Devlog Journal 3

This week in class, we discussed the six elements of game design: actions, goals, rules, objects, playspace, and players. We also discussed the 10 basic tools of game design: constraint, direct and indirect actions, goals, challenge, skill, strategy, chance, uncertainty, decision-making and feedback, abstraction, theme, storytelling, and the context of play. We discussed how each of these can be used in different ways to design new games.

To put this into practice, we were asked to play a game where we had to cross 3 boats through a river stream. The game setup was 4 players with 3 boats each, and the goal was to get each boat to the end to get the most amount of points. The first boat to get to the end granted the player 12 points, which is the most amount of points you can get. The second boat that would get to the end granted the player 11 points, and so on. The player with the most amount of points is declared the winner.

We would play the game with our group of 4 players and would realize that boats move forward depending on the number we rolled on our die.  Because of how dependent the gameplay was on the result of each die roll, we saw that it was a game of chance and uncertainty.  Macklin and Sharp say in Chapter 2 of Games, Design and Play: A Detailed Approach to Iterative Game Design,  "The more chance, the harder it is for a player to develop strategies, regardless of their skill." In the game we played, there was little to no strategy or skill needed to play the game, the only skill or strategy there was in the game was where we placed our boats after we rolled. 

After our group played one game, we were then asked to make one modification to the base game. The group would discuss that there was something strange about the rules. The boats are able to move as many spaces forward as the number we rolled on our die. But the rules said that if we rolled a six, we would either get a good wind or an ill wind. A good wind moves one of your boats forward to the nearest boat. An ill wind moves one of your opponents' boats back to the nearest boat. When we played our first game, we would roll a six frequently, but because of the wind rule, the best you can get from it is a +1 for one of your boats or a -1 for one of your opponent's boats most of the time.  Macklin and Sharp say in Chapter 2 of Games, Design and Play: A Detailed Approach to Iterative Game Design, "This isn’t to say there isn’t fun in chance-based play, but it is of a different nature than in skill-based games." In our group's case, we knew that the game was mainly based off chance, so we made the following modification: When you roll a six, you can either move one of your boats forward six spaces or move one of your opponent's boats back six spaces. We made this modification in an attempt to make the game more fun and rewarding because we wanted the reward for rolling the highest number on the die to be as rewarding as it looks since it is a game that relies on chance.

Macklin and Sharp say in Chapter 2 of Games, Design and Play: A Detailed Approach to Iterative Game Design, "The less chance, the more room there is for them to develop strategies. In game design terms, how much of the play experience is driven by the quality of player actions and the decisions that the player makes relative to the things that happen outside the player’s control?" In the game we played this week, we learned that a game can still be fun even if it is dependent on chance, it is simply different than a game that is dependent on skill. The game we played had more chance, therefore it had less room to develop strategies for it. Playing this game with the group I was assigned to made me see the significance of the question Macklin and Sharp asked. The quality of player actions and decisions they make go hand-in-hand with the things that happen due to chance. Some games have more chance and uncertainty than skill and strategy. Some games have more skill and strategy than chance and uncertainty. Some games only have skill and strategy. Some games only have chance and uncertainty. Each of them is different in its own way and I think that is important to consider as a game designer.