The book. 

Game Design Statement: Divided Attention

One of the hardest things to do is to get a large group of people interested in playing a game together. In any group, there will be some who are too impatient to learn rules, some who don’t like competition, some who suffer from performance anxiety, and some who simply aren’t interested in games. In creating Divided Attention, I wanted to make a game that would be easy to learn and compelling enough that everyone would want to play. At the same time, I wanted the game to address issues of a social division and self-categorization.

I chose the format of projecting the game in a theater or auditorium because it is an environment in which people expect to be entertained without active participation. The appearance of a game in a theater challenges the idea of passive spectatorship and comments on the invisible groupings that exist within a crowd that has come together for a unified purpose (i.e. a movie or lecture).

Divided Attention, created in PowerPoint, is self-contained; no previous knowledge or instructions are necessary to participate. Players do not need to move from their seats or interact with each other, except to glance around when they are asked to raise their hands. These were crucial design decisions. I wanted the images alone to control a player’s movement through the game and to sweep viewers into the action almost before they know what’s going on.
As viewer’s ideas, beliefs and opinions do not affect the outcome of a movie, one of my challenges was to make a fixed, repeatable game that had an unpredictable ending despite having the same set of images each time. The way I decided to approach this problem was to capitalize on the only variables in the scenario I was creating: the players’ opinions and whims. These factors, and a little luck, determine how players move through the game and with which players they are grouped.



Divided Attention begins with brief onscreen instructions. Players then are asked to divide themselves based on the month in which they were born. This is accomplished visually: the months are randomly grouped into four boxes, each of which is assigned a color: blue, red, green or yellow. Players are asked to keep track of their geographical location, as the colors shift during the game. What follows is a series of episodes in which players are asked to make decisions. Some of these decisions are based on opinion (such as choosing a preferred celebrity or activity); others are purely strategic (“migrations,” in which players can move directly from one color to another).

Decisions result in either the player staying the same color or changing to another color. I attempted to design the game so each color would gradually become associated with a personality type. For example, if a player repeatedly makes decisions that indicate they are outgoing and attracted to fame, he or she will move towards red. If a player demonstrates a preference for humanitarian concerns, he or she will move toward green. The game, however, is not intended to be a personality test. I wanted to create decisions that players could make without factual knowledge (unlike, say, Trivial Pursuit). It was also important that astute players could figure out the color associations by the end of the game and try to take control of the outcome.

The object of Divided Attention is to belong to the largest group at the end of the game. Throughout the game, “votes” are taken so players can see in which colors other players reside. I originally intended to invent a game in which players did not need to communicate with each other at all. I soon realized, however, that it would be impossible to create an interactive experience with fixed projected images. As Chris Crawford points out in “The Art of Interactive Design,” “Participation is not the same thing as interaction.” Crawford defines interaction as “a cyclic process in which two actors alternately listen, think and speak.” In my game, the “actors” are the audience members and their means of speaking is my raising their hands during votes. The projected images comprise the game engine through which the players are engaged, but because they cannot change in response to players’ actions, it is not an actor.

The game remains a work-in-progress. While players enjoy playing it, the goal of the game does not seem to provide a satisfying payoff. I am in the process of rethinking this element. One of my ideas to make the game cooperative, with the goal being that all players must end the game in the same area/color for everybody to win. If even one player is separated from the group, everybody loses. I think I also need to work on making the game play more meaningful by giving players a stronger sense of control over their movements. This could be accomplished by changing the text in the game, but it’s more likely that a major thematic overhaul is needed.

Divided Attention was originally conceived as an art project. My overarching motivation for creating the game was to explore the arbitrariness and fluidity of social divisions. I was thinking a lot about sports, politics, communities, class, gender—any arena in which exist an “us” and a “them.” Thus, Divided Attention always begins with all players together, followed by a random splintering, the machinations of grouping and regrouping, joining and defecting, and, finally, the reuniting of the participants.

Beta Test: Divided Attention

Thanks to everyone for your feedback on the beta version of Divided Attention. Again, I got a lot of great ideas for improving the game. Here's a summary of what I'm thinking.

Game length: I think 10 minutes is about the right length in terms of holding people's interest. I think, however, that I need to restructure the game so it builds to a better climax. It should become more frenetic and exciting as it progresses.

Thematic consistency: The class seemed divided on whether it was a good idea to keep the visuals abstract or to use "themed" shapes (star, planets). I agree that keeping things consistently abstract is aesthetically better. Jane and others I've shown the game to like the movement of the shapes, so I think I'll head in that direction.

The falling word episode: Too long. I meant to shorten or remove it before the beta test.

Meaningful play: Some have commented that it seems that where one ends up depends entirely on how he or she answers the final question (Greek gods). This is true, however I was hoping players would begin to realize that consistent responses to the questions push them toward certain colors. That's the purpose of the falling word episode. I thought that made it pretty obvious but I was wrong. The problem is, if players aren't aware of the relationship between colors and choices, then the outcome seems pretty random.

The final question: The Greek gods question seems to push the majority toward red. It also relies on knowledge of Greek gods and their associations. I think I need to replace this question or move it toward the beginning of the game, where movement is still mysterious and seemingly random.

Displaying progress: Jane's idea of somehow letting people know how much of the game remains was a good one. I experimented with putting a "temperature" bar at the bottom that slowly fills up as the game progresses. The problem is, it was distracting and detracted from the visuals. I have to try other approaches, maybe putting text to indicate the halfway point or something like that.

Music: The piece of music I chose works well (though I'm pretty tired of hearing it) when I keep it timed with the game. I think, however, that the music should change during the final vote to aurally indicate the end phase. Otherwise, the end phase seems like just another part of the game.

Competition: While I think watching and participating in the game is engrossing, I was hoping for more competition and audience response. The pace of the game might be what's preventing more interaction (players don't want to look away from the screen), but I don't want to slow down the action. I'm going to try to invent episodes that give players a chance to do something to influence the actions of others. Don't know what yet.

The payoff: Still weak, in my opinion. People aren't excited enough about belonging to the largest group. If there were a way to display and congratulate the winning color, that might help. Unfortunately, PowerPoint does not allow branching. Players seem to like the statistics at the end, but again that poses a problem. If I wanted to transfer the game to a fixed medium, such as a DVD, I wouldn't be able to update the figures easily.

Well, the above thoughts are just the tip of the iceberg. I'm hoping to resolve as many of the problems as possible before the final class.

Prototype Critique: Jessica's Avatar Game

Here is a very late critiques of Jessica's game.

1. Name/designer: The Avatar Game, Jessica

2. Platform/category: party game

3. Core mechanic: drawing, matching (drawings to the drawer)

4. Play experience adjectives: creativity-inspiring, humorous, psychological, puzzling

5. Structure: Jessica's game has minimal structure but enough to be compelling and entertaining. However, in its prototype state, I think it succeeds more as an activity than a game. The payoff is more in learning who drew which avatar than in winning. The creation of a magic circle is minimal because there aren't enough restrictions in play to make players feel like they're doing anything other than what they might ordinarily do: draw a picture or look at a picture and try to figure out who drew it. Adding more restrictions on drawing or guessing would create more of a game by forcing players to do what they wouldn't ordinarily do. For example, if players had to draw avatars for others, both the drawing and guessing would become something out of the ordinary.

6. Best game element: I liked that drawers were given small pieces of canvas to draw on. This transformed what might have been throw-away items (like the sketches from Pictionary) into what Jessica called "souvenirs," or mementos of the game. I also liked the time restriction on drawing and guessing. That kept the game from being endless and, again, nudged the activity away from the ordinary.

7. Clarity of rules: The rules were only somewhat clear. I'd say a 5. Jessica mentioned something about the guessers having to explain what they thought certain avatars belonged to certain players. This was not carried out during play partly because the instructions weren't clear.

8. Strategy: Because the goal of the game seemed secondary to the activity, drawers did not have a reason to either make their avatars clearly their own or misleading. Guessers simply tried to do their best. Strategy did not seem to exist. If more rules were added, a strategy might emerge. Say the guessers had colored guessing chips, some of which were real and some of which were fake (marked on the back). If each drawing is guessed in turn, then a player could put his or her real chip on a drawing and fake chip on another drawing in order to bluff (i.e. mislead other players). An even simpler idea is to have players guess in turn. That would allow the guessers to use other players' votes as clues as to who the drawer is.

9. Emergent play: I was surprised at how enjoyable the game was despite its simplicity. The emergent play occurred in the conversations that arose while guessers tried to figure out the drawings, and after the drawer's identities were revealed. I think Jessica could formalize some of the conversation, perhaps adding an element of persuasion in which a guesser tries to "sell" a theory to others. How about if every guesser "owns" a drawing and tries to get as many votes as possible whatever the identity of drawer really is?

10. Further development: I would like to see more rules and variations, including the ones mentioned above. Another interesting idea that we mentioned in class is to have the drawers make the drawings for each other, or one designated drawer draw all the avatars. Jane thought that simultaneous drawing (everyone draws, then everyone guesses) would eliminate some of the down time. As I said before, more rules would make a more structured activity that would be more game-like. I'd also like to see the guessing portion developed with some kind of bidding or voting rounds. I like the idea of incorporating persuasion or influence into the game to make the decision process a little more difficult.

Project Post: Response to Playtesting and Feedback

Hello all. Thanks to everyone who gave me feedback in person and via blog and email. I was very excited by the positive response to Divided Attention and have made a lot of changes based on some of your suggestions. Probably the biggest change is in the content of the game. In the prototype that I showed last week, I think I pretty much got the format worked out. I initially thought of PowerPoint as just a means of putting the game together quickly, but now I think that it works fine as the medium. Who needs to learn Flash or Director? But I realized that I needed to give the game more thematic cohesiveness. I reworked all of the game's events in an attempt to make the decisions more meaningful. Now, I hope, when players consistently make the same kinds of choices, they will gravitate to certain colors and areas on the screen.

Jane and others also said that I needed to make the objective clearer and to provide some kind of payoff. I'm still working out this part of the game, but I think Jane's suggestion of displaying some kind of metrical information (statistics) will help bring it to a satisfying conclusion. I'm still hoping that players will get into the alliances and oppositions that the game creates, and that some kind of team spirit will emerge.

I'm happy that the temporary music track I selected (by Philip Glass) worked so well with the game. I really wanted to compose my own music and hopefully eventually will, but I probably won't have time to do it before the end of the semester.

The length of the game is something that I'm still mulling over. The piece of music is about 9 minutes long, which is too short for a complete game (maybe) but too long to double. I was hoping for a game that lasts 10 to 15 minutes. The dangers are that I will make a game that is repetitive or too exhausting. I was surprised that some people described the game as intense. If it goes on and on, players might lose their place, get bored or become confused. On the other hand, I don't want players to become disappointed if it ends right when they are getting into it or starting to understand the logic behind it.

My intention in designing the game in part was to have the game's inner workings (the relationships between and definitions of the colors, for example) to gradually reveal themselves to the point at which players might be able to take control of where they are going. This is why I need to give them a clear place to go, i.e. an objective. I'm not sure I'll be able to completely resolve this problem because if the objective is too obvious, then players won't have the freedom to make spontaneous choices or simply take pleasure in exploring the game. Jane points out participants in Divided Attention can make a choice to play "strategically" or to make decisions meaningful to themselves. In other words, you can make choices trying to move toward a color you think may be popular (to fulfill the goal of being in the largest group at the end), or you can answer the questions to form a personal profile of youself and see where you end up. I like the idea of keeping both possibilities open.

Jane proposed the idea of having some players instructed to close their eyes during certain events. I'm intrigued by this idea and may incorporate it in a later game, but I think I want ths game to be an eyes-open experience. I don't want players to feel like something is happening to others that they don't know about. The concept of Divided Attention is that we can be with other people, experiencing the exact same thing, but unknowingly be separated from them by belief, religion, values, whatever. Then there's the practical problem of figuring out how to let people know when they can open their eyes again. I want to stay away from spoken commands or any kind of interaction between players beyond the voting events.

I'll be showing an updated version at 7 p.m. in the lecture hall on the Third Street graduate campus. I'm hoping it will be complete in terms of length and that it will have an ending.

Playtesting Round 1: Jacob's Party Game

I apologize for not knowing the official title of Jacob's party game, which we played in Pete's Cafe, but I've chosen it to give playtesting feedback.

1. Name/desiger: Party Game (official name tk); Jacob

2. Platform/category: Jacob's game falls into the social or party genre.

3. Core mechanic: It's difficult to choose a verb to describe Jacob's game because it is made of up a variety of subgames. Most involve talking, drawing or writing. Perhaps "creating" or "socializing" covers all the activities.

4. Adjectives describing the play experience: chaotic, collaborative, creative, conspiratorial, festive, silly, enjoyable, entertaining

5. Structural elements: The game has clear rules, a defined play space, time limit, plenty of interaction and a magic circle. What it lacks is a clearly defined goal. It is structured more like a party mixer in that it seems to be designed to get people in a space to share stories and ideas. I particularly liked that all of the game's activities were done with a partner, which made some of the more silly actions (such as those created by other players in the sound game) more tolerable (and fun). The magic circle the game creates is a safe space in which silly actions can be performed, even in public. When you are playing the game, you are a member of a "secret club," an idea cleverly reinforced by the placement of the rules under the tables. I really liked the idea that these rules were taped there while people not playing the game were eating there. Fun was within their reach, but they didn't know it existed.

6. Best developed element: What worked best for me was the way the games were integrated into a whole, the dependencies. For example, I liked how one activity was to write a story based on a drawing created by another activity. This made the collection of activities understandable as a single activity. It also allowed players to interact with other players with whom they might not have shared a table during the game. I think the games could be even more linked.

7. Rules: The rules, both the individual instructions and the group instructions, were very clear. I'd give them a 9 out of 10. They could be improved by making the goal of the game more explicit.

8. Strategy: It was not possible to develop a strategy because there was no known goal to the game.

9. Emergent play: Jacob's game is all about the emergent play. The rules of the individual activities are straightforward, so it's up to the players to make the game fun by being as imaginative and open-minded as possible. I found myself trying to make the game more fun by creating difficult or embarassing situations for other players in the game. Like many party games, the creativity and willingness of the crowd will make all the difference.

10. Further development: Coming up with more finely honed activities and working on more interesting connections between them seems to be the primary challenge. The chaos adds to the fun of the game, but I think it would be spectacular if players could more easily recognize the relationship between their actions/enjoyment and the actions/enjoyment of other players. I think the way players switch activities could be refined or clarified. During the game, Leo and I were unable to find a table that was open and that neither of us had played. This will probably happen frequently. What's tricky is that the switching of tables adds an element of confusion that contributes to the fun of the game. So a balance needs to be struck between organizing the switching of activities and letting people run around trying to find a game they haven't played. I don't know how to solve this one.

Another problem I encountered is that I ran out of time trying to write a story for an image. This could be easily fixed by have a large clock counting down the remaining minutes for each round.

Overall, I really enjoyed the party game. I liked being in a large group but interacting with one person at a time. It reminded me a little of "speed dating" (which I have read about but never participated in). Party mixer games do not necessarily have to have a goal other than to get players aquainted, but if that's the case with this game, the rules should make that clear from the start.

Nice job, Jacob.

Playtesting Round 1: Cihan's Zilchmaster

A rousing evening of playtesting. I participated in the testing of Cihan's Trivial Pursuit-inspired game, Zilchmaster. Here are the responses to the questions:

1. Game: Zilchmaster, Designer: Cihan

2. Platform/genre: board game

3. Core mechanic: voting

Unlike Trivial Pursuit, in which the core mechanic is answering trivial questions, Zilchmaster players spend most of their time voting true or false on opponents' answers. This is a welcome shift, as it adds a tactical element to a pretty stale board game.

4. Adjectives describing play experience:

Entertaining/humorous: The game's most enjoyable aspect is in coming up with answers to questions that don't have a definitive answer. Questions such as "Why are you here?" or "Is lameness a disease?" are antithetical to the usual trivia questions and encourage creative responses. The quality of the questions will make or break this game, I think.

5. Game structure:

Zilchmaster has all of the formal elements of a complete board game, including a clear goal (collecting all of the colored wedges) and meaningful play (the way one votes affects the game result). It does require a lusory attitude in that one must accept the rules governing how a wedge is earned, for example. I think, however, that the magic circle it creates is a little unstable because of some unclear rules. I am thinking specifically about the how questions are answered, and how those answers are judged. Because I was trying to play strategically, managing my "true" and "false" tokens as resources and basically ignoring the questions and answers, I was residing in a different magic circle than most of the other players, who were simply using their tokens to express how they truly felt about an answer. It seemed we were playing two different games. The rules may need clarification and/or reworking in order to make the questions and answers more meaningful to the game play.

6. Best developed game element: the tokens

Although there were problems with running out of tokens (which may be dependent on player order), I thought the inclusion of a resource to manage was the best way to modify Trivial Pursuit. Most trivia games do not incorporate a resource besides players' knowledge, and that resource is static. Most party games that involve voting do not require players to manage a limited number of true/false tokens. Having the player answering the question collect all of the tokens used to vote is an interesting mechanic that may have a balancing affect: the more "false" tokens a player collects, the more power he/she has to deny other players wedges.

7. Clarity of the rules: 5 (out of 10)

The main problem with the rule set was that they did not address how to answer questions or vote on answers. My main concern is that the questions and answers ultimately have no effect on the game. It becomes simply a matter of managing tokens to deny players wedges. We could have played the game without asking any questions. The rules need to be more specific about the relationship between the question and answer (for example, does the quality or accuracy of the answer matter?), and the basis of the voting (are we supposed to be passing judgment on the answer? how do we decide which token to use is the question has no right or wrong answer?). I understand that having questions without a definite answer was part of the designer's intention to subvert Trivial Pursuit, but in order to make the game play more meaningful, there needs to be stronger connection among all of the game's activities.

8. Strategy: The main strategy that arose when I played was in management of the tokens. Because the "false" tokens can prevent another player from getting a wedge, I found them to be more valuable. Thus, if I knew two other players were going to vote false, I could vote true and save my false tokens. There is no reason to use a "true" token except to avoid using a false token (why would you ever want to give another player another turn or a wedge?). Of course, sometimes you have vote "true" because you don't have any "false" tokens. I suspect that the value of "false" is too great and the value of "true" too low. There needs to be some instances in which voting "true" might be a positive thing. Could there be some kind of reward for players voting "true" if the majority votes "true"? Or perhaps there could be some kind of penalty for voting against the majority in general. I think the choice of how to vote needs to be more agonizing, to use a gamery word. Incorporating incentives and disincentives to voting with the majority would be a difficult mod to make and would probably take the game further away from Trivial Pursuit. That might be a good thing.

9. Emergent play:

As described above, I was surprised by how mathematical the game became for me. If I had more time, I would have tried to determine if it was possible for anyone to gain a wedge or win the game. As it was, the game proceeded very slowly. No one had a single piece at the end of 3o minutes. A redesign of the board might help the situation. Also, if players could earn a wedge more easily, then gaining or losing a wedge as a penalty or reward would become feasible. I was disappointed at how unimportant the questions and answers were to the game, especially since I found many of the questions and responses very entertaining.

10. Further development:

There's a good game waiting to emerge from Zilchmaster. I thought voting facedown helped, and Cihan came up with the idea of sometimes voting facedown and sometimes voting in turn face up, depending on which space a player lands on. That would add variety and require tactical flexibility. I am looking forward to see the new board and a stronger relationship between the questions/answers and the voting. Here's a random idea: add another kind of token to the game called a point marker. A wedge equals five point markers. In addition to earning a wedge the normal way, you can buy a wedge with five point markers. You earn one point marker if you voted with the majority. You lose one point marker if you voted in the minority. If you need to pay a point but don't have any markers, you must cash in a wedge for five markers. Players are not allowed to discuss how they intend to vote, but there now is a strong incentive to vote alike. The basis for knowing how to vote likely would shift to a legitimate response to the answer, and the players would be required to guess what the "common" response is (true or false). There's still the option to vote against the common response for tactical reasons, if one had a point marker to spare.

Just some food for thought.

Project Update: Divided Attention

Yesterday, I actually began creating a prototype of Divided Attention using PowerPoint. Even though I only finished the onscreen rules and sketches of the opening images, I'm pretty excited by how it's going. I've decided that in addition to sound effects and the soundtracks of various video clips I intend to include, the game needs music. I'm going to try to write the music myself. It probably will be minimalistic, but increase in complexity as the visuals get more complicated (i.e. as the screen becomes more divided).

I want the game to be entertaining and playable, but I also intend the game to be an art piece. I want it to address issues outside of the realm of play and to raise questions about group behavior, identity and self-categorization. While I'm hoping it will be fun, I also want it to be an experience that players become emotionally invested in, or at least that produces some kind of lingering emotional response (as well as an intellectual response).

Warning: Useless diatribe below

Regarding our discussion in class Wednesday, I don't think that game design is an art practice in all cases. Certainly a game can be designed to be an art piece, but not every game created is a work of art. That's not to say that a person couldn't have an experience similar to one they might have in viewing a work of art, a feeling of the sublime being one example. But there are many things created by nature or humans that evoke feelings of the sublime that are not art. The key is the intention of the person who creates the game: if the designer intends game to be art, then it's art. How successful it is as a piece of art is an entirely different matter.

I would certainly be the first person to say that board game design, especially as practiced by the best designers today, approaches an artform. But I hestiate to say that the games themselves are artworks. I don't want to sound like a snob, but in order to make sense of what we do as artists, we need to establish some kind of boundary, no matter how fuzzy or changeable. And, of course, there's the perfectly legitimate argument that I am limiting the definition of the word "art" to serve my own purposes, and that those who choose to call a game a work of art are simply using the term more broadly. I would agree and point out that the differences over semantics and "games vs. art" are really the same argument. So there.

Game Talk at the Third Street Studios on Nov. 18

A date has been set for my talk on German board games (or something like that) for the Alternative Lecture Series at the Third Street Graduate Studios. The talk will take place on Thursday, November 18, at 7 p.m. I'll be giving a really fast intro to the board game scene, focusing on the relationship between games and art. Since I'll have a captive audience, I'll also take the opportunity to test my final game project, Divided Attention, on the crowd.

If that weren't enough, the speaking sharing the bill with me is a champion Hacky Sack player. It should be a lot of fun.

In Other Gaming News ...

Congratulations to Jane for the unveiling of her super-secret project. It's so super-secret that I still don't know exactly what it's all about, even though I read the New York Times article about it.
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Thanks also to Jane for causing me to waste valuable art-making time playing Katamari Damacy, a totally bizarre but addictive Japanese Playstation 2 game about rolling a sticky ball around a landscape and picking up stuff. I'm a complete video game klutz and can't get past Level 4 (Jane says she's gotten to Level 30 or so). But who cares? I'm happy just watching the intro sequence and listening to the various renditions of the theme song: the psychotic humming version, the tender piano solo, the manic opening mix, the jazzy in-game version. If anyone can make sense of the images in the opening cut scene (the stork carrying a turtle or the dancing pandas that turn red, for example), please explain it to me. On the other hand, don't.
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My copy of the huge fantasy game Heroscape arrived in the mail this week. This is a incredible feat of manufacturing, with 30 detailed painted miniatures and tons of plastic tiles that assemble into a multi-level board. It's so big it barely fits on my dining room table. It retails for $40, though I've seen it at game stores for $60. I got it for $20 in a two-for-one deal at Amazon.com (the sale is over), which pound-for-pound is the best game deal I've gotten all year. Update: Somehow I convinced Gabe to play a game of Heroscape. It was quick, breezy and a lot of fun, if you don't mind rolling dice. At first I thought some of the characters were overpowered, especially the guy with the bow and arrow. Then I realized that most characters have a crazy special power. Overall, the game seems pretty balanced. I think once I get to know all of the character powers, the game will be much more fun.
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The most important game trade show in the world recently closed in Essen, Germany. Some day I'll actually go, but until then I have to experience it vicariously (usually in postings at Gamefest.com). There's a slew of new games by American and European designers that I'll have to somehow get my hands on, including Antiquity by Dutch company Splotter Spellen, which, like my favorite game Roads & Boats, has thousands of pieces.

Another Go at Anno 1503

Today I took a break to play Klaus Teuber's board game Anno 1503 with Flint. It was a close game, coming down to a race to accumulate enough money to fulfill the last winning condition. Though I seemed to be on the road to victory, I lost. But I was reminded of how balanced a well designed game can be. One of the best things about Anno 1503 is that there are numerous approaches to winning, but none of them is a sure thing. Flint concentrated on building, while I adopted my usual role as a seafaring explorer. I was zipping from island to island picking up valuable loot while my town languished. Flint, on the other hand, gave up on his ships entirely and concentrated on expanding his town. What makes the game work is that a player can win by playing the extremes or by using a more balanced strategy. A great design assures that no one strategy guarantees a win. If that weren't the case, the game would become predictable and therefore "broken," to use gamer terminology.

Project Post: Divided Attention

Finally, a somewhat informative post on my final project, Divided Attention.

Divided Attention is a visual game designed to be projected in an auditorium or theater. Everyone in the theater may participate, and no special actions are required other than the occasional raising of one’s hand. Participants do not need to leave their seats. The game is presented as a slideshow or minimally animated video and lasts from 10 to 15 minutes.

The game is about how we invisibly divide ourselves into groups, and how at any given time we belong to overlapping and intersecting subgroups that concurrently make us allied with and opposed to each other.

The game consists of the following:

• Locations: Start Place, Areas, Outposts, End Place
• Events: Randomization, Journeys, Decision Events, Polls, Reconnection
• Other Elements: Boundaries, Paths, Media (images, movies)

The game proceeds as follows:

1. Start: all players together
2. Randomizing: setup stage in which players are divided into subgroups
3. Events/Journeys/Polls: mechanisms to divide and join players, and to determine positions of other players
4. End Scenario/Final Poll: end of game, winning group determined
5. Reconnecting: players visually reunited
6. End: all players together

At the start of the game, the group is divided somewhat randomly into subgroups. The object of the game is to connect and disconnect with others, to form groups and ultimately to belong to the largest group. All of the game’s events are led by the visual presentation.

Throughout the game, players must keep track of their location on the screen. Possible locations, called areas (for large groups) and outposts (for small groups and individuals), are defined by boundaries that cannot be crossed. Events take place within areas that require players to make decisions affecting their location. Some decisions will results in journeys to other areas and outposts. Polls allow players to get a sense of where other players are on the screen.

After the final poll, the game is over. Players are reunited visually and end up in a common space as they were at the beginning of the game.

Questions/Problems

Are members of an audience likely to participate in this game?

Will this game sustain the interest of players for 10 minutes? Will players adopt the lusory attitude required to sustain the game for its duration?

Will players be honest? Will they not cross boundaries?

During decision events, should players vote for themselves or to try to win the game?

How can the game be designed such that the same presentation can be played multiple times?

Is the win scenario satisfying enough? Is a win condition necessary at all?

Is there enough interactivity? Any?

Only the polls provide players any feedback. Is that enough?

Game Critique: Citadels

Citadels is a game that relies on complications arising from imperfect information. The game consists of two types of cards: character cards and district cards. The object of the game is to earn the most points by “building” districts, that is, laying district cards from your hand on the table and paying the cost. The game ends when a player builds his or her eighth district.

The core mechanic of the game is the selection of characters. The character cards numbered from 1 to 8, and each player in turn secretly selects one character before passing the remaining characters to the player on the left. Depending on the number of players, some characters cards are taken out of play facedown on the table. Each character card affords the player who possesses it a special power on his or her turn. The Assassin, for example, allows a player to “kill” another character (if another player has that character’s card, she loses her turn). The Warlord allows a player to destroy (remove) another player’s district card.

During each round, the characters are announced in numerical order, and when a player’s character is called, he takes his turn. The Assassin, number 1, always goes first; the Thief, number 2, always goes second, etc. This means that the player holding the Assassin always has a chance to kill another character before that character acts.

Because players keep their character cards hidden until they are called, Citadels is a game of imperfect information, and accordingly it involves a great deal of uncertainty, second-guessing and bluffing. Because some of the characters bring a player extra money (depending on the type of districts built), it is sometimes easy to guess which character a player will choose. A savvy player, of course, will not choose the obvious because that will make her a target of the Assassin. But sometimes the least obvious is exactly the obvious.

Information Types in Citadels

Using Celia Pearce’s model, Citadel contains the following information:

Information Known to All Players: the nine characters cards, the makeup of the district card deck, the rules, the amount of money each player has, the district cards each player plays, the characters players have played that round (after they have been called)

Information Known to Only One Player: the district cards in one’s hand, the character card one has chosen

Information Known Only to the Game: the character cards taken out of play during character selection, the order of the district card draw pile

Randomly Generated Information: none (the character cards taken out of play or the order of the district card draw pile are random, but these occur as part of the game setup and are not really information generating as with a die roll)

Citadels’ Economy of Information

Information in Citadels is valuable because it can be used to increase one’s standing in the game (monetarily or in number of districts built), protect one’s self from attack, or to exploit vulnerability in another player. Knowing that the player before you selected the Thief and will likely target the Bishop, for example, is a very valuable piece of information because it could prevent you from losing your money, which would jeopardize your standing in the game. You wouldn’t select the Bishop. That tidbit of information is worth much more than, say, the information gained by looking at what district card that player last built (but which also has value).

As in Poker, the hidden information has a higher value than the public information, and the effort in deducing what is hidden yields a higher return.

A Negative Feedback System?

Citadels does not have a positive or negative feedback system built into the game, however emergent negative feedback keeps the game balanced. When a player pulls ahead and/or is about to end the game with his or her eighth district, that player becomes a target for the other players, who can attempt to sabotage the leader’s efforts using the Assassin, Thief or Warlord. Is this a true feedback system? Maybe not, but the game gives players a means for restoring balance that serves the same purpose.

A Hybrid Winner

I should be blogging about my own game project, I know, but I just wanted to mention that Games magazine has chosen its 2005 Game of Year and, surprise, it's not German. In fact, it's by a deceased American inventor, Sid Sackson. The game is called Buyword, and has not been published previously.

Buyword is particularly pertinent to our class because it could have been the result of our exercise in which we modified classic games by incorporating an unexpected descriptor or action. In this case, Sackson modified Scrabble buy combining it with elements from a game about finance. The game consists of a collection of letter tiles and a pile of money. Each tile has a value indicated by the number of pips. The idea is to buy tiles, assemble long words and sell the words back to the bank at a profit. Thus, the game incorporates money management and investment strategies, concepts not previously associated with word games.

I haven't played Buyword, but I'm looking forward to trying it out.

Game Talk at the Alternative Lecture Series

I've been asked to give a presentation for the Alternative Lecture Series at the Third Street studios in November (the exact date has not been set but it will be on a Thursday evening at 7 p.m.) Of course I'm going to talk about games as art.

I'm going to give an overview of the current trends in board games, particularly German-style games, but the lecture will focus on the aspects of game design that approach (and perhaps reach) art. In particular, I'll be talking about the magic circle, the invention of new meanings for game components (tokens, cards, etc.), interactivity, emergent play. I'll be drawing on some of the readings and discussions we've been having in class.

Also, I'm hoping to use the lecture to test a prototype of my final project (one of them, at least), and perhaps to play a group game or two.

I'll let everyone know the date when it's decided. Everyone is welcome. There will be food and beer!

Eye Candy: Caramba

Groovy '60s pop art? No, it's the board for the 1973 German game Caramba.

My blog has been looking a little gray so I thought I'd share this game from my collection. I don't usually buy games as collector's items but I couldn't resist this one, which I recently found new (!) marked down from $40 to $5 at a game store. Called Caramba, it's something of a two-player variant of the 1960 German race game Malefiz (a.k.a. Barricade), with a little bluffing thrown in. Players secretly designate of their sombrero-wearing pieces a "favorite" and try to get that piece to a goal. The other pieces are used to bluff. Moves are made by rolling dice.

It's not a terribly interesting-sounding game, but who cares? Look at that board and those cards! When we discuss games as art, we usually aren't talking about the graphic design, but there's no denying that the way a game looks can make a huge difference in how enjoyable it is.

I admit I've never played this game. I just take it out of the box once in a while to look at it.


Totally cool cards and plastic men with sombreros.

Witch Hunt, Emergent Play and a Few Project Notes

We played two great games of Witch Hunt (a.k.a. Werewolf) in class Wednesday. Just for future reference, Jacob, I ALWAYS tell the truth (unless, of course, I'm lying).

We didn't get a chance to discuss the games afterward, but I wanted to comment that examples of emergent play were rampant that evening. The rules don't specifically address the kinds of interaction that develop while playing Witch Hunt, except to say that it's OK to lie. What ends up happening is that players begin to analyze each other's behavior, form alliances, debate and attempt to organize or formalize processes that the rules only loosely describe. For example, when the voting became chaotic, Jay suggested that we each nominate someone else to "kill" and tally the votes. This was not in the rules but was an emergent structure. (Ultimately, his proposal failed.)

In "Rules of Play," Salen and Zimmerman argue that in a well-designed game, simple rules generate complexity and emergent play. I find this extremely interesting. When writing the rules for a game, one might think that being as explicit and complete as possible is the best way to ensure a successful experience (i.e. interesting and fun) for the players. Rules must never leave players in doubt of whether an action or behavior is allowed. Yet, rules that are too detailed, too controlling would result in a scripted experience that would detract from the meaningfulness of the game play. If, say, the rules to Witch Hunt stated that each player must, in turn, make an accusation before a vote is called, there would be less chaos but the rigid structure would detract from the fun. This is because such a structure threatens the game's illusionary world -- panicked villagers wouldn't be so orderly -- and because it gives plays less control over shaping the experience.

The two games that I am designing for this class (I still can't decide) will have simple rule sets, but, I am hoping, a significant amount of emergent play. That challenge I am giving myself is to create games for spaces in which people normally do not interact (or do much of anything at all, except look). Those spaces are a movie theater and a gallery. I am making games in which there can be interaction and emergent activity while participants are doing what they normally do in such circumstances. Can people interact while standing or sitting still and not communicating with each other visually or verbally? I am trying to find a way.

By the way, I wrote a entry a while back about an interesting incident that happened when playing Werewolf in another class.

Design Exercise: Unnamed Card Game

Well, Jane didn't think Gangster Mutant Cats in Space was such a bad game after all. She promised to try it out at her local bar, but somehow I can't see her and her friends meowing and making catfight sounds in public.

The result of today's in-class exercise was much more successful, in my opinion. Jane gave us the first rule of a card game and the last rule. We had to come up with all the rules in between, keeping in mind meaningful play, as defined by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman in "Rules of Play." In order for game play to be meaningful, the relationship between a player's actions and the outcomes must be discernable (i.e. visible and recognizable) and integrated into the game's bigger picture. In short, players should feel that their decisions matter.

Here are the rules we were given:

First rule: Each player selects one card.
Last rule: The player holding the magic card at the end of the game wins.

My group first decided that the magic card should not be fixed at the start of the game, that at the very least it should change every round. We also agreed that players should not know what the magic card is at the start but somehow must gain clues during the round. The magic card's identity would only be known by all at the end of the round when all cards are revealed.

Every action had to be meaningful, i.e. had to serve the purpose of moving the player closer to the goal of the game. Luck and randomness (after the initial deal) needed to be minimized in order to give players a sense of control over the game.

In the end, I think we came up with a pretty good game in a half-hour. We couldn't, however, agree on a name.

The Unnamed Card Game (a.k.a. Jerkface)
For 3-6 players
10-15 minutes

Material

A standard deck of cards

Setup

Shuffle the cards and deal one card to each player and four cards facedown in the center of the table. The remaining cards are set aside and are out of play.

Object

At the end of a set number of trading rounds, the player holding the "magic card" scores one point. The magic card is always the second highest value of those held by players (except in the case of a tie; see below). Aces are low. Suits and color do not matter.

After each player has had a chance to go first, the player with the highest total points wins the game.

Number of Trading Rounds

The number of trading rounds played is equal to the number of players. Three players should play four trading rounds instead of three. Keep track of rounds played with tokens or by keeping a tally on paper.

Game Play

Choose a start player. Each player in turn must trade the card in his or her hand by either swapping it with a facedown card on the table or trading with another player. Players may not refuse a trade or reveal any cards to other players. When each player has made a trade, the next trading round begins.

Winning the Hand

After the final trading round is finished, players reveal the cards in their hands. The player with the second highest card wins the hand and scores one point, which is recorded on paper or with scoring tokens.

The cards (including those out of play) are shuffled and redealt. The player to the left of the start player begins the next round.

Resolving Ties

At the end of a hand, if two or more players are holding the same valued card, none of those players can win the hand. The cards' value is still taken into account when determining the hand's magic card. For example, in a four-player game, the players are holding 10, 8, 8 and 5. The 8's are disqualified, thus the player holding the 5 wins the hand. If the players are holding 10, 8, 8 and 8, the player holding the 10 would win because a tied card can never be the magic card, and if there is only one eligible card it becomes the magic card.

Winning the Game

After each player has had a chance to go first, the player with highest point total wins the game.

Variant

One possible variant is to eliminate the tie rules, instead awarding a point to each tied player if their cards are magic. This would allow the assignment of a penalty point (-1) to the player(s) holding the highest card. The penalty point would complicate matters because now a player would have to think hard about holding on to a high card in the hope that it is the second highest. If a player were unsure of the spread of card values, it would be safer to take a low card and not risk a penalty.

S.F. Weekly Yu-Gi-Oh! Parody

This week's S.F. Weekly has a great parody of the Yu-Gi-Oh! card game. I was a little bit disappointed that you can't actually play the real game with the cards they created. It's not surprising, however, given the fact that most adults can't figure out the game rules.

Game Critique: Narrative & Yu-Gi-Oh!

Mirror Force, a highly useful Yu-Gi-Oh! card.

While I'm on the topic of collectible card games, I thought I might as well use one this week to discuss narrative.

When Yu-Gi-Oh! started to take over the young minds of America, I began to get interested. A couple of years ago when I was poking around a game store in San Jose, a woman came in and bought more than $300 worth of cards. I asked her if she played the game and she admitted she didn't understand it but this was the only thing her son wanted for Christmas. Wow, nice mom. I was curious but I didn't want to buy a card game that seemed aimed at 8-year-olds. I took a vacation in Hawaii and while investigating the "skill" games in an arcade (uh oh, I sense a future post topic), I came upon one that had decks of Yu-gi-Oh! cards. I'm pretty good at these games (I'm a former crane game champion), so all it took was about $2 for me to win a starter deck and three booster packs.

Anyway, to shorten this narrative, I learned to play the card game. However, nobody wanted to play it with me, so I ended up polishing my skills on a Game Boy Advance version, called Eternal Duelist Soul. One thing you have to love about Yu-Gi-Oh! is how seriously it takes itself. This becomes clear when watching the original Japanese TV series. I watched about 120 episodes in Japanese (with horrendous English subtitles) and was completely drawn into its ridiculous tale of Japanese teens whose dark sides emerge when they play a card game. In the TV series, the game usually isn't depicted as a friendly schoolyard pastime; it's often a matter of life or death. This mirrors the original manga, in which an affable kid named Yugi turns into a sinister avenging adult who brings bad guys to justice by forcing them to play grotesquely violent games. The card game didn't appear in the earliest installments of the manga but it eventually took over the storyline.

Surprisingly, the card game is fun and does require strategy. If you have a fixed set of cards, however, I believe that the optimal strategy is entirely knowable no matter how your opponent plays. I think this frequently is the problem with CCGs, one that is solved only by adding more cards to complicate the game system. Adding cards means more money, and this leads to the most common complaint about CCGs: those who can afford to buy the most (or best) cards usually will win the game.

Yu-Gi-Oh! The Card Game and Its Narrative

Every episode of the Yu-Gi-Oh! TV series that I have seen has something to do with playing the card game. In fact, it sometimes it takes several episodes to show a complete "duel." This can be mind-numbing for those who don't play the game, but for those who do, it's a valuable strategy lesson and sometimes a preview of cards yet to be released in the real world.

The Backstory

The backstory for Yu-Gi-Oh! is huge and still growing, created by the TV series and the manga. While it's easy to despise the Yu-Gi-Oh! empire because of its ubiquitous marketing, I think there's a lot to admire in how well the card game has been integrated with the other elements of the Yu-Gi-Oh! world. The TV series serves multiple purposes: not only does it teach, it provides visualizations that enhance gameplay. When cards are played in the TV series, monsters spring to life from the cards and literally battle each other on the playing field. This is what happens (or should) in the minds of players in the real world, but by showing this in the series, it reinforces the idea that the cards are more than just numerical values to be compared. Themed decks associated with characters from the TV series and manga also allow players to recreate the conflicts from the story, or at least draw from them to enhance the play experience.

Narrative Typology

Yu-Gi-Oh! The Card Game presents an emergent narrative, that is, one created and influenced by the players. Each duel tells a story in the fashion of the TV series, but without the predictible conclusion. Players can mimic events from episodes, playing a certain combination of cards, but the overall narrative of a duel is formed by player actions and the randomness of the decks.

Players who engage in a duel are assuming roles identical to those of the TV characters, who also duel with cards. Thus, the narrative they create is performed. Players are free to create personas and role play to the degree desired. To some extent, if a player executes a particularly well-thought-out play or has a streak of good luck, stories of play may emerge. Players who compete in tournament become known "duelists" much like their fictional counterparts, and their stories of success parallel those in the TV series and manga.

One of the wonderous qualities of Yu-Gi-Oh! is that each card is a living piece of the overarching Yu-Gi-Oh! narrative. Thus, each is imbued with magical qualities that transcend or deny its own near worthlessness as a laminated piece of paper. There are cards I love and cards I hate, and the only difference is the arrangement of the colored ink on the paper.

A Windfall Arrives in the Mail

The complete set of the new collectible card game Call of Cthulhu.

A couple of weeks ago I got a phone call during a break in a seminar. It was from Game Informer magazine. Evidently, I entered a drawing for a complete set of Fantasy Flight Games' Call of Cthulhu, a collectible card game (CCG) based on the writings of H.P. Lovecraft. I don't remember doing so. Well, I won and last week the cards arrived, more than 235, neatly arranged in a binder.

I'm not a huge player of CCGs, mainly because of the cost of collecting them, but I like them because they distill a lot of imaginative play into a very limited format. The cards serve a variety of functions, from acting as agents for the player to imposing new rules or modifying existing rules. In Call of Cthulhu, for example, there are no resource cards like the "land" cards in Magic: The Gathering. Instead, any card in one's hand can become a resource by rotating it and placing it under a "Domain" card (simply a place for storing resources), where they normally cannot be retrieved. This forces players to sacrifice potentially useful cards.

This idea works superbly in a non-collectible game called San Juan, the card game version of Puerto Rico (one of the most popular games out of Germany in recent years). Puerto Rico is a fairly complex game about raising, processing and shipping agricultural products. It involves multiple game boards, tons of cardboard tiles, wood bits, money, victory point chips, etc. Miraculously, San Juan reproduces much of mechanics of the original game using only one deck of cards. Any one card can serve as a building (buildings modify the game rules), money or a produced good. It's probably the finest example of economical design I've seen in a non-CCG game.

A CCG is, in a way, a form of the self-modifying game (sometimes called self-amending). These are games in which the rules of the game are created, destroyed and/or modified during play. Usually, the game's central mechanic is the inventing, changing or discarding of the game's rules. I'll write more on this topic in a future post, but I've long been fascinated by self-modifying games. If this sounds intriguing, check out this site about Nomic, a game invented by Peter Suber.

Meanwhile, I hope to find the time and an interested party to play Call of Cthulhu. I have every card, including the rares, but only one of each. Still, I should be able to construct a couple of pretty good decks.

Re-Design Exercise: Gangster Mutant Cats in Space

As much as I'd rather not post this, here are the backstory and rules for the dice game modification that my group devised. For those who aren't in Game Design as Art Practice, the class for which I'm writing this blog, our instructor Jane McGonigal gave us a boring dice rolling game (see rules below) and instructed us to make it more interesting by creating a backstory and a method for keeping score. Our goal was to create "a clear link between the backstory and the tracking mechanism." We had about 20 minutes to do this before the class playtested the game.

Well, because another group created such an awesome game (incorporating elements from The Exquisite Corpse) and the class really got into it, we didn't have time for our game. And because I caught a bug and had to stay in bed all day, we weren't able to demonstrate the game during the next class session. If we're lucky, we'll never have to play this game.

Here are rules for the plain dice game: Players take turns rolling dice. The first player rolls six dice. Any 1's rolled are set aside and the remaining dice are passed to the next player who rolls and sets aside any 1's. If a player does not roll at least one 1, then he is gets one penalty point and the game continues. If a player rolls all 1's, then all six dice are given to the next player to roll. When a player earns 7 penalty points, he is out of the game. The last player in the game wins.

Gangster Mutant Cats in Space

Backstory: Human space travelers set out to settle a new world. Unfortunately, before they could find a suitable planet to colonize, they perished, the victims of an unknown space virus. Their cats, however survived and multiplied, eventually taking over their space cruiser. Because of their close proximity to a pulsar, some of the cats mutated to have only one eye. Still, they maintained their sense of humor and upstanding moral sensibilities. Meanwhile, other cats mutated to have two or more eyes; they developed an attitude problem. The One-Eyes and Multi-Eyes formed gangs on the derelict spaceship and regularly engage in petty catfights. Well, not that petty because the losers get tossed into a nearby black hole. Fortunately, cats have nine lives. Actually, because of the zero gravity environment, seven. After all seven lives are used up, the cat is re-absorbed into the energy of the universe and becomes the momentary twinkle of a distant star.

Modified rules:

Rolling the dice initiates the catfight. At first, it's only the player, who is a One-Eye, versus whatever Multi-Eyes show up to fight (i.e. are rolled). Any One-Eyes (rolled 1's) in the vinicity may be called to join the fight.

When a player rolls one or more 1's, he or she must give a loud space meow for each 1 before touching the dice. By meowing, the player is calling other One-Eyes for help in fighting the Multi-Eyes.

If the rolling player touches the dice before meowing (tries to pick up the 1's, for example), then none of the One-Eyes will help in the fight. The Multi-Eyes prevail and the player scores one penalty point.

If a player does not meow enough times (once per 1 rolled) before touching the dice, then he or she only claims the 1's meowed for. For example, if three 1's are rolled but the player only meows once, then the player may only take one 1.

If no 1's are rolled, then all opposing players must make loud cat fight sounds before anyone touches the dice. If any player fails to do this, then no penalty point is awarded.

Tracking the score: Each player has 7 cat tokens and must throw one into the black hole (center of the table) when he or she earns a penalty point. The cat remains there, tumbling pathetically through space while its molecules get scrunched together, until the end of the game. When a player tosses in his or her seventh cat, he or she is eliminated. Last One-Eye player remaining wins the game, but is soon thereafter mauled by Multi-Eyed cats.

Inspired Design: Backpacks in Goldland

I worked on a video project for most of the weekend and didn't have time for games, but last Thursday I played Goldland with Flint, whose studio is across the hall from mine. He hadn't played a German game before and really liked it. We're going to try play a game every Thursday afternoon.

Goldland is a resource management and exporation game by Wolfgang Kramer, who designed one of the best board games of all time, El Grande. In Goldland, players gradually build the board by laying tiles. Collecting resource tokens from tiles allows a player to enter other tiles and survive "adventures" such as crossing a desert or confronting a bandit. The goal is to collect the most gold, and much of it is at a temple at the opposite side of the 7 x 7 grid from the starting space. Here's a picture of the game.

One of the most elegant design features are the "backpacks" tiles on which players store their resources and gold. Collected tokens are placed on spaces numbered from 1 to 12 beginning with the highest number. The highest uncovered number is how far you can move on your turn. For example, if I have three resources tokens, I place them on the 12, 11 and 10 spaces in my backpack. I can move 9 spaces on my turn. The idea is that the more items you place in your backpack, the heavier it becomes and the more difficult it is to walk. This is a brilliant example of modeling a real-world condition with a simple mathematical system, and of using what could have been a trivial aspect of the game (storing collected tokens) to create restrictions on gameplay that add to the realism of the simulation. I find beauty in clever mechanisms such as this. They are one of the main reasons I play these games.

Session Report: Attribute, Ticket to Ride

My cards during a rousing game of Attribute. I chose the the topic "my artwork" and had to pick a word that did not match that topic. Which card do you think I played? Answer below.

Attribute

Finally, I had an evening free to play a couple games with Sarah, Yuki and Gabe. This is not a game critique, just a session report.

The highlight of the evening was Attribute, a crazy funny German word/party game that some have compared with the party game Apples to Apples. Frankly, I think that's like comparing apple to oranges. One of the major differences is that Attribute has an action component. Players are dealt four attribute cards with adjectives on them such as "fragile," "nocturnal," "stretchable," etc. Each player also receives a sheep card (why sheep? I don't know, but that' s part of the charm). Sheep cards are kept secret and come in two colors: red (don't match) or green (match). The attribute cards are kept in players' hands and the sheep cards are placed facedown on the table.

One player then makes up and announces a topic. It can be anything: an object, an abstract concept, a person. For example, "Britney Spears." Players who have a green sheep card must then choose an attribute card that matches the topic. If you have "blond" or "buoyant," those would work with "Britney Spears." Players who have red cards must pick a card that does not match the topic. "Manly" would be a good choice. But say you have a green sheep and the cards "stretchable," "greasy," fragile" and "anal-retentive" in your hand. Which would you pick?

Once everyone picks a card, they are turned over at once on top of the facedown sheep cards. The object is to earn points by grabbing an attribute card that has a green sheep hidden underneath -- in other words, one that matches the subject. You earn a point if you grab a green sheep or if nobody grabs your red card. You are penalized a point if you grab a red sheep or if nobody grabs your green sheep. It's a little confusing at first but makes beautiful sense when you think about it.

Each player in turn gets to invent a topic until the pile of sheep cards runs out. It usually takes about 30 minutes.

It's very unusual for a word game to be imported from Germany (the company published an English version). This one made it, I think, because an online version proved very popular. Interestingly, the difficult part of the game is coming up with intriguing topics; choosing a card and grabbing is much easier, at least for me. I'm pretty good at making rapid connections -- which is probably why I'm a conceptual artist -- so I managed to win the game. Final scores: Roger 11, Sarah 10, Yuki 8, Gabe 2.

OK, to answer the question in the caption above: I had a red sheep card and it was my turn to come up with a topic. I said, "my artwork" and chose "Overrated." I wanted to see if anyone would take it. Friendships were at stake. Gabe grabbed it immediately. Hmm. He defended his action saying that he thought that I might think my work was overrated because I'm so humble. Nice save.

Ticket to Ride

We also played Ticket to Ride, a game that won Germany's 2004 game of the year award (Spiel des Jahres) . The game, called Zug um Zug in Germany, is designed by American Alan R. Moon and published by Days of Wonder, a company located in part in Saratoga, California.

Ticket to Ride is a fast-paced game about claiming rail lines across the United States. Basically, players collect and play train cards that match the color of routes between cities. When a player has enough cards of the same color to claim a route, he or she marks it with plastic railroad cars. The object is to earn the most points by connecting pairs of cities on "ticket" cards. Each player starts with three tickets and can draw more during the game, but any uncompleted tickets at the game's end generate severe penalties. Two things make the game work well: difficult decisions (do I use my turn to draw colored train cards, claim a route or draw more tickets?) and the fact that the game takes about five minutes to learn.

As usual, I lost miserably. I always seem to get stuck trying to build a difficult route and neglect to draw more tickets. Final scores: Gabe 114, Sarah 81, Yuki 69, Roger 62. Sometimes I think I enjoy the activity of playing a game so much, I forget to try to win.

Finally, we played a few rounds of Blink (also known as Speed), one of the best 30-second games around.


Ticket to Ride, also known as Ticket to Humiliation. My useless meandering route is the one with the red train cars.

Project Posting #1: Scale and Duration

This is my first post regarding my game project. Currently I have two ideas I would like to develop. I know I should choose one, but at this stage, I think I'll pursue both and see which one shows the most promise. I will save the details for later.

Both projects will bring gaming and interactivity (as defined by both Crawford and Meadows) into venues not usually associated with play. Both will allow people to participate without radically changing their normal or expected behavior in these environments. Both will operate on two scales: Individuals will play separately and independently but will be greatly affected by how others are playing. The duration of one will be short and entirely controlled by the game; the other will be of variable length, depending on how long a player wishes to participate.

To summarize:

Game #1

Scale: variable (1 to as many as can fit in the venue)
Geographic Scale: limited to size of venue
Site-Specificity: requires specific type of venue
Duration: probably less than 5 minutes
Type: short-term, non-persistent, non-pervasive

Game #2

Scale: variable (any number)
Geographic Scale: limited to size of venue
Site-Specificity: requires specific type of venue
Duration: variable (as long as a player wishes)
Type: long-term, persistent, non-pervasive

Stay tuned!

Game Critique: Samba de Amigo

Although I pretty much stopped playing video games, I have a soft spot for bizarre games, especially ones that allow me to do something I wouldn't ordinarily do in public. Samba de Amigo was released in 2000 for the Dreamcast system. It required players to shake maracas in time with music in order to score points. Here's a photo of some strangers playing the game and a screenshot, showing the sombrero-wearing monkey behind the circles and bubbles that players must follow when shaking. The maracas have sensors that detect shaking, and motion sensors in a strip placed on the floor can pinpoint where you are holding the maracas.

Players stand in front of the television with a maraca in each hand. On the screen is are rings in a circle. Each ring represents either right or left maraca and one of three positions: high, middle, low. When the music starts, small bubble-like spheres float from the center of the screen toward one of the rings. Wthe bubble hits the ring, you must shake the maraca in that position. So if the bubble hits the high left ring, you must shake the maraca in your left hand high in the air.

The bubbles fly all over the place in various combinations and at various rates of speed depending on the music. Sometimes you must freeze your position until you hear a bell.

It's a great game, largely because the activity is well-integrated with the theme. Most of the music is Latin, so shaking maracas fits in perfectly. Futhermore, you must shake in the rhythm of the music, so you are actually playing along with the band using real percussion instruments. Part of the problem I have with most computer and video games is that the mode of player input is so far removed from the actions depicted in reponse. Does it really make sense to push a buttom to jump, for example? The controller or keyboard usually adds a experiential layer that insulates a player from the game world. No matter how realistically rendered the characters or environment might be, interacting often comes down to the same thing: push a button to jump, hit a key to shoot.

Samba de Amigo as Interactivity

Using Chris Crawford's model of an interactivity, the two actors in Samba de Amigo are the program (game) and the human player (although two people may play simultaneously, it really amounts to side-by-side solo games). The computer "listens" to the player by monitoring his actions via the maraca and floor sensors. The player listens to the program by looking at the screen (where the bubbles are going) and hearing the sound effects that indicate successful and missed shakes.

The program "thinks" by processing the input, and determining success and failure according to its internal rules. The player thinks by using the visual and aural responses of the game to assess his performance. The program "speaks" by generating those visual and aural clues (red X's on missed bubbles, booing sound effects, etc.), and by adjust the player's score. The player "speaks" by adjust his playing (faster, slower, more accurate, etc.).

This constant adjustment of cues on the part of the program and of performance on the part of the player forms the cyclic process of listening, thinking and speaking that Crawford discusses in his essay. All three elements are important and equally weighted in Samba de Amigo, thus I would say the game has a high level of interactivity.

Using Mark Stephen Meadows' four-step model of interactivity, Samba de Amigo breaks down as follows:

1. Observation: The affordance of the maracas is to pick them up and shake them. A plastic mat on the floor has footprints that tell the player where to stand. The position of the maracas is indicated on the screen. This allows players to experiment with the correspondence between the position of the maracas on the TV screen and in real space. Once the game begins, a player must assess the situation quickly and constantly and adjust his performance accordingly.

2. Exploration: Shaking and moving the maracas in space constitute exploration.

3. Modification: Shaking the maracas correctly causes the program to register a success (and adds points); shaking incorrectly registers a failure (and subtracts points).

4. Reciprocal change: The game responds to success and failure with visual and aural cues. This continues until the song finishes or the player does so poorly that the game ends. Completing a song successfully allows a player to try another song, and in some cases unlock more difficult songs.

Massive Multiplay on the Playground

Our discussion on Monday about scale and massively multiplayer gaming reminded me of the large-scale games I used to organize when I was in elementary school in Sunnyvale, California. This was way before cell phone games, video games and Pokemon. You might be wondering how we entertained ourselves. Well, during recess we played tetherball (a game whose only design goal clearly was to find a way not to lose the ball), kickball, jump rope and Four Square (a ball bouncing game played mostly by girls). Kids were in better shape in those days.

While we didn't have Game Boys, we had various toy fads, including my favorite, clackers. These were hard plastic balls connected by a short length of cord and a ring. There were really only two things you could do with clackers (three, if you count injuring yourself): move the ring up and down so the balls swung like pendulums and bounced off each other with a clacking sound, and the dreaded "butterfly." The butterfly was a maneuver in which, by moving the ring up and down more vigorously, you caused the balls to bounce off each other at both above and below your hand in two opposing arcs. The balls would make a loud machine-gun-like clatter. More often than not, when you attempted the butterfly the balls would fly around wildly and hit your arm, causing a painful bruise. We used to wrap towels around our arms when practicing. There were all kinds of rumors about the balls shattering and blinding children, and kids getting hit in the temples and killed. Urban legends, I think.

We also entertained ourselves with Wacky Packs, stickers that were irreverent spoofs of products. These became the black market currency when I was in third or fourth grade, something like Yu-Gi-Oh! cards, except they were not a game. We like them because of the gross illustrations, but looking back it's pretty clear that Wacky Packs expressed some kind of cultural anxiety of their time. Remember, this was the '70s, the transition decade between eras of idealism and social activism, and self-obsession and hyper-materialism.

Both clackers and Wacky Packs were banned at my school, and I'm proud to say my massively multiplayer games were added to the list of verboten activities. We played three games: MMP Crack the Whip, MMP Red Rover and MMP Electricity. Of course, we didn't called them "massively multiplayer," as the term did not yet exist.

MMP Crack the Whip

When I visited my cousins, who lived nearby, we used to love to play Crack the Whip, which could be called the Shoulder Dislocation Game. We would link hands in a chain with one person at an end designated as the leader. The leader would run around the yard making violent snaking movements, trying to get people to let go. There really wasn't a way to win or lose, though if you repeated lost your grip, you were deemed a "loser." The purpose of the activity was to get dizzy, run around a lot and scream.

At the school, I introduced the game during lunch recess and everyone wanted to play. I mean everyone -- the entire school population. We would gather in the large grass field next to the school, join hands and crack the largest whip that may ever have existed, probably more than a hundred kids. Of course, there was no way of winning or losing, and we didn't care. We just ran and screamed. Sometimes the leader would tie the chain in knots by going under the hands and we'd end up in a tight bundle.

The school officials were alarmed. I guess it may have looked a little like a scene from "Children of the Damned". They glanced nervously at each other but let us play for a few days.

MMP Red Rover

Red Rover is a game most people know. Two teams face each other across a field and join hands. Someone calls "Red Rover, Red Rover, let Bobby come over." Bobby would then leave his team, run to the other team and try to break through a pair of joined hands. Potential wrist and finger injuries exist. If the runner gets caught, then he joins the opposing team. If he breaks through, then he returns to his team with an enemy player who joins his team. A team wins if the opposing team is reduced to one player. This game was impossible to finish with 50 or more kids to a team, but it looked impressive.

MMP Electricity

Electricity is a game I must have read about when I was a kid. I don't remember the source and at the time I couldn't remember the goal, so I modified it for the playground. We formed two parallel lines and held hands. At someone's signal, two players at the ends of the lines squeezed the hand of the players next to them, who used their other hands to squeeze the next players' hands and so forth. Thus, an invisible impulse raced down both lines. When the impulse reached the end, it came back to the leader, who shouted "beep" or something like that. First "beep" won."

Electricity was the game I liked the most because we were standing almost perfectly still when we played it. Sometimes we formed a circle. School officials didn't know what we were doing. All they knew was that this had all the hallmarks of a cult: kids seemingly drained of free will holding hands and obeying a charismatic leader. They had to put a stop to it.

We had three or four days of MMP fun before there was an announcement that, due to "safety concerns," we were no longer permitted to gather and play games in large groups. I suppose someone could have gotten hurt, but it hadn't happened. More kids got hurt daily by falling off the monkey bars.

From that point on, all MMP activities had to be sanctioned by the school. Thus, we were forced to square dance (OK, I liked it) and dress up like miners and "pan for gold" for Gold Rush Day. But it wasn't the same. Large-scale, spontaneous game-playing derives part of its pleasure from the very fact that its is not sanctioned, sponsored or supervised. There's a very specific kind of feeling that one gets when joining with like minds to play. Perhaps it's a long-buried herding instinct or simply a need to connect with and belong to a group of peers without the presence of an authority. I remember that, even though I was very young, I was witnessing something unusual and powerful when I saw my classmates put aside their differences to play my games. We felt the rush of independence when we realized that we could organize something ourselves and it could be fun. Who needed adults?

No wonder they banned our MMP games.