Project 3- Another Board Game

CAGD 170- Intro to Game Design

Take-Out Takeover!

Unit 3, Group 3

Playtest 1

Summary

Two players compete against each other as two successful restaurant businessmen, and they must surround each other's restaurants or hop over them to eliminate them.  Take-Out Takeover! is playable for all ages, but due to its high amounts of strategy and competition, this game is specifically targeted towards competitors.

The game consists of 20 chips for each player.

Get this- they put their chips on the lines,

not inside the squares!  

Playtest Results

I can say that our playtesting experience was, in short, successful!  All of the player set groups were heavily entertained with the strategy and they referred to this game as "a combination of chess, checkers, and tic-tac-toe".  All of them seemed to understand the rule sheet quite easily as they found the visuals to be extremely helpful.

The first set of playtesters.  They're plotting whether to

surround or hop over each other.

There is no such thing as a perfect playtest, and this is where the issues come in.  Despite all players seeming to understand the objective, they did show some difficulty with the concept of hopping.  Even as they repetitively looked back at the rule sheet for clarification, they were still unsure of their movements. 

Players become uncertain on how to eliminate

each other as everything becomes cluttered to a side. 

After their playtest, they have consulted us some issues with the game that struck out to me: the rule sheet served more like a set of rules of what to do in the game than functioning as a step-by-step process for players to follow.  The rule sheet DID specify what moves to make, but it did not specify HOW to do them, such as the number of turns used to hop over another player or how many chips it would take to successfully surround another player.

Overall, they loved the strategy!  All playtesters
loved the game!

One group of playtesters also noticed how the first player that places their chips always won the game.  The reasoning is uncertain, but it appeared as if the first player had an advantage to the game.  To fix this, my partner and I will continue to playtest if the pattern is certain, and we will attempt to input movements that would restrict the first player.

Game Development

As for creating the game, both my partner and I implemented a tremendous amount of time and care into the ideas.  We did not create the game from scratch, however, we used other games as inspiration, such as Go, Reversi, and Checkers.  These games served as a base for the objective and strategy, as well as giving us a clearer goal for the game we wanted to create.

When the game first started, it had a
different concept.  Ideas for the board andrestaurant types were sketched down.

We playtested our game repetitively until we created an ideal gameplay.  Through our playtests, we constantly changed the rules, gameplay, and even the premise.  Playtesting allowed us to see our game as players, and thus our game changed quite drastically.

As we explored other games, we
kept fixing our ideal game.

Not only did we implement a lot into our game, but we also worked as partners.  We did not split tasks- instead, we both worked on creating the rules and drawing visuals and designing the board.  We were consistent with our times, met when we could, and shared our ideas and concerns freely.

Our issue, however, was that it took a rather long time to create a game of our liking.  The process was slow and time was short.  This is due to us not meeting as often as we liked- not only was there the Paradise Fire, but our greatly contrasting schedules only allowed us to meet at certain times.

Noting how the rule sheet confused our playtesters, we realized that the rule sheet served as a rough draft on the various moves that can be performed in the game.  We spent more time shaping and playtesting to create an ideal game than specifying the rules.

As we formed our game, we started to createmoves.  They were sketched out.

Alas, these issues can be resolved.  We will continue to focus on polishing our game as well as the rule sheet, to ensure a fun experience for players.  We can do so by meeting more regularly, for instance, meeting during our breaks.