Top 10 Game Design Lessons: 2013 vs 2021
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.ค. 2024
- In today’s video I discuss a list I posted back in 2013 about 10 game design lessons I learned that year and if I still agree with those lessons. The two main games I mention are Viticulture and Euphoria.
Here’s the original post: stonemaiergames.com/the-top-1...
00:00 - Introduction
01:10 - Play a lot of different games
03:11 - Minimize frustration
07:05 - The first game matters
10:00 - The value of short-term goals
12:04 - Balance the cards
14:00 - Connect mechanisms and theme
16:20 - Blind playtesting is king
19:48 - Writing rules is an art form
23:06 - Downtime is a killer
26:18 - Forward momentum from the first turn
28:12 - It all comes down to fun
Become a champion of this channel: stonemaier-games.myshopify.co...
podcast link: stonemaiergames.com/about/pod...
Intro animation by Jeff Payne vimeo.com/jaaronpayne and video proofing by Cody Simonsen - เกม
![[Full Episode] MasterChef Junior Thailand มาสเตอร์เชฟ จูเนียร์ ประเทศไทย Season 3 Episode 5](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/g5wpgeAIzMs/mqdefault.jpg)
Your number ten reminded me of a quote by Stephen King: "If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot." I think the same is true for game designers.
I agree!
It's always cool to reflect on things like this. I had a similar list of "Top 10 things I learned as a Game Developer" for a BGDF interview a few years ago. It appears as though we've traveled a similar road.
As a Developer, I spend far more time with designers engaged in conversation at the beginning of our relationship now than I did a decade ago. Back in 2012, when Professor's Lab started, I would receive rules and a prototype and simply playtest and provide feedback. Now, I have hour-long conversations with the designer to find out their motivations in the game, the reactions or emotions they want to elicit, and then assist them in reaching that end goal.
It still amazes me that you get through these videos in one take!
Favorite thing about this video is how you're modeling a growth mindset. Can't improve if you don't learn from past experiences and mistakes. You give me confidence that you're still on that learning edge seeking to improve your designs. And that makes for better games for us. 👍🏼
Lesson number 4 resonates with me. I am an engineer and often times, as I start working on the documentation of my design, I find that it is too complex to explain what was done. Most of the times there is a simpler design that is just as effective and much easier to document. Thanks for this great video.
Some of these are great advice for building a D&D campaign (which i'm doing now). Short-term & long-term goals, building an engine, balancing your cards (magic items).
I definitely agree with what you said with #1. Games don't necessarily have to be fun. The might create other emotions. It just needs to be captivating.
Great Video!
Just my 2 cents on the topic of frustration. I like to think of it as "minimise feeling stuck" "minimised wasted actions", rather than "minimising frustrations" because some "good" frustrations due to having a few good decisions to make, rather than having no decisions to make. In other words, not all frustrations have the same negative feeling.
I've learnt from my own playtest groups, is that players don't hate limitations per se, they hate it when they are forced to do a "bad thing" or a "worse thing", and that is usually due to actions which make them feel like "i wasted a turn as there was no advancement". Jamey touches on this in the 7th point.
tldr: Players hate feeling stuck. If all actions and decisions contribute to a player's advancement, in one way or another, or if the game is balanced to the extent where players can rebound from a bad turn easily, then i think that would reduce that sense of negativity.
The value of short term goals, not just in the game, but in my own process/life is so important for me personally.
My tastes have definitely evolved! I like much more complex games these days, so even though I’m gaming at least four days a week, I’m playing one or two games each session rather than four or five.
I’ve noticed some things about myself: I don’t like mean games. I don’t like dexterity games or real-time games. My favourite moments in the hobby are usually when I’m learning games or teaching games. I play for the intellectual puzzle, and interesting decisions make games fun. I usually lose, but that doesn’t matter, as long as I don’t feel like I’m doomed to lose from the start.
Theme is an interesting discussion topic for me. I’m designing a game with a striking theme, which is surprising because I prefer to learn games by their mechanics: how does a turn look, what’s the objective, when does the game end, etc. My friend who does game design sessions with me learns games the same way. But I think of my cousin, who came into the board gaming hobby via RPGs, and she learns games in a more narrative way, so I try to think of how intuitive my mechanisms will be given the theme, and I try to kibosh any ideas that would be too difficult to explain thematically (unless they’re really, really good!).
I’ve come across some games whose themes and mechanisms don’t match very well, and that is their main downfall. Take Parks (Henry Audubon), for example. It’s a gorgeous game with fun gameplay and plenty of references to nature, but nothing in that game makes sense thematically. You take pictures (somehow there’s only one camera in the game that everyone keeps stealing from each other) that match the art of the parks, but the pictures are taken on the trail and not in the parks. When you visit a park, no one else can visit it again for the rest of the game; you also can’t visit that park unless you’ve already seen the scenery on the trail, which defeats the purpose of a park. When someone wants to stand beside you on the trail, they have to extinguish a campfire. When you fill a canteen with water, a baby animal pops out and you can use it as currency. It’s all extremely strange and confusing, which led to me eventually giving the game away, even though it was fun and beautiful; it was just too hard to teach for a game of its weight.
The first game can make a big difference. My first game of Tapestry was terrible (sorry, Jamey!): I was matched with a board and a faction whose strengths were completely at odds with each other, and neither of the other players-who had both played before-noticed until it was too late. Suffice it to say, I noticed the anti-synergy after a few turns, and for most of the game I was essentially waiting for the inevitable loss. I ended up getting around one-fourth of the next highest player’s score, and I was really unmotivated to play it again. I eventually did, which raised my opinion of the game substantially, but I still wouldn’t consider the game a favourite because of the sourness of that first play (even though I like similar games, such as The Gallerist, quite a lot).
As for the “fun” element, I agree that fun takes many forms; excitement is only one form of fun, and there are many others. One of my latest flames is Evacuation by Vladimír Suchý, and I love the tightness of the resources and the breadth of the implications of your decisions. I introduced it to a friend of mine that I’ve only recently started gaming with. He told me with a smile, “Agh! This game is a f***ing nightmare,” but I later learned that he, like me, loved making agonising decisions in games, so his remark was actually high praise!
Thanks for the video! It provides food for thought as I continue my design process.
Even though Jamey kept saying "I'm heavily biased here..." (with regards to his games), he is one of the most objective and down to earth designers/publishers out there. Case in point, in this video he called out several of his games (including his recent games such as Red Rising) where he regretted not achieving certain goals that should have been in the final product.
Even though I'm not a fan of Stonemeier Games (I find most of their games boring), it makes me excited with what they will publish next.
Not a designer, just a player, but I had some thoughts as I was listening:
9. The first game matters. I don't know how true this is. There have been games I've played once and knew I never wanted to play again, but that was cases that weren't the fault of the game - it was just clearly a game that didn't match my preferences and personality. On the other hand, I've had first plays that made me think "Uh oh, I didn't like this as much as I thought I would" that upon later plays became absolute favorites (The Voyages of Marco Polo, for example). Also, I tend to like the kind of game that you have to play a few times to understand it. So I'd hate to see designers design for that first play experience - I'd rather they design it for the long term experience.
7. Balance your cards. I like the way the Garphill Games do this, where there cards have powers that can be invoked in 2 ways (dismiss/recruit powers in Paladins and Viscounts and Raiders). You can extend this to other aspects of a game too. In fact, Viticulture has kind of a weird thing there money is very useful early in the game and then is more or less irrelevant later. (I don't have Tuscany and don't know if this provides other uses for lira as the game goes on?)
6. Mechanisms and Theme. Zee Garcia is his reviews talks about Theme as the first part of his reviews, and he often makes judgments based on whether the theme helps teach the rules. Theme can also help you figure out what the rule must be at the table. My best example of this is probably Scythe, where there are a lot of little rules and special powers, but they often make perfect sense thematically. Viticulture is another great example of how people "get it" right away because of the theme.
4. Rule writing. I could write a 10-page essay on this one. I'm not a designer, but I love to write, so I always write rule books for any fan expansions I upload to bgg (I've made several for Scythe), and I found early on exactly what you suggest: if you can't write a clear rule, the mechanism is probably wrong. I also really (really!) like what you said about writing the rules not only as a teacher but as a reference. I've pulled my hair out looking for simple things like "if I'm playing 2 player, is the set up different?" which you think would be ultra easy to find, but often gets lost if a rule book adopts a "If this is your first game..." narrative. Rule books are crucial for the first game, but for any game that is more than trivial, it's also going to be needed for repeat plays. A rule book really needs a clear high-level organization so that there is no confusion where a needed rule might be found. Doing this for a complex game is NOT EASY, and it seems that there is a real need for professional rules writers. Game companies understand they need pro graphic designers and pro artists. They really need pro writers too.
3. Downtime. It's funny - I was thinking Red Rising is actually a good example of a game where you can't plan ahead - the board state changes too much, especially in a 3+ player game. Not only that, but because there is so much to read, the downtime is going to be worse for the first play. So Red Rising breaks 2 of your rules! In fact, it might break 3, because I'm struggling to think of a good example of a "short term goal" in Red Rising - nothing is really tabulated until the end of the game. (I guess you could argue that moving ahead in the Institute or something is a short term accomplishment.) Now, I think it's a good game, and I think that the downtime problems with Red Rising do go away with repeat plays. Downtime is an interesting one because I tend to be a fast player and there are players in my group that aren't. But I also usually enjoy the time between turns because I do like planning and thinking of contingencies. I'd rather play a game where I have to think between turns than one that is constant action (e.g., Space Base - a good game, just not my favorite) or simultaneous. The sweet spot is a game where I have enough to think about that I'm just ready when my turn comes around again. The designer of the game has some influence on that, but so does your game group and your player count.
1. Fun. I like what you said about other emotions. There are games that are almost nothing but fun (Can't Stop, Escape: Curse of the Temple, King of Tokyo) but I'll never rate those as highly as the games that make me think and plan (Scythe, Paladins, Concordia). I want to feel a little bit of a brain burn. I want to feel like I'm building something. When a game has delayed gratification, I want to feel both parts of that - the gratification and the delay!
Great points! Red Rising's short-term goals are the "deploy" abilities on the cards in your hand. :)
Jamey, I very much enjoyed this list! I really like when you took a point and said “this is true… but here is how I changed” like with the last example :)
Turns out 2013 Jamey was pretty smart and that older and wiser Jamey still agrees with most of what his younger version said. It's good to know as I reference some of your older game design lessons that they are still relevant today.
Jamey, thank you very much for sharing your insights! They are really helpful :)
I'm designing a game at the moment and this is very insightful and honest. Thanks mate!
This was a very cool video. I like that this video has showed the complexity of board game design and the progression on how you deal with that complexity. My board game design in the last 3 years has changed a lot along the same lines as your list but most notably would be changing mechanisms to make them easier to explain. I think this one is super important.
It would be fun and informative to virtually work with you on designing a game. Maybe you could do that with one person and post a weekly video with you and that person talking about the game and your experiences.
Great advice and game design lessons!
Awesome video. Thanks for that!
Well this was perfect timing lol I think the part of designing my own game right now that is causing me the most dread is the rulebook. I know it's going to be difficult and really good rulebooks are hard to come by, so I want my game to have a great rulebook. That being said, I love this idea of if it's too difficult or too much to write about a small rule, then change the game not the rulebook. This video was super helpful! Thank you
LOVE this whole video!
Thanks a lot for putting these videos out there.
I'm currently designing my first and your videos have been really helpful and have given me a lot of information even just on where to look for getting a game printed and published.
I love Lords of Waterdeep too. Downtime is a killer for Settlers of Catan, when no ones wants to trade and you can't even build a road to get to better numbers. Railways of the World is also my favorite.
13:40 Great insight. There are several great games that utilize a card row/river quite well. Clank!, for example, has cards that are helpful through the game. Nations uses three rows of cards every round. The icons on the cards are easy to identify, and there’s just a few cards (wonders, advisors) that have some basic text on them. They are ordered per age, so more advanced cards come out later.
Thanks Jamey, very useful, I wish I’d seen this video 2 years ago when I first started developing my board game. But I was happy to see we have the same thinking that number 1 is fun! That’s been my mantra for last 2 years, in every aspect I drop rules if not fun, and always challenge myself to figure out a way to make each aspect of the game more fun. For example every game needs some jeopardy, but if you have too much then it becomes annoying, not fun. Cheers, Tim.
Thanks Tim! I completely agree about fun (and some tension too).
Good stuff, Jamey
Great video... I think what you said for your revised #1 is key, because "fun" is such an overused term those days. I think it means "it makes you happy", which is very vague, plus what makes you happy may not make me happy (for example if you're happy you won, I may not be happy I lost!). Some people love very simple games, some like complex games, etc... I think giving people emotions is definitely the way to go, you want people to remember their experience, so in a way it relates to your point about the importance of the first game/experience (ie first impressions matter): you want people to remember that first experience, and people remember via emotions they felt. It's like going to a movie: the best ones are the ones that manage to give you emotions, so they stimulate you. A game is a success if it it makes you excited to play it again.
I think my biggest evolution is slowly moving from just a player of games to dabbling in the design side too.
I actually found that a lot of this list really comes together when I think of times I've had fun playing a game for the first time especially with family that don't tend to play heavier or even midweight games.
Wingspan seemed daunting when I sat down to play with my family who definitely get turned off quick if the first play is overly complex (see Dungeon Petz lol) but the start was slow enough and the rules walked us through it well enough that they really enjoyed it and actually wanted to come back to it.
Last night I taught Sushi Go to my mother in law in about 5 seconds and she destroyed me and my son on her first game lol. I think I looked at the rulebook once. That one kinda turned on a lightbulb in my brain of how mechanics can be intuitive and simple. Just interesting to look at the depth of simple to more complex games and see that onboarding process at work and that "Aha! I get it now" moment in a player's eyes where the rulebook because the reference book from that moment on.
Thank you again for all the info. So helpful.
Thanks for sharing these examples! I love how easy it is to get Sushi Go to the table.
I'm usually not big on theme. I like mechanism and fun factor, but a good theme will help me remember the rules. A good theme will help decide what to do on edge cases, understand the intention of the designer through the theme.
Red Outpost is a good example. The rule book was not long and not explicit enough,but the theme and the mechanism were so intertwined that it was easy to "know" what to do.
It was a good subject Jamey. Thx a lot.
#4 was a big surprise for me. I made more than 900 iterations (over a year and a half) writing rules for my first design. I handle the process a lot differently now, allowing changes to happen freely like a Bob Ross painting.
Really interesting video!
After taking a break from playing games for a little while, last night I got back to it by playing Euphoria with my wife. That's what brought me to this video, was just looking for fun insights from you regarding it. I'm at the "first game matters" point and although I generally agree I don't think I would've traded a smoother first game for the long term fun that the game provides after you get to know how it all connects. In fact one of my favorite things in board games is that moment of realization where in the middle of a play session your head goes like "ooohhh, I see now!" that's just so much fun. :)
PS: just to be clear, I already had Euphoria and we just had to remember the setup and rules, as soon as we got to playing, the flow of the game immediately returned to us no problem. But I remember when I first bought the game, reading the rules for the first time was a bit daunting, but nothing terrible, and then the realization moment I was talking about was great.
This is all so useful thanks Jamey! I'm working on a design right now and have play tested it a couple of times. Players have found it frustrating when they can't sell a toy from their shop in my game which I thought was just part of the forward planning required in the game. I'm going to see now if I can design or change something to avoid these frustrating moments.
The other point that stuck out for my toy shop game design is a sense of progression. Players are doing the same thing at the start as they are at the end so I'm going to look at how I can add in a sense of doing more and bigger and better things throughout the game. Thanks again for the great video and advice!
Daniel: It's great you were able to identify that point of frustration early on! Sometimes games offer a backup option for completing orders--like, maybe there isn't a customer willing to pay $10 for a toy, but you always have the option of donating the toy to a shelter for 2 VP or of selling any toy to an open market for $5.
Good luck figuring out the progression element too!
@@jameystegmaier Thanks for your reply Jamey! That is a great suggestion. A small reward so players still feel like they are moving forwards even if it isn't as fast as the other players.
And yep I'll bank that luck! The game I am designing is quite rules light and I'd like to keep it as light as possible. So at the moment I'm thinking that I might be able to get a greater sense of progression by having players gain money more quickly in the game to allow the players to buy more toys and sell more toys later in the game. So players are still doing the same actions but just more of them.
@@danielkeeble753 That sounds like a great solution!
Great video. I agree about the fun part. I can't put my finger on what makes a game fun for me...maybe the anticipation of seeing what will come up. I like Roll for the Galaxy and Ethnos a lot and both of them have that anticipation in there. Also: I love seeing the stacks of cat food cans and the kitty in the corner. I feel a definite kinship hahaha
Biddy gets anxious if I don't keep a big stack of food over there. :)
I'm not a designer, but in choosing which games to buy, length (including set-up time) and accessibility became a lot more important than it was 5 years ago. Having kids means I just don't have as much time as I used to to play 2 hour+ games, so I don't need as many of them (even if that new one looks *really* cool), because they would all compete for a very limited slot.
Not being easy to understand impacts that even more, because if two plays of one game are far apart, it will feel like the first game every time. So games that play in an hour are perfect for me because they hit the table sooner, but still have a decent amount of depth. I also bought a lot more fillers lately because it happens quite often that we have friends over and have about 30 minutes to play a quick game before dinner is ready, or something like that.
The newest version of Jamaica has a rulebook with colored tabs which are all visible even with the cover closed. Great for players needing to reference a rule while playing! Probably costs a bit more to publish, but the payoff from appreciative gamers who may follow a publisher because of that "little extra" seems worth it. Thank you Jamey for another great top 10!! Very informative!
That sounds really nice, Jeff--I need to check out that rulebook.
th-cam.com/video/J1DArIbZHKY/w-d-xo.html
Jamey, here's the link to the video where I saw the rulebook for Jamaica. Zee did a great job doing a comparison!
@@jeffdekorne7944 thank you!
The last one "it all comes down to fun" I partially agree with this one. I think one of the great things you can strive for as a designer is to make a game that is challenging and puts the players in a state of flow (see mihaly csikszentmihalyi's theory on this). I see 'fun' as an output to this.
because when you see your self in a place where the anxiety and boredom is ballaned you find yourself loosing track of time and thereby having fun.
I always think of "this war of mine" when designer are saying that "design for fun" - because that game is f*ing brutal.
I think a perfect example of "4a: change the mechanics so they’re easier to explain" is in Codenames. In the original game, you get X+1 guesses and it always took 5 minutes to invent a scenario to try and explain why you need that +1 and how to use it. In codenames duet, they changed it so you always have unlimited guesses. This simplifies the rules without any negative impact on gameplay.
But now I have the problem that I have to explain why I like the new rule when I play with a group where some players only know the old rule. :shrug:
Those cats could design a killer game with all that knowledge they got from listening in their sleep xD
I think Walter's game would be called "Ribbon". :)
@@jameystegmaier Haha yea! Probably stuck on the same game mechanic XD. Great list by the way. Imho I think frustration in a game can be very good, if in the same game, you manage to find a solution to said frustation. That is a very satisfying moment :)
I think it's important to take your time when you design (design anything actually). You rarely see all the kinks right away... Blind play testing helps uncover some of those kinks but play testers are not designers.
It's important to take breaks in particular (and playing other games is a good way to take breaks!), and regularly go back to a design with a fresh mind. Revisiting the rule book is a good way to spot what's not elegant. Recently, I have also found it beneficial to port the game on TTS and write scripts to automate some of the logistics in a game, clunky stuff jumps out right away sometimes! You find tedious things that have to be done in a certain order, etc... I'm a programmer, and in coding there's something called "refactoring", which is essentially a process to make the code "cleaner", I'm always amazed at how cleaning the code often reveal bugs and inefficiencies, and the same methodology applies really well to board gaming design.
Another thing about taking your time to design is that when you haven't touched a game for a month and you come back to it, if you find yourself delving in the rulebook that's usually not a good sign. I dislike reading rulebooks, so if I have to refer to the rules again on subsequent plays, that's irritating. It means something is not streamlined, rules don't stick. I can go back to Azul, Chess, Wingspan or Scythe without ever having to re-read the rules, that is a Hallmark of a well designed game. Many heavier games today don't have that characteristics and you find yourself amnesic when you play them again!
I really like your point about taking breaks while designing a game and seeing the impact when you return from a break.
Thank you for your brilliant insights.
I played euphoria once and I didn't like it. I felt like I understood the game, but maybe I will need more plays to truly understand it and enjoy it more. One thing I hated were actually the extra turns for doubles in dice, it felt arbitrarily unfair in an strategic game (the winner actually rolled a few doubles during the game...). I would love to play the version of euphoria without dice rolling, in which dice only represent age, it sounds clever and interesting.
The number one: I'd like to say "engagement" instead of "fun". I think that is the core experience to aim for. (At least that's what I think right now.)
Writing rules is absolutely an art form...
Hiring technical writers should be standard at this point :D
Do you have a video at hand where you break down what player agency is in board games? Curious to know how to think about it as a games designer and best practices creating it. I've been struggling to find good definitions and analysis on the subject with examples.
Would love to see a video on the topic. :)
I think it comes up in my video about games about perfect information, which covers a big part of player agency: th-cam.com/video/6xEwB2uvAPI/w-d-xo.html
Player agency is when you have control over your decisions and the outcome of those decisions. I generally prefer games with high player agency but still some amount of randomness that requires players to pivot. Like, in Viticulture, you have control over which types of cards you draw (that's agency) and when you play cards (also agency), but you don't have control over the content on the cards because it's a blind draw. If a designer wanted to add even more agency to Viticulture, they would let players draw 2 and keep 1 (which is fine but slows down the game and changes the decision point) or always have 3 face-up cards of each type (which also changes the decision point and requires players to read cards from across the table).
Jamey thank you for a great video on a very interesting topic. I look forward to the video about the top theme-matching mechanisms. My favorite is the rocket testing mechanism in the game Leaving Earth. Check it out!
Fun video to listen to, thanks Jamey!
Beyond the importance of good rules, one I absolutely agree with is a good first play. What are your thoughts on a first play where your goal is to see the game in action? I've tought some games where the first play leads to something like "I see what I need to do differently next game" (Example - A Feast for Odin). It can be a dangerous slope for some to lose big to an experienced player. Those new players though are just as excited to get the game back out in trying to replicate the successes of their opponents.
Should a game be competitive for all players regardless of game familiarity, or is it fair to ask for more then one play as a designer?
Thanks Jay! My personal take on this sounds similar to yours--I think it's important for a player to have fun on the first play (whatever that means for the game in question), but actually having a high chance at winning the first time you play a game isn't necessary and may not even be a good thing.
Great video Jamey! Some of my thoughts below:
On point 9, minimizing frustration: I fully agree with minimizing frustration via player aids/intuitive rules, but feel that strong emotions (of for example loss) in a game generally result in a more memorable time, even if at the time it might be felt as frustration. (You actually elude to this in your last point!)
On point 3, minimizing downtime: Increasing the ability to plan your turn at the same time decreases player interaction, what are your thoughts about this 'cursed problem'? (One partial solution you mention is of course the grande worker!)
That's an interesting point about how the ability to plan for your turn decreases the potential for player interaction. I think it's a matter of how much the board state changes. Like, in Red Rising, a player is deploying a card and picking up another. That's a fairly big change in board state, though there are still quite a few other visible cards that don't change. That's similar in a worker-placement game: When it's getting close to your turn, only one or two actions may change, while the most remain static.
@@jameystegmaier Thanks for your reply Jamey! Maybe having reasonable back-up plans available (that don't change your entire stratagy) mends this point partly. This would explain why in many workerplacement-type games you can still plan your turn/back up plan (as you usually can get at least something useful), while in a game like Concordia/Brass/Red Rising your entire plan can get derailed as you cannot pay a certain cost anymore or certain resources/cards are unavailable. It is likely a function on the amount of dependencies in the game (a resource in most WP games is always useful (even though you might lose a few points), while in Red Rising the absence of a certain card might nullify your entire strategy (similar in Brass/Concordia/games were planning is harder)).
@@joerihessels8230 I like that! That's the lens I use as a player: What's the thing I hope to do, and if it's no longer possible, what's the second-best thing? Once you get into third- or fourth-best, I start to feel like I might as well wait until my turn to think about it.
@@jameystegmaier I feel things like a Grande worker in Viticulture or the Power in Terra Mystica help smooth planning a lot. Even if you get blocked, there are more expensive methods to still get what you want. Still less player interaction than Brass/Concordia and the like, but definitely improved planning capability.
I played Roll For It. I found that mostly you make some interesting choices early, but then you are just praying to roll number x. If you don't roll x several turns in a row, you are just stuck waiting until you roll x. There should be more to do. Ganz Schon Clever has better mechanisms I'd like to see used in a Eurogame
If a board game would be a person:
Mechanics are the brain
Story/World is the heart
Body/Lookalike is the visual part of the game (table presence)
and they together form the game.
And just like in reality, people prioritize different aspects. For somebody, the appearance is not so important but very critics about the mechanism. And the opposite can be also true. Somebody can't play the game if they don't feel the story, theme behind it.
So your game should be excellent in all 3 areas.
Wish I had learned your number nine lesson before this year. One of my friends owns wingspan and suggested we play I have been waiting to play for so long I agreed but two other friends were available to play with my wife and I. I suggested my wife display as a team with me but perhaps I didn't suggest energetically enough because of five player game of wingspan where she has never played wingspan before, three of the players were experienced and I've played magic gathering for more than 20 years I meant that it was a long slog that ended with her telling me I'm not allowed to buy the bird game. ,😭
Hey Jamie, although I´m someone who does not take into consideration "the first game", I completely agree with you on that, lots of folks after "first bad game" won´t touch that game anymore which makes me wonder one thing and something I´ve also thought about: why is it that games don´t have a "walkthrough" game or 2? I mean, I believe all games should have it (or most of them), especially for hard/heavy games, that would help people understand the mechanics better, my point of view, of course. Also, I´m not a designer nor have I ever own a company, I must be missing key things on why this is not done on games. For example Mage Knight, it has that kind of walkthrough. Also, Euphoria with a walkthrough guide for each player would make that way easier to play/teach.
Aaron: I love a good gaming tutorial, and I discuss the pros and cons of them (along with my favorite examples) in this video: th-cam.com/video/fhil3lk0yx4/w-d-xo.html
@@jameystegmaier awesome, thanks, will take a look, that way I’ll understand better. Btw, do you know the type of paper used to print board game cards? Been trying to do some print and play, but want to use paper similar to Scythe or Red Rising cards, can’t find the type anywhere.
@@zero-il9on When I make prototypes, I use 80 lb paper. The fancy paper used by board game manufacturers isn't something you can easily get (or print on).
@@jameystegmaier thought that would be the case. Thank you very much, really appreciated! I will try that one. Greetings from Costa Rica.
Jamey, this was a great and informative video. Thanks for making it! What I like about this list is that so many of these elements play into the others - when you have a big enough decision space (balancing short term goals, cards, building momentum), it gives you something to do between your turns in that downtime that is hopefully often a fun puzzle to solve. I’m excited to enter the blind playtesting phase once we finish writing a consumable rulebook.
I was surprised to hear you mentioned that blind playtesters were okay with the effort involved in print and play today. Is there a large benefit you gain from this over Tabletop Simulator or another online platform, or a gamecrafter prototype?
Thank you! I've also been pleasantly surprised by blind playtesters' willingness to print and assemble prototypes--maybe it helps that we pay them? I think the tactile experience of having a prototype on the table with other people just can't be replicated by TTS or Tabletopia. Gamecrafter is great, but I think many playtesters can put together the prototype more cost effectively than Gamecrafter can.
Hello Jamey! I hope that you can help me with a quick question! Sorry for disturbing you! I am creating a quite miniature heavy game, and the cost of the molds at PandaGM is crushing me. (around 40 different minis that I may be able to cut down on a bit) Would it be possible to only get the molds for the miniatures created after the game is funded? (Gamefound) Or would that not be a viable option? TY in advance and ty for all your great knowledge!
Absolutely! Just make sure you budget accordingly so your funding goal covers the cost of the moulds.
@@jameystegmaier Thank you a lot! I would love to have you as a mentor ;) One final question I struggle a bit with is where to get the games made for reviewers. I read that Panda does not do review copies and refers to gamecrafter, but it seems they only have standard stuff, and not minis etc :)
@@GreymarshGames Check out the articles and videos here, including the prototype section. :) You can ask questions in the comments of each article. stonemaiergames.com/kickstarter/how-to-design-a-tabletop-game/
@@jameystegmaier Thank you Jamey! I read them many times, but still struggle with how to make the perfect product for review. Maybe I missed something :D I will look again. Thank you, and hope you will pop by Greymarsh Games and check out Sky Empire :)
I have extreme agreement with you on the idea that public information (with only one copy) should not be text-based, such as a row of cards or tiles that are unclaimed. Iconography is obviously the simple solution. However, the one exception that I’ve been trying to wrap my head around for at least a year now is Wingspan. Jamey, can you please try to explain why the bird tray in Wingspan is so much more acceptable in reality than in theory? I’ve never had anyone complain about it, and it simply works. How?
I think the Wingspan tray works because (a) players don't need to remember how many face-up birds there are, (b) because you can easily pass around the tray or lift up a card, and (c) the cards are easy to pick up when you're ready to gain one.
This is the first I'm seeing this list and I think your number one rule is quite telling because if someone asked me what stands out about Stonemaier Games for me is that they are fun. I have seen many people on BGG and elsewhere pointing out "flaws" in various Stonemaier Games. While I can see their points, for me these "flaws" have often felt like design decisions to make the games more fun. I have played many games, well reviewed games, that were clever, balanced, and even innovative, but at the end of the day they just weren't fun. Conversely when someone asks me what Stomemaier is contributing to the hobby my first answer is "Their games are just fun!"
Thanks Kirk! That means a lot to me, as that's the goal of all of our games. :)
I wanted to touch up on your #9. Some games are complicated, which adds length and increased brain power to master them, and sometimes the designers come back with a new version that streamlines some elements. It's interesting to see the community feedback on those: you often see people complain that they miss the complexity of the original game, and see other rave about the fact that the game is shorter, there are always mixed reactions. To me, streamlined is always better, even it cuts out some complexity. You will reach a wider audience. Yes some people who like heavier games won't like it because it doesn't stimulate them enough, but you should remained focused and ignore their masochistic needs (!): the goal of every design should be to produce elegant designs that are easy to understand and memorize. Streamlined games can be hard to master, those are the best.
I agree with the majority of statements, however, it should apply for majority of games, but not for all. Great example are Phil Eklund's games. HIgh Frontier is a complex game with many, many rules. You have a card with 4 pages just as a reminder on what actions can you take and when. While in 99% of other games this would be a gamekiller, in HF it's perfectly valid as the game has almost perfect thematic connection, everything just fits and is actually a masterpiece of modern gaming. I don't think that I ever felt immersed in the game as much as HF. Same goes for Lacerda, it's not complexity for complexity sake, everything sits smoothly in its place, mostly because it has been playtested A LOT (both Eklund and Lacerda games). These designers make complex games, not superficially complex for complexity sake, but complex interconnected thematic experiences. Game can be easy to teach and hard to master, but usually immersion rate is pretty low. In complex games (if the rules are not fiddly), immersion is quite bigger. Easy rules will most of the time make great games, but not something you will remember more than 2 days after you played it.
Just as a minor criticism: it's funny how you talk about balancing visitor cards, when the power is all over the place in the base game decks. Rhine Valley fixes it.
Thanks for sharing your opinion! Here's mine: The visitor cards in Viticulture are circumstantially balanced, which means that sometimes they will be more or less powerful depending on when and how they're played. Most importantly, all visitor cards in Viticulture Essential are balanced in terms of how they each offer utility at any time in the game (instead of just early in the game or late in the game). Rhine Valley actually has nothing to do with card balance; rather, the objective of that expansion was to create visitor cards that were focused on engine building, not gaining VP.
On 9. the first game matters, i'm shocked that almost no games have a simple beginner version of the game for a first playthrough.
Think of how exciting opening legacy packs are for a legacy game. Why not put the advanced rules and components behind a pack to make learning the game and getting new rules an exciting prospect.
tutorials have been in videogames for decades, but are almost completely absent in boardgames.
Here's a video on this topic: th-cam.com/video/fhil3lk0yx4/w-d-xo.html
I don't like fun games.