Week 6: Rules Explicitness

This week, we were split into groups and played two card games: Exploding Kittens and The Crew. While playing Exploding Kittens, we realized that we could easily follow along with the instructions. We started off playing nervously, trying not to draw an exploding kitten. Once we got comfortable playing, we decided to make it a little more challenging by using the sabotage-style cards to interfere with the other players. The instructions for this game were well put together and easy to follow. We quickly learned and understood the game and played a few fun rounds. The Crew, however, was more challenging to understand. This is a more complex card game with multiple pieces and factors involved. We understood how the game works after playing a few trial rounds and watching an instructional video. There are a set of 50 tasks to complete, but we were able to skip around and test out different tasks. 

In James Ernest's Writing Effective Rules, he says, "Assume that the player knows about games in general, but nothing about your game. It may seem counterintuitive, but the more they already know, the more assumptions your reader may bring, and the more you may have to work to convey the specifics of your game." This is an exciting thought when planning our group's card game project. Playing  Th  Crew was super difficult to understand. They assume it's users already know how to play the game. Our class had to watch a few third-party tutorial videos to learn how to play.

Even after that, we had to run multiple trial games to understand the game entirely. Honestly, I still am confused about how to play some of the tasks in the game.  This will be important when designing our own card game. We must consider how various players will comprehend the rules. In Chapter 9 of Games, Design, and Play: A Detailed Approach to Iterative Game Design, Mackin & Sharp discuss the importance of understanding your players. As designers, we must consider "Who is playing?" "Where are they playing?" "When are they playing?" "What else do they play?" and "What else do they like?"

Chapter 9 states, "All of these considerations around what the team wants to do with the game and the design motivations in making it take time to develop." These questions will be essential to consider when my group begins mapping out ideas for our game. Having experienced the difficulties with The Crew, I want to understand the players and how they would play our game.  I am excited to begin planning and working on our group's card game. I know we have many fun ideas, and it will be interesting to see how they all come together. Chapter 10 talks about the importance of Prototyping, "One of the important things to consider when setting out to make a prototype is what ideas and goals need to be evaluated. One of the better ways to do this is to pose questions about the aspects of a game's design that need to be answered." Our group will submit multiple ideas, and we should prepare questions about the game's design. Hopefully, we will better understand how we want our games to be designed and played. Once we determine which game would work the best or be the most interesting to prototype, our project will run much smoother. I'm excited to see what everyone comes up with for the topic "travel." I already have a few ideas in mind, and I will now consider the goals and questions my group members may have.