Hey to all of you out there :) Recently I've received quite a few mails about creating board games containing questions - like the classic Trivial Pursuit or Bezzerwizzer. I've also developed that kind of board game myself - so let me just share some of my thoughts about this subject. Hopefully this can help you to overview the project of creating this yourself - it's no small task ;) Theme and gameplay First off... you need to know what and why..
You probably started out by selecting a theme you really like... this is how many question board games start their life. But this may have a significant impact on the scope of your board game. The theme can vary from x-factor to NFL to World War II to SEO and so on... but where some topics are quite easy to create questions for - some are very difficult and problematic. Most people would be able to create a film quiz. You can read up on a lot of facts about the movies and then start writing down your questions. This is easy because the facts are (mostly) the same, no matter from where you might find them. When you look at topics like history, politics and especially warfare! ... You'll discover how the facts change places and perspectives according to the source you're using. Ex. I've been to some Russian war museums where they displayed some reports - from the Winter War - explaining how one Russian pilot heroicly held off an attack by twelve Finish fighters. I haven't been able to find the same engagement depicted with that positive view in Western literature. So why I'm trying to tell here... is that you'll have to be careful how you expound it to people. Futhermore it WILL give you a head ache when trying to cross check your references. Writing the questions Now I'll give you a little run-through the process of writing questions for your own board game. And I'll begin with a warning, because this might only be fun the first 100 questions... hereafter you'll see how much work there really is to it. It's not uncommon for a this kind of trivial board game to have between 2000 and 3000 questions... and some even go up to a crazy amount of 5000! When I was writing questions for my own board game, it took me roughly around 1 month to write 550 questions... This is with a "redo/rewrite" percent around 4%... so far from good enough to actually publish yet. I wasn't experienced in writing questions at that time - and the topic was primarily warfare which didn't help scope-vise at all. But even so - I would still say that you shouldn't expect to write more than 5-6 questions per hour. So remember that - when you determine how many questions you need to begin with. How to write questions This is not a field I'm expect in - but if you're new to this - I can give you some pointers I'm sure :)
Then there's all the "going through the questions again". Leave that to someone else than yourself - You can't find errors you've made yourself ;) Remember This has to be part of your planning from the beginning - otherwise you might end up with a very neglected product. The cost and deadline You've probably already read this between the lines... this is going to cast ya! Producing a board game with questions is a costly affair in time and money. You can choose to work your way out of this or pay your way out... So let me write down some numbers for you if you want to try and estimate the budget of your board game. 5-6 questions per hour, $ 15-45 per hour, X amount of questions in final product... 1000 questions for a board game will cost you somewhere between - $ 2.500 and 9.000 This is still a very rough sketch of the expenses - and you have to keep in mind all the other expenses that comes along the way - when you're producing a board game. However - there might be one last option though... I know some companies sell question databases online here and there. So you might be able to buy generic questions for your game. But this leaves you with no rights or guarantee that these questions won't go into another game as well. Just a thought :) This was my experiences on writing questions for board games - I hope you can use it... Happy gaming out there!
4 Comments
Greetings my fellow developers :) It's time to touch the subject "probability in board games" ... so therefore I'll try to take you through some of the different aspects of dealing with probability in your board game. I won't be going over any equations or hard core math solving... that's not really my field - but I'll try to show you some ways of gaining control of the probabilities in board games. If you want to create a fair and interesting game - you'll have to tame the probability :) What kind of probability aspect suits your game? There are many kinds of probability mechanics to put in a game...
The theme: Usually has a big impact on your choices. Ex. drawing tokens from a bag can refer to the randomness of "digging for jewels" or wheel spinning referring to weather changes / wind blowing. The practical aspect: How fast do you need the players to get a result (dice vs. wheel spinning)? How many times will the probability be in play? Is the result shared between players? You could include "production cost" ... but that's really no fun - and cost influences all levels and all parts of the game.. so that's usually something you put on top of the entire plan. Calculating the probability I don't think there are that many ways to go about calculating random events happening in your game. This is where you have to bring out your calculator and spreadsheet! Some of the questions you might have to struggle with...
One thing you also have to take into consideration is - how much does 1 random action fill in the game? How dependant will players be on getting the right numbers, tokens etc.? A thing Warhammer does very nicely - is evening out the odds between the players. Because die rolls in this game is so important and there are so many factors involved - you're usually rolling between 10 and 20 dice at a time - which means that over time you "should" get an even amount of 1s, 2s, 3s and so on. Probability related to human players In my world of board games not all the probability concerns are about the physical stuff going on in a game. I also think you can put in a players perspective of his/her chances... and how that person might percept his/her chances of winning in the long run. I've done a few war games with many different factors, technologies and weapons involved. And it's interesting to see how people react to each other's choices... how they counter each other's choices. When you're observing people play your game - try to look for patterns / trends... how do players adapt during game and what are they chances of them doing something with significant effect on the game. Take notes and make sure that you get a overview of the situation. If you run into a scenario where the player's reactions happen to be the exact same every time - you might want to consider giving them some more choices that may suit different play styles. Casual / Mainstream / Hardcore Before I end this... I want to remind you of how dealing with randomness and chances in your game - may affect your potential buyers. You don't see many casual gamers wanting to throw 10 dice at a time ;) ......... Happy gaming to you all out there! :) Hey again dear Board Game Developers, I hope you're having a great time while waiting for Christmas :) In this post I'll talk about something that rarely comes up when you share knowledge about board game development. LOGISTIC... a super important word if you're building board games yourself! I've had the "pleasure" of many headaches when it comes to the logistics of all the board game pieces, boxes and prints I've ordered through the last 2-3 months. So let's go through some of the situations and problems you might face - when dealing with your board game logistic. Amount and size First off - you need to know exactly how many of everything you need to make 1 complete game. I have covered some of this topic in several other posts.. why I only want to point out the importance of you keeping track of everything you order. Make sure you have an Excel document or similar where you write down orders, dates, address of deliveries, amounts and size on the deliveries. Where? If you (like me) can't store your board games in your home - you'll need some space somewhere else. I'm lucky to have great parents with a huge house where I can store probably my first 500 board games without problems. I'll recommend you to try and find a friend, family member or the likes where you can store your game components "for free" or where you can pay in kind. Starting out by renting a storage slot/room is not the best idea - since that'll be a monthly expense which demands monthly sales. Try to minimize those expenses in the beginning (then I'll leave the money talk for another post). Remember No matter where you store your board games it has to be with easy access - Especially if you're storing components and have to assemble the board games by order. Who and how? I've ordered board game pieces from many countries and companies which means that I also have some assembling to do - whenever I'm going to sell a board game. If you're in the same situation - you have to take these things into account otherwise you might find yourself running around like a decapitated chicken. I've collected a few questions you should ask yourself - based on my attempts to get a logical/easy/low cost assembly line established for my own board game production. Think about....
Remember Every mile you drive with or without board games in your bag is an expense in the overall financial view. So you might as well focus on minimizing this from the beginning... I think that'll be all for now - Happy gaming! :) Hi there :) This is the post that I've waited for myself :D ... as promised I'm going to talk about turning a computer game into a board game. I've played a lot of computer games through the years and from time to time I encounter experiences that I want to carry into other "worlds/medias"... and my favorite media besides computers must be board games ;) I'm currently working on 2 projects of that caliber so I'll try to go through as many aspects of the process as possible. I hope you'll find some inspiration for your work - if you're sitting with the same challenge as me :) Getting started I assume you've already found a computer game that you want to turn into a board game. So now it's time to figure out, what exactly do you want to convert?
After sorting out WHAT you're aiming for... it's time to ask yourself a few questions. These questions should follow your project to the very end :)
I know the laws too... of course you're not allowed to copy a concept and run with it. But what I'm talking about - is making a game that can be presented for the owners of the computer game franchise. If you're going to aim for anything in that regard - you should aim for the stars :) Research Now it's time to get your hands dirty... and dirty they'll get! This is a lot of work... Both computer games I'm working on - I've played waaaaay over 100 hours each. Mostly because I like (read: love) them... and because I want to understand what makes them tic. You'll have to push the AI as far as possible, try to "cheat" the computer (I don't mean using codes), try to see how the game mechanics can be sabotaged. Then there's all the visiting forums and read threads about the game. What do people like/dislike and why? How are problems dealt with? Data collection After all this "soft" research it's time to for the hardcore data collection. Start the game... and write down every stat/data on units, flow, maps, campaigns, weapons, magic, amount of dialog etc.. etc.. You might be lucky to find many of these things on the internet during your first research - so remember to save it for later use (ex. you can find data on all of Warcraft's units on the internet) The data collection is of course connected to WHAT you want to create - so make sure not to drown yourself in data ;) Excel is your friend.. when it comes to arranging all the data you need spreadsheets. Simplifying collected data As you might realise during the data collection process it's almost impossible to "just" transfer the data used for a computer onto a board game. In most cases you have to simplify it. Ex. You may have weapon damage ranging from 5 to 50 or greater... which means that now you have to turn it into die results. So 5 may become 1 on a 12-sided die and 50 is 1-10 on the same die. This is just an example. But you'll undoubtedly have to do a lot of data conversion if you're going to make it possible to actually play the game without a master degree in math. Another example could be unit health. If you have 4 space ships with 100, 200, 300 and 800 health - you want to simplify the data. Go for the lowest possible number that still keeps the units differentiated by the same amount. Here you can divide by 100 and end up with 1, 2, 3 and 8. Data impact and adjustments So now you have an idea of how to process the data you've collected and how to make it accessible in a game. But you need to know how it's actually going to impact the game. If you look at the first example with the weapons - This means that you would have to use a 12-sided die. So, is that what you want? Or would it make the game more appealing if you adjusted this? Eg. First weapon level being 1 on a 6-sided die - where last weapon would be 2 dice with a hit on 5 on a 6-sided die. It doesn't have to be the exact same ratio as in the computer game as long as you keep an eye on the impact it has on the game. Interaction Just like gamers are interacting through joystick, keyboard and guitars when it comes to computer games your gamers will be interacting with your board game through cards, dice, tokens etc. It's important that you find the right measure of interaction according to the experience you want the players to have. Eg. creating a character with skills could be done through deck building. It's about giving the players the same level of control and depth of interaction - Even though the board game can't present any "behind the screen calculations". Remember It's all up to you! How do you feel when playing computer games - what do you want to convert into a board game? Until next time - Happy gaming - on both fronts! :) Hello again world :) My day started out with a lot of writing.. writing about my newest game "Startups". While I was writing it suddenly hit me - "Is this really the best name for my game?" To be honest I wasn't quite sure - though I've been going over this brainstorm so many times. In the end I came to the conclusion (again)... that Startups is a good name because it relates to the theme and mechanics of the game - but it's not without drawbacks. So with this in mind I started this post - enjoy :) A project's name Every project has to start out with a name... a working title so to speak. But you have to keep in mind - that it's a bit too easy to let your project's name convert into the name of your board game. This may happen if you run out of time and haven't really paid any attention to the fact that you're missing a name. The importance of a name Then.. as your project starts coming towards a conclusion the concerns about the "real" name comes back - "What am I going to call this board game?" I think this is important - far too important to be concluded over a single brainstorm or the initial idea that triggered the game creation itself. You have to find the right name for several reasons:
But I ran into a different problem with my board game's name Startups - Which was the English grammar rules... I don't pretend to know much about grammar I just hope that I spell correctly from time to time ;) But even I could see the problem with writing "Startups is" instead of "Startups are"... it sounds and looks wrong and will be a thorn in my eye until I launch my new game :D Brainstorming - Name inspiration When it comes to finding inspiration... going to www.boardgamegeek.com is always a lot of help - also when looking for names :) Try looking for computer games with the same theme / game play as your board game. Just to get you started. I usually start a good name brainstorm with dissecting my game... going through the mechanics, player situations and game pieces to see if I can find a good phrase or name.
Looking forward to see your crazy suggestions out there in the stores - Happy gaming! :) Hey there guys, Today I'll talk a bit about webshops and selling board games online. I'm lucky to finally have my first board game in a webshop! So that's a great feeling :) You can find my board game Startups - in the Independent Game Creators' webshop. I hope these simple steps can help you towards your first online sales.... First thoughts on webshops As you probably know if you've been trying to start a business before or have talked to any entrepreneurs over the last couple of years.. it's really easy and cheap to start a webshop. But that being said... I would never recommend you to start your own webshop because you want to sell one board game. It's REALLY hard work to get your webshop to actually sell anything! You need to use hundreds of hours SEO-ing your webshop, setting up Ad-words, social marketing stuff, maintaining the webshop itself.... yea, I could continue on in this fashion. My experience tells me to find a webshop that's already running smoothly - and get them to sell my board game. In that way I can focus on what's important and fun for me - creating new board games :) Find a webshop It's extremely easy to find relevant webshops for your board game - well, they want to be found and Google is your friend ;) Many webshops are managed by only a couple of people which makes it much easier to get directly in touch with the person deciding what things they want to sell - in contrary to many stores where it can be days before you reach a person in charge (not to mention franchise which can be even worse). Remember Another benefit with webshops are that they usually don't need the same percentage of a sale as a regular store. The simple fact that they don't have an expensive rent / shop window makes a difference. In general it's easier to get a beneficial deal for both sides. Webshops selling your board game One of the key issues here (no matter who's going to sell you game) is that you need to be able to sell the game yourself. If you can't sell it - how are they supposed to be able to sell it? It's all about presentation - also on the web :) Pictures, short and easy to read text, product thoroughly described. There are many other subjects regarding the webshop itself about security, payment and so on.. but that's for the webshop owners to decide. Help them - and learn... Always check up on their sales, visits etc. and be curious about it - you might learn some nifty things in the process. Help them out as much as possible!
To celebrate the first sale... and the second... and third... and...! :) If you want to see my board game in a webshop: Startups - IGCwebshop Happy gaming out there! :) Hey people, I hope you've had a wonderful weekend with lots of board game moments - I know I had :) This weekend I was testing one of my new board game prototypes that's based on a computer game. Actually several of my board games are.... Therefore I want to give you some names on computer games that has inspired me and that I think you should check out :) Later this week I'll make a post about just how you can turn computer game aspects into playable board games! Transport Tycoon Transport Tycoon is a great game with fun "old school" build mode and many interesting economy elements. The brick by brick building makes for some interesting projects - and monitoring how well your transport company is doing is fun when playing against real opponents. Diablo A great role playing game (RPG) with a low entrance barrier for new gamers. The whole aspect of picking a specific hero and then equip him or her with weapons, armor and loot you find on your slain enemies is fantastic. Spells, damage types, enemies, environment.. it all add up to this involving universe where you want to explore every corner of every map. Starcraft I can find many real time strategy (RTS) games that I like.. but never one that comes close to the time I've spend on Starcraft - trying to master it! Starcraft is a triumph when it comes to balancing and unit diversion. Whenever you think balancing - think Starcraft! Grand Theft Auto Ever wonder how a "free world / sandbox" game looks like. GTA is the answer - and that's a high quality answer. You can do almost anything here - and there's no restrictions on how you have to play the game - though there are goals. I don't know if any board game could ever get close to this sandbox concept. But I would salute those trying! Silent Hunter It's hard to come around the tension and atmosphere you find in Silent Hunter (submarine simulator). As a submarine captain you have to navigate through hostile waters in search for your prey. The whole "fog of war / aiming in the dark" aspect is hard to find in board games. But if the result can be anywhere near the atmosphere from Silent Hunter it would be worth exploring. Battlefield The battlefield games are great shooters and worth knowing (and playing) when we talk about fun combat with tanks, planes, infantry and what not. Shooters aren't easy to turn into board games but they still have many interesting features... ex how easy you switch from driving a jeep to flying a helicopter and how this suddenly changes the premises for your involvement in the game. Total War This is the ultimate clone between real time strategy and turn-based strategy... there's no equal! And the scale of battles is a chapter all by itself - stunning! You can learn many things from both aspects of the game.... the variety of gameplay, the many units and formations, and the whole region conquering works very well. Sins of a Solar Empire My favorite in space strategy game! Loads of upgrades and interesting planets to explore. Many ways of forcing influence on your opponents bases. Huge fortifications and many different space vessels that make it fun to fight battles in outer space. Like Starcraft they use 3 different races to insure ever changing gameplay. Remember This is just a short list - I could write many more... I'm sure you can find other cool games I haven't mentioned for one or more reasons (one being the goal of not having too long articles on my blog)... Go out and explore some new cool computer games - and drag them to the board game table afterwards - you never know what might come of it ;) Happy gaming on both fronts! Hello again board gamers, In this post I'd like to go through a very subjective/individual topic when it comes to board games - which is evaluation and comparison. I think it's important if you're going to create your own board game - that you have a base of knowledge about what does and doesn't work in other board games. Actually - I'd recommend you to "study/evaluate" this across platforms because computer games in many cases are board games with a virtual interface - It's all about core gameplay (I'll have to visit that in another post) ... :) Evaluation Table First off - you should create an evaluation table in where you can place the board games next to each other. Excel is always good for keeping things organized! When you have written down all the games you want to evaluate - you have to figure out what precisely you're looking for - what data do you want? Here are some of the questions I used for my list:
This is a very individual matter - and my list is minded only on strategy games. (ex. Starcraft, Axis & Allies, Risk, Memoir, Civ, HoI, Total War, Diplomacy) The Evaluation Now that you have all the game data listed. It's time to evaluate on it. Here I usually use 3 levels (easy/good , medium/ok , hard/bad) to keep it simple. These graduations can't stand alone of course... You'll have to write down why you're choosing "easy" instead of "medium" etc. This should give you a good overview of what game mechanics and game designs that work.... and in the end this can help you create a better game! Remember You can easily do this with other board games like Trivial Pursuit, Cluedo and Pandemic. So... get on with your evaluation - and happy gaming :) Hey my fellow game makers, One thing that's always taking up a looot of my time - is writing rules. Well of course that doesn't apply for the first draft when I'm writing the rules for myself. But when other people are going to have a try at the game the rules need to be much more precise and simple. In the following sections I'll try to take you through my rulebook writing :) The early beginning... I always start out with a blank document where I write down a lot of headlines consisting of aspects and figure:
The Basic Index In continuation of my evaluation I start building the index for my game rules based on my results. This is an easy way of getting your rules structured and it could look like this:
Rewrite and rewrite When you've written down every single word that you can sqeeze out of your mind about how to navigate your great game it's time to shorten them "again"..... and I mean REALLY shorten the rules. There's this classic rule about text - that you can make your sentences 30% shorter when rewriting them.. and this feature can be applied to your sentences several times. Well, it may be less or more depending on who you are and what not.. but your rules can without a doubt be shorter than it is at this moment. Using pictures and icons As we all know pictures says more than a 1.000 words... which when implemented correctly also works in board game rules. The illustration on the left is used in my rules for COMMANDERS where I have to explain a lot of maneuvering around the map. With several pictures I make it easier to understand where you can and can't go. It also has a psychological effect when people glance at your rules - it all of a sudden looks easier to overcome. All thanks to the good old Donald Duck comics we read as children ;) Keep it precise and simple Remember that every page you add to your rules will eventually narrow your potential market. Not everyone has the patience to read/learn a Warhammer rulebook. My experience with casual gamers is to keep the rules on a maximum of 4-5 standard A4 pages (this doesn't include pictures, stats, data sheets, reference sheets etc.). Remember That if you can't explain a rule live to the test persons playing your game - then you won't have much chance explaining it to them through text. In that case you might have to work a bit more on that specific rule. I think that's all I have to tell you about rules for now.... until you come to visit my blog again - happy gaming! :) Hey guys :) It's been a while since my last blog... I've had lots of things going on here. And one of those things was visiting a board game event arranged by Guldbrikken (Denmark) It was called Danish Board Gaming Days (Danske Spilledage) and was held at the Experimentarium in Copenhagen. I had brought my first two games STARTUPS and COMMANDERS for this weekend event. Though I was busy networking most of the time I managed to take a few pictures that you can enjoy. You must be there! There are a few rules for an entrepreneur who wants to have success with his or her product - One of them is: You must always attend to as many events, conferences, festivals and exhibitions as possible. Make sure that you continuously check the board game market for events. - Ask in the board game shops - Ask the community on www.boardgamegeek.com - Ask managers of the conference halls where such things are usually held. But there's more! Board game events are not the only places where you can show up with your board game... You can always visit completely different events - just for the inspiration... and who knows. Sometimes you find some really interesting people that might be able to help you with your work. I usually visit Human Resource conferences, Entrepreneur events and Computer Game festivals. It gives me a lot of inspiration and a chance to pitch my ideas/games for a different audience, find beta testers or potential partners for my games... You never know... I hope to see your game on my next visit - wherever that might be ;) Happy gaming! |
SunTzuGames' blog
Sharing my thoughts on game design, production and more! Categories
All
NewsletterGet alerted when I launch a new game or Kickstarter campaign. Click here!
|