Blog Post #4: TBH I Enjoy Any Kind of Game That Let's You Kill Your Friends (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

Introduction

It’s been a while! In this blog post, I describe three types of players that would enjoy playing my board game. I also discuss different formal elements AND dramatic elements for my game, and how it would effect those types of players.

Types of Players

There are many types of players, and each type has a different style of play and preference of game. They have different needs and agendas when playing (Fullerton). Looking at the list, I can see three types of players who would definitely enjoy my game:

The Competitor: This type of player plays to best other players, regardless of the game (Fullerton). The main objective of our game is to be the “last man standing” which is mainly achieved by hurting and eventually killing the other players. This would be a great game for a competitive player.

The Collector: The collector acquires items, trophies, or knowledge. They enjoy creating sets and organizing history (Fullerton). In our game, we have plenty of different types of resource cards, with various types of cards in each category. The collector would enjoy collecting resources around the map in our game.

The Craftsman: A craftsman wants to build, craft, engineer, or puzzle things out (Fullerton). In ‘Get Off My Island!’, we have crafting cards (wood, stone, reeds) that can be used in many different combinations to craft items that assist the player in monumental ways. For example, 2 reeds and 1 wood creates a basket to get more resources, while 2 reeds itself create bandages that heal up a players health. There are many objects to craft that help in various situations, and it is up to the player to figure out what is best in certain games and scenarios.

Formal Elements

Bow-and-Arrow: I think adding a bow-and-arrow as a crafting item would be a good addition as a formal element. It would cost 2 wood + 1 reed and be able to hurt other players on the board. This would excite the craftsman because they’d have another interesting item to craft, and it would also make the competitor happy because the item has the potential to swing the game in their favor.

Inventory: An inventory allows players to collect and manage game objects that are not power-ups or units (Fullerton). An inventory would hold all the forage, fishing and crafting cards of the player. This would excite the collector, as they would enjoy acquiring items.

Lives: Adding lives to my game would be very interesting to see. It makes the playtime longer, and would be more forgiving to worse/newer players as they would get more time to play and stay in the game. However, this would displease a competitor, since they’d have to work much harder to get a player out of the game permanently.

Dramatic Elements

Challenge: The challenge of a game must be satisfying to complete, and require the right amount of work to create a sense of accomplishment and enjoyment (Fullerton). In GOMI!, the challenge is being able to survive with limited food resources, while trying to kill the other players who are trying to kill you as well. Each player must be able to maintain their health while depleting other players’. This would be the Competitor’s favorite thing to do, and would draw them into the game.

Premise: The premise of a game establishes the game’s action within a setting or metaphor. Without a game’s premise, lots of games would be too abstract for most players to become emotionally invested in the end result (Fullerton). In GOMI!, the premise of the game is that the players are stuck on an island with a limited supply of food and resources. The players must adapt and survive by acquiring food and resources, similar to how one would actually survive on an island. This would excite the craftsman and collector because they have to collect items to be able to survive on this game, and those items can become more crafted items.

Economy: The economy would change from game to game; if people are constantly dueling and losing health, people would want more food and it would become more and more valuable as the resource diminishes. Another example would be if one player has most of the wood in the game, they’d be able to control how much it is sold for and it’s value. This would make a collector happy because it encourages players to have many cards in their inventory.