Entry 7 - Indigo

Last Friday in class I presented my card game Spade & Neutered and played a few other student’s. My favorite of the bunch was a game called Salty Salad. The game began pretty normally with each player being dealt 7 cards. One card is flipped face up from the deck and players go around attempting to place a higher value card on top. However, the counting up rule seems to simply be a filler for the real core of the game which is that if you do not have a higher card you are required to draw 2 new cards, at which time you can make up and implement a new game rule. This new rule interesting enough can also cancel out existing rules and can be anything that doesn’t allow for an automatic win. So, in complete honesty this is lazy rule writing. That being said, it led to some very fun gameplay for me and aggravating gameplay for others. A game where you make up the rules has a certain allure that they were tapping into which challenged myself and other players to really think creatively and maybe strategically about a new rule set to implement. The game generated intense engagement which has always been of paramount importance for me as a game designer. Designing a game is a lot like a teacher designing a lesson plan. The teacher may create a great lesson plan that others can learn from if they choose to be engaged, but not everyone wants to pay attention. It is up to the designer, being myself going forward, to take on the responsibility of implementing interesting subject matter that pulls in players and prompts critical thinking/decision making. It is even more crucial that those decisions seem to carry weight to keep players interested in how their decisions impact further developments, even if their decisions might be those of simulated choice.

Unfortunately, in class only one group sat down to play my card game. Therefore, my feedback is limited. I attempted to keep an eye on the group as they played to build player profiles of sorts and the overall response of the players seemed to be one of enjoyment and competition. When I checked in with them all and asked how they were enjoying my game they said it was entertaining, funny, and was “Just an overall winner of a game, honestly”. Of course I was flattered, and the feedback I received reflected that was the agreed upon sentiment, but there were discrepancies. When it came to the areas of finding the game interesting, being occupied, feeling happy, aesthetic appeal, and enjoyment I received 3-4s. However, when it came to “It felt like a rich experience” I received a 4, 4, 3, and 1. This left me with some concern. I looked to see if there were any suggestions for improvement and all the feedback I received was to make the rules of re-shuffling expended spades back into the deck less buried in my rules. Aside from moving up a rule, there were no complaints and only positive feedback, but I feel like there are certain types of players like the person that left the 1 in Rich experience and 2 in feeling concentrated, that I’m not quite reaching. Perhaps this is due to the luck element, however the game does promote card counting which (if known) could create more engagement. Alternatively, in a future iteration I could implement use of other card types or sets of card types to serve more strategic purposes to make players feel less like their fate is sealed by chance.