Red group
Monopoli – Make it playable in 10 minutes.
Blue group
Risk – Make it appropriate for 21st century conflicts.
Green Group
The game of life – Make it relatable to millennials.
Yellow
Candy Land – Make it deep, strategic and adult oriented.
Purple
Battleship – Make it story-centered.
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Part 1: Due September 29
Play the original game and analyze it
What are its core mechanics?
What makes it distinctive?
What are its best and worst aspects?
Do some research on its history
What made it successful?
What was its evolution?
What are some similar games?
Develop the prompt
Research the constraint and make it more specific.
Write a statement outlining the intentions: what the game is supposed to do/say/dramatize, who is the audience etc.
Start prototyping
Shrink the game: What’s the minimum level of complexity you can have while still retaining its identity?
Collect and bring to class material
Deliverables: the minimal version of the game + one post summarizing the analysis and research findings and outlining the conceptual/research statement of the project.
Part 2: October 6
Are there some mechanics from more contemporary board games that could be injected in the original concept?
Given that you are not necessarily designing a commodified, packageable game, are there oblique shifts you can apply to this essential gameplay? eg: making it physical or location based, turning it from competitive to cooperative, making it real-time instead of turn-based, adding a digital computational element, turning it into a ballet, making the pieces edible…
Deliverable: bring an iteration of the game that can be played by another group. Bring all game components and complete written rules.
It can be visually and thematically undeveloped, it may need tuning or secondary mechanics, but the core mechanics should be tested and solid.
-Keep it simple and always ask yourself: do I really need this rule or component?
-As your theme gradually shifts, are there vestigial parts from previous iteration that don’t make much sense anymore?
-Add one element or mechanic at time and test its effects.