was having. I felt emotions of happiness, relaxation, and at times guilt. Through the sounds and visuals the game depicts what is essentially our world. The message was that we have allowed nature to go to waste and we have destroyed nature to build our cities (that's where the guilt came in). I loved that the game was about restoring the balance.

I also enjoyed Journey, by the same developer as Flower. The fact that the story is told without anybody or anything saying words left it up to me to decide what the story was about and what was happening. I felt curious for the entire game and enjoyed exploring the world. The multiplayer was also interesting since you couldn't actually talk with other players directly and interacting much more challenging but cool at the same time.

Starry Nights in Games:

I've only ever experienced a couple starry nights in games. 

One game where I experienced a starry night moment was Grand Theft Auto IV. One of my favorite things to do in GTA was just to get a helicopter and get to the tallest building and just look at the city at night.

Another game where I experienced a starry night (more nocturnal atmosphere actually) was Batman Arkham City. I really enjoyed the movement system in the game and the dark, grunge environment. But I really like doing the classic Batman perched on a gargoyle shot then diving off and gliding. I would say this is more power fantasy than a starry night though. But I love Batman and associate him the most with the night.

Week 8: What is Art?

In the last lecture we had a discussion about what makes an art game and the question of 'What is art?' was asked. When I first thought about the question the first thing that came into my head was that if art was a form of self expression then anything can be art.

I've thought about it a little more since then, and I don't think anything can be art. I believe I've come to my own conclusion on what I personally believe art is, but I don't expect others to agree. Art is a form of self expression, but in my opinion it has to have meaning and is only art once someone other than the artist has experienced it; by hearing, reading, seeing or playing it.

The reason I say that it is not art until someone has experienced it is because if no one else has experienced it, it has no significance to anyone except the artist. It would make the piece of work more like a form of a diary or private journal. If a poet were to write a poem and no one ever reads it or hears it, how can anyone say it's art? How can anyone even say the poem exists?

Even then, after someone has experienced the work, it has to mean something to the person who experienced it. The person experiencing it must understand the artist's message. Recently I saw a modern art sculpture; it was a large piece of metal that was twisted in the center and folded slightly. This meant nothing to me when I saw it, and the only thing that came to mind was "Why on earth is this in the middle of a park?" But to someone else this may mean something and I'm just unable to see or feel what they do. It is only art to him and not to me.

In conclusion, I can definitively say there is no definitive definition of art because it is very subjective. What may be art to me may not be art to others and vice versa.

Week 7: Liar's Dice Rule Changes

Name of the Game: Liar's Dice 2.0

Number of Players: 2 or more

Object of the Game: Make the correct bids and deceive your opponents as long as possible.

Setup:

1. 5 dice for each player plus another five to be placed in the center
2. 5 cups to cover player's dice. The five dice in the center are left uncovered.
3. Choose a player to go first in the first round. 

One Round:

1. Every player rolls their dice while hiding them in their cups. The dice in the center are also rolled and left covered.
2. The first player makes a bid. When a player makes a bid they say a face value and guess how many there are at the table. 
3. The next player can either challenge the bid, or make a higher bid by guessing either a higher face value, or guess a higher quantity of the face value at the table, or both.
• If the next player challenges the previous player's bid, everyone reveals their dice. If the challenger was correct and the previous player was lying, the liar gives his die to the challenger. If the challenger was wrong he/she gives his/her die to the player whom he/she challenged.
4. If a player's finds himself/herself with dice that are all different, he/she can change one die to anything at the beginning of the round. She/He must inform the other players she/he is changing one, but he/she must not show his/her dice. A player can fake changing his/her die and opposing players can challenge the player changing his die.
5. If a player has one die left, that die is always a wild one.

Our task was to eliminate the positive feedback loop. The positive feedback loop in Liar's dice is created due to the mechanic whereby a player loses a die. Every time a player loses a die, he/she is more at a disadvantage, and the players with more dice have an even better chance of winning the round.

Week 6: Atari Golden Age Card Game - Paperboy The Card Game

Name of the Game: Paperboy - The Card Game

Number of Players: 3 - 4

Object of the Game: The player with the most pairs at the end of the game wins.

Setup:

1. The deck is shuffled.
2. Each player is given four cards.
3. The rest of the deck is set aside, and a dealer must be chosen.
4. The dealer will place 4 cards in the center of the deck and keep track of rounds.

How to Play:

1. Four cards from the deck are placed face up in the center of the table.
2. Once all the cards have been placed, players can begin picking up cards when the dealer says go.
• A player must put down a card to pick up another.
• After ten seconds the cards are removed and placed in a trash deck on the side.
3. Once a player has 4 cards that are of a set (the sets are specified below), they can claim that set by showing their cards to the other players after a round of cards has been placed. They set this set aside in their own deck, and the dealer deals that player 4 new cards.
4. If a player has the trump card (which is the bike with an explosion behind it) they can use that card when another player claims a set and the targeted player will not receive any points and his/her cards are placed in the trash deck.

Sets:

1. House, Bike, Paper, Fence.
2. Rock, Fire Hydrant, Dog, Old Man.
3. Window, Car, Tree, Mailbox.

Our game is based on the Atari game Paperboy.

Week 5: Collection Board Game - 4 Tile

Name of the Game: 4 Tile

Number of Players: 2-4

Object of the Game: The first player to get the specific number of each color tile wins.

How to Play:

1. All players start on any corner on the board.
2. At the start of the game players roll a die for each of the 4 colors(green,red,blue,white) on the board. Each roll determines how many tokens of that color players will need to win. Eg. Roll a 4,3,2 then 1 would mean the first player to get 4 green, 3 red, 2 blue and 1 white token will win.
3. Players take turns rolling the die and move around the board in a clockwise direction.
4. When a player lands on a colored space, they collect one token of that color.
5. When a player lands on one of the 'X' spaces, they should follow the directions written on the board.
• For the top right and bottom left corners: Pick a player. This player loses one token of every color.
• For the top left and bottom right corners: Lose one token of every color.
• For the top and bottom middle spaces: All other players lose one of every color.
• For the right and left middle spaces: Take one of any color from each player.
6. The player to get the specified amount of tokens wins.
7. Players may trade with others at the start of their turn.

We wanted to make a game that was simple enough for players to understand while still creating opportunities for players to interact, and not having the game drag on. We started the initial concept with just the colored tiles, and then we added the 'X' spaces and made them all do something different. We found that there was much more interaction that way, without having to add more mechanics and rules.