On August 12th, I shared 20 of the Un-sticky notes Sharon and I made and wrote about one of them (Everybody Wins) in depth. Let’s take a look and another random selection of 20 Un-sticky Notes..
- Confrontation is not the only kind of interaction
- Change the scope
- Change the scale
- Imagine the box
- End the game
- Stop keeping score
- What did he just say
- Provide small rewards along the way
- Eliminate randomness
- Control for variables
- Fix one thing
- Ask why why why why why (Each “why” after the first is on its own line.)
- Recall the inspiration
- What’s it feel like
- Less exceptions
- Remove a rule
- The narrator is unreliable
- Turn it upside down
- Invert one rule
- Try a different randomizer
Some of these are pretty standard pieces of design advice, like “Confrontation is not the only kind of interaction,” “Provide small rewards along the way,” and, “Less exceptions.” The one I like the most (right now) is, “Imagine the box.” I like it because it’s a jam-breaker. It doesn’t focus on what you’re doing right then and there. Instead, it encourages you to visualize the final product. Doing this helps you picture what your idealized vision of the game will be like, which may reveal aspects of it that you’ve forgotten while bushwhacking your way through probability tables or reck ratio balancing.
I glanced at “What did he just say,” and that gave me an interesting idea. I chose to interpret it as rewarding played for paying attention to what the player before them does. Imagine a game where you have a range of actions available to you (build, move, research, invest, and harvest). Each action costs resources and provides a benefit. Applying “What did he just say“ yields the rule: If you choose the action that the player before you chose, that action costs less (or may even be free).
Can we justify this metaphysically? Can there be a situation where it costs X to do a thing, but if other people do the same thing immediately afterwards, it costs them less than X? Producing in volume works kind of like this: It costs X to produce (say) 500 units, but (1.20 * X) to produce 1,000 units. This is also true if the service provider has to travel to you to offer the service (and passes the travel costs on to you), but is happy to charge other patrons less since the travel costs have already been covered (This implies an interesting game structure and theme…). This is also true if it’s a business where there significant setup costs (or costs to get the production line running, but it’s easier to produce once the line is active. I’m sure there are other examples, but there’s no need to list all of them. For now, we’ll simply accept that there are several ways to metaphysically justify this mechanic.
What are the consequences of letting following players use a prior action at reduced cost? The obvious one is that the first player to take a desirable action will (unfairly?) bear more of the cost than other players. Also, it’s likely that players will tend to take the same action in clumps. If you choose to build, I’m incented to build, and the player who follows me is also incented to do so. This rule could have the unintended consequence of causing all of the players to play in the exact same (if not very similar) way. A less obvious consequence comes from strategy: I may choose an action that I know you could not afford to take, even at the discounted rate, simply to prevent you from copying my action (and gaining the benefit of the discount).
It’s an interesting idea, but I’m not convinced that it’s a fruitful direction to take a game in. I think you’d have to ensure that each player started off with fairly different resources (like the beginning of Settlers of Catan) to ensure that all of the players don’t end up playing the same game.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: thought : gaming
[1]
For the past few weeks, I’ve been working with friends all across the USA to assemble the second promotional video for Inevitable. Inevitable is a board game that Jeremy and I are independently publishing. We’re getting 500 copies made at a commercial printer, and we have high hopes that we’ll be able to follow that up with another run of 1,000.
The movie (like the game) is weird, outrageous, and funny, and I’d be flattered if you’d take a moment to watch it. Thanks!
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming : icp
About five months ago, just after I was hired at Steve Jackson Games, Sharon came home with a box of a co-worker’s mis-printed business cards (about 200 cards). We spent an evening writing short ideas and suggestions to inspire innovative board game design ideas (if you’re familiar with the Oblique Strategies deck, this is in the same vein) on all of the cards (Actually, Sharon wrote all of them. I just helped think of them.).
Once we finished, we called them “Un-Sticky Notes,” (Get it? Eh?)
Here’s twenty of ‘em, selected at random:
- Everybody wins.
- Allow multiple paths to victory.
- Provide multiple goals.
- Enable solo play.
- What would a girl do?
- Let the game win.
- Share the pawn.
- Apply clever technology.
- Get messy.
- You’re it.
- Sabotage.
- Assume a benign universe.
- Be more consistent.
- Let them dream.
- Do something impossible.
- (The X, Y, and Z axes, drawn.)
- Steal something.
- What’s the last thing they’d expect?
- Do something dangerous.
- Disguise it.
I really like the cards. Every time I draw one, it kicks my creative mind into gear. Of these, I’d like to discuss Everybody wins. That’s a funny (as in odd) one, in that if you implement it in the broadest, most literal sense, you could argue that it takes a game and changes it from a game into an activity. After all, if everyone who’s playing wins, and everyone who’s playing always wins, and there’s no distinction between “levels” of winning, then why play?
It’s easy to abandon the idea of a game where the players always win every time, but I think there’s interesting space to explore there. Two directions that my mind wants to go with this are a game where the path you take becomes the focus of the game (instead of the outcome) and… Oh nuts. Writing that one pushed the other one out of my brain. At any rate, there are plenty of movies that tell you the end at the beginning of the movie, yet we watch and enjoy them (American Beauty). Could there be a board game that does the same thing? Will players assign victory-like conditions to aspects of play within the game? (“Hey, you found the silver and the gold widgets! Yay!”)
Perhaps I’ll type more on this later. I have to excuse myself for now.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming : thought
[5]
The title says it all. As of ~11:30 today, I no longer work at SJG.
Odds are, I’ll start posting parts of my in-development game design book on this blog.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming
[6]
Many moons ago, AEG licensed Pressure Matrix from me – it was the very first game I sold. Shortly after that, they licensed The Isle of Doctor Necreaux and published that.
They recently announced that they’re going to demo Pressure Matrix at GenCon:
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/536082/pressure-matrix-at-gen-con
Yay!
(I should ask ‘em for a PDF of the current rules and board tiles.)
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming : icp
[2]
Howdy all.
It’s been an interesting two weeks. I’ve hit the 90-day mark, so I’ve been given a security code for the alarm system. That’s oddly reassuring in a funny way. It’s kind of like hitting an benchmark, like being told, “Okay, you can hang out here a little longer.”
About 10 days ago, I realized that I’m screwing around too much with other designers’ designs. I’m trying to do too much work myself and not sending enough of the design work back to the original designer. Consequently, I’m striving to cut back on messing with the designs and build better communication with designers. I’m starting low, but it’s an ongoing process.
That’s one of several goals I wrote down in my notebook. Let’s see what else I have there…
(Pulls out notebook)
Okay. On 6/12/10 I wrote:
* Figure out what’s publishable.
* Stop screwing w. it yourself.
* Go to the designer(s).
* Get some direction from Phil / SJ.
* (Redacted)
I’m happy to say that I’ve made progress on (if not accomplished) each one of those goals.
With Origins coming up, lots of people will be out of the office for part, if not all, of the upcoming week. I’ll be on holiday for the duration of the following week leading up to July 4th. Consequently, I expect to get a lot of SJG stuff done, then get very little SJG stuff done. It’ll be an interesting two weeks.
On a different front: Inevitable is coming along very nicely. Our Kickstarter campaign ended and was a huge success. We’re entering the very last phases of playtesting and doing a little last-minute comparison shopping for printing services and dice suppliers. Once that’s done, we’re going to create 100 copies – and virtually every one is already accounted for! After that’s done, we’ll create another 100. If demand for them is anything like the first 100, they’re going to sell through very rapidly.
Not much else to say for now, I suppose. have a great week!
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming
[1]
Howdy all.
Sorry I haven’t been here for a wile, but I just got done hosting Protospiel South and The Inevitable Project just ended its funding drive at Kickstarter. It’s been very, very busy.
A little on Protospiel South: It went tremendously well. Everyone who attended seemed to have a good time. We had just as many attendees as we could handle. The crafting table was a success and got used (although I may have gone a little overboard on the quantity of colored paper). Each meal had just enough (or a little too much) food to feed all attendees. The Austin Chronicle ran the calendar entry that we submitted to them and even made some art to accompany it.
I’m certainly going to have it again next year. Same days (Friday, Saturday, and Sunday of Memorial Day weekend), but in a different hotel. The Best Western Atrium North was fantastic and very nice, but we filled their largest room to capacity. Next year is certain to be larger.
A little on Inevitable: Donors pledged $9,435 (!!!) to see it get made. That’s absolutely incredible. Now we have to nail down final prices from printers, etc., get it all printed, assemble it, and ship it. This is tremendously exciting, and Jeremy is doing amazing work to see it completed. If you haven’t looked at the Inevitable Leaks Blog, you really ought to. The money is hi-larious.
On SJG:
I’ve been sending out new games for playtest. I’ve made an effort to contact designers with pending games to keep them appraised of what’s going on. (Note to self: Ask the MH guy to create the cheat sheet / play aid that you don’t have the time/skill/resources to create!) I need to remember that I’m good at deconstructing the game to fix the problem and apply that skill more often.
It’s nice to have a job again. This job is still awesome. Now that I’ve been there almost three months, I’m used to the typical flow and can start getting into more complex projects, like establishing procedures, etc..
I’ve readjusted to working. As I plunged into it, I dropped a lot of other stuff I was doing, like game design (ironically), reading, cleaning, cooking, shopping for food, etc.. I’m resuming those things, and that’s nice. For example, Sharon had a nice discussion with Steve Jackson at Protospiel South about dice games in theory and practice. Since then, Sharon’s been thinking a lot about dice games. Sharon and I made up two dice games this afternoon while waiting for our (incredibly awesomely fantastically delicious) doughnut at Gourdough’s. When we got home, I mocked up a board for the game that needed one and we played both of them. The board-based one which we made together is quite fun. The all-dice one I made was a little bland; it needs… something.
There’s not really a lot of “insider advice” here, I suppose. Okay. Here’s one tip: If you go to a game design convention (like any one of the Protospiels) and reps from a game publisher are there, present your game as if they were considering it for publication – even if their public policy is that they are not accepting outside submissions. Don’t get all in their face about it, but make your game(s) look as good as they can. Bring your “A” game. This may be the best and most relevant tip I gleaned from the past two weeks. A corollary: If you have a game that’s thoroughly playtested – a game that’s really done – that doesn’t really need playtesting, but you’re shopping it around… Bring that out and show it off.
A final note: Royce – It was fantastic to meet you and your friends. I wish I spent more time to sit and talk with you at Protospiel South. I genuinely regret not doing so.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: thought : gaming
[1]
We interrupt your regularly scheduled update on lessons learned while working at Steve Jackson Games to bring you this special call to action:
Jeremy and I are working hard to create a professionally-printed limited print run of 100 to 500 copies of a satirical dystopian board game we’ve made. The game’s name is Inevitable. To help make this happen, we created a Kickstarter project for Inevitable. This has been ludicrously, wildly successful. Our Kickstarter sponsors have blown our $3,000 goal out of the water – nearly doubling it.
This is simply awesome.
It also puts us very, very close to a secret “stretch goal” that we figured out several weeks ago as we were crunching the math…
Our current plan has us ordering a some of the components as a package from one vendor (specifically, the box, cards, and board). As you know, our initial run of the Deluxe Set is 100 units, but we get a sweet per-unit price break if we order this package in a quantity of 500 or more. This will make it cheaper for us to produce the initial run of 100 sets, and will also leave us in a really good position to produce 400 more “second-run” Deluxe Sets if (when?) the first run sells out. (We even have a lead on free storage space to hold the surplus components in the interim.)
It makes good business sense, but it means that we’re facing an initial printer bill of around $8,500. We have a few investors in line who are interested in helping us to make that goal, and we’re each prepared to pitch in as much of our own money as is necessary. So, basically, you don’t need to worry about whether the game will get made— it will. (We’re still on schedule for a summertime release.) But when we saw that our Kickstarter campaign had gotten to nearly $6,000 we began wondering whether one final push might take it all the way to $8,500, which would cover that initial printer bill in full.
If you already gave, we thank you, and we’re not asking you to contribute more. We’re already amazed and humbled by your generosity. But we’d love it if you’d simply spread the word. Let your friends know about Inevitable, and encourage them to get involved. (An easy link to share is this one: http://kck.st/cqqYv5) If we got only 33 more donors at the $75 level we’d be there. And then… then we’d start planning an awesome release party.
Our initial $3000 goal seemed hopeful, and we hit it in eight days. $6000 seemed wildly optimistic, and we’re almost there now. $8,500 seems – well, frankly, it seems impossible. But we won’t know unless we try. 22 days remain!
Sincerely,
Jonathan and Jeremy
PS: Tell us anything you might need to help spread the word. Want a snappy flyer that you can print out? Want a batch of free postcards sent to your house? Want a sneak-preview of the full rulebook? We can provide these things.
PPS: HappyCOM-9 adds “DENIZENS: MAXIMIZE YOUR COMPLIANCE BY SLAYING ALL WHO WOULD OBSTRUCT OUR GLORIOUS PROGRESS. “
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming
[2]
When I sat down to write this week’s notes, I thought I hadn’t really learned very much. My starting outline looked like this:
Brainstorming – Taking notes, listening, capturing info, etc.
Being the good guy – Project X (Not the real name of the project, of course.)
Targeting – Do your research! Steve Jackson: Lego dinosaurs. Project X: An elegant, engaging mechanic.
…and I started at the end, writing about targeting your game submissions at the correct publishers. 45 minutes later, there’s the formidable screed below. I suppose that means I’ll save the bits on brainstorming and being the good guy for another week.
That said, let’s discuss targeting…
Targeting –
There’s a thread on the designers’ forum at Board Game Geek that started as a designer sharing his joy and fear about sending his first prototype to a publisher. The discussion has flirted with evolving into an analysis of the game and how to make it, “less dry.” My contact with the designer of “Project X”, looking at the past submissions (accepted and declined) at SJG, thinking about how I submitted games to publishers, and learning about what games have and have not been accepted at SJG… All of these have me thinking about targeting your game submissions. I suggest the following:
Note that some of these suggestions overlap with ones I made earlier. That’s kind of inevitable, I suppose.
1) Do your research on the company.
It’s not enough to simply find out if they accept unsolicited submissions or not. Look at their past and current product line. Play at least a few of their games, if you can. Only contact the publisher if you think your game is a good mechanical and thematic fit for their company.
2) Dissect and deconstruct your game. Figure out what makes it stand out from the other games. Distill that into one sentence. Figure out what makes it most appealing to produce, from a publisher’s stance. Distill that into another sentence. Use these sentences whenever you can: In the cover letter, on your sell-sheet mock ups, on the prototype box…
3) Do even more research – this time, on the people in the company.
Everyone has favorite things – favorite mechanics, favorite themes, favorite components, etc… Find out who’s going to receive your game, or who the ultimate decision maker is in the company. Learn what that person’s favorite things are. If your game includes one or more of those things, that increases your chances of getting accepted.
Note: I’m not under any illusions about how difficult it is to do this. It’s hecka-hard, but it is not impossible. Go to conventions – especially industry-only conventions like GTS – and hang out with people in the business. Find your target and offer to buy them dinner or a drink, then have a casual and friendly conversation. I know it sounds hard to do, but it’s getting to the convention that’s hard. Politely asking someone to share their knowledge is easy by comparison.
Also, use the power of the internet to research your target. Look for blogs written by the people you’re targeting. Using Steve Jackson as an example, it’s not hard to find personal thoughts and notes he’s written, or to find articles about things he’s participated in recently and in the past. Given what I’ve learned, if someone made a Lego game about dinosaur pirates in the SCA (however preposterous it may sound), it’d have a leg up on the competition at SJG. (Note: SJG is not accepting submissions right now. Do not send a submission. All unsolicited submissions will be placed in the circular file or returned if an SASE is included.)
…The following notes are for when you send your game to the publisher…
4) Include your design notes!
This is something I wish-wish-wish I’d done for every prototype I sent. You wouldn’t send a prototype off without the rules, right? Of course not. Without them, people can’t learn how to play the game! Your design notes serve an equally important role for a publisher. They tell the publisher why you made the decisions you made. They tell the publisher that you’ve already considered the ramifications of what will happen if they change X, Y, or Z. They prove to the publisher that you’ve really worked on the game.
You are keeping design notes, right?
5) Include your playtest notes!
I wish I’d done this too, for very similar reasons. These prove that you’ve playtested your game, recorded the feedback, and how you incorporated that feedback into the game.
If you haven’t playtested your game, strongly reconsider sending it to a publisher. Playtesting is vital. It uncovers a million little flaws that are entirely invisible to you. Do it now, while you can still address and correct each flaw. If you don’t, the publisher will find each and every flaw during their playtest. You don’t want that to happen.
6) Include any special supporting tools you created to design the game.
Do you have a special spreadsheet that helps you automagically balance out point costs? Include it. Did you create a program that helps you randomly generate room tiles? Include it. Not only do these things show how much work you’ve done and how much you’ve thought about the game, they let the publisher know that these tools are available to them (making their job all the easier) if they choose to develop and publish the game.
7) Make a “how to play” or a “about the game” movie.
Two years ago or more, when I first heard about a publisher requiring a movie with every game, I freaked out and got all indignant. “What do you mean I gotta make a, ‘how to play,” video? I’m already designing the game, playtesting it, laying out the rules and components, creating the prototype, researching publishers, and maintaining a contact list! Now I have to master video production as well??? Gaaah!”
I’ve changed my tune, and it’s not because of working at SJG. It’s because of the Kickstarter project Jeremy and I created for Inevitable. If you go there, you’ll see the pitch video Jeremy and I created to encourage donors to pledge. Our Kickstarter project is much more effective for having that video than it would have been without it. Videos are not only a very effective way to convey complex game concepts, but they allow you to connect with the viewer in a personal way that writing does not.
On making the video: Relatively speaking, it wasn’t that hard. I’m using a fairly modern iBook running OS X 10.6. I used iPhoto, Garage Band, and iMovie to make the video. iPhoto, Garage Band, and iMovie are all part of the iLife suite, which costs $80. That’s a powerful tool suite that’s super-cheap. It also takes technical actions (audio and video editing) and makes them tremendously accessible. I’ll grant that I was an Apple tech support agent for 6+ years, but I’ve never had any video-oriented training. That’s why there’s no “real live action” footage in the video. It’s more like a slide show than a video, really. Still, it gets its point across just fine. If you’re computer-competent, and you’re willing to put firth a little effort, you can make a video. I guarantee that it’ll make your submission stand out from the others. Y’know how many of the submissions I’ve seen at SJG have demo videos? None.
Okay. Steps 4, 5, 6, and 7 were less about targeting and more about good game development, making your game submission stand out, and increasing your chances of getting your submission accepted by a publisher. That’s okay, I suppose. The advice is still valid. It’s also worth noting that I never followed those last four pieces of advice when I sent submissions to publishers. I truly and sincerely wish I had. If I had that advice four years ago, I bet I’d have more games under contract today.
Two more things:
1) Yesterday I was in the “Hotness” list on Board Game Geek! I was designer #13, just six steps below Matt Leacock, my current game designer idol. Woot! (Today I’m not even on there. I tell you, people are so fickle!)
2) Protospiel South 2010 is coming together nicely. I have to go raise the pre-registration price to normal pricing, but a three-day pass is just $30 – cheap! If you’re going to be in Austin, TX on Memorial Day Weekend (28, 29, and 30), I strongly recommend dropping in. I think it’s going to be very productive.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: epiphanies : gaming
[1]
Note: The advice in this post is not mine, but someone else’s. In some cases, my opinion may differ.
Sorry this one is late. I don’t know if I was caught up in my own things or what, but I didn’t really catch anything new to jot down last week. However, my office mate had a lot to say about his preferences for artists who submit portfolios. With his permission, I’m paraphrasing his advice here:
1) Have a website that showcases your work; an online portfolio.
Don’t include your portfolio in an attached Word document, or PDF, or anything like that. My office mate really hates to open (or download) PDFs. A URL that points at your website will be fine, thanks. If you don’t know how to create a website that showcases pictures and art, check out Flickr or DeviantArt. They’re both relatively easy to use and they won’t stop an art director from checking your stuff out.
2) Keep your, “Hi there,” note short.
There was one that he especially liked. It was something like, “Hi. I’m Bob. I make art. You can view my portfolio at http://www.somewebsite.com/portfolio. You can contact me at ###-###-#### or by replying to this email. Thanks, Bob” In reality, the note wasn’t quite that casual, but my example was probably longer than the real email was. My office mate liked it because it was short, to the point, and didn’t imply that the writer expected a response if his art didin’t fit our needs.
3) Your art is what matters. Your reliability is as important, if not more so.
This is a corollary of sorts to #2. Your education and training is less important than your ability to produce and what you produce. Professional references are also very useful to include.
4) Thumbnail + larger version + full-resolution options = happiness.
This is an extension to #1. If your website has a page of thumbnails that you can click on to get a larger, screen-sized version, that’s good. If visitors can also view high-resolution versions of your art, even better.
5) Don’t rely on a specific screen size.
If you’re making your website yourself or hiring someone to do it for you, don’t rely on viewers having a specific screen size if you can help it. Odds are that any art director will have a monitor that’s more than big enough to view what you choose to display. A related tip: Please don’t force the browser to resize the window. It’s irksome.
That’s about all I have for this week. It was a good week, and I’m looking forward to Protospiel South 2010. That’s one month away. Wheee!
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: thought : gaming
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December Game of the Month:
On August 12th, I shared 20 of the Un-sticky notes Sharon and I made and wrote about one of them (Everybody Wins) in depth. Let’s take a look and another random selection of 20 Un-sticky Notes..
- Confrontation is not the only kind of interaction
- Change the scope
- Change the scale
- Imagine the box
- End the game
- Stop keeping score
- What did he just say
- Provide small rewards along the way
- Eliminate randomness
- Control for variables
- Fix one thing
- Ask why why why why why (Each “why” after the first is on its own line.)
- Recall the inspiration
- What’s it feel like
- Less exceptions
- Remove a rule
- The narrator is unreliable
- Turn it upside down
- Invert one rule
- Try a different randomizer
Some of these are pretty standard pieces of design advice, like “Confrontation is not the only kind of interaction,” “Provide small rewards along the way,” and, “Less exceptions.” The one I like the most (right now) is, “Imagine the box.” I like it because it’s a jam-breaker. It doesn’t focus on what you’re doing right then and there. Instead, it encourages you to visualize the final product. Doing this helps you picture what your idealized vision of the game will be like, which may reveal aspects of it that you’ve forgotten while bushwhacking your way through probability tables or reck ratio balancing.
I glanced at “What did he just say,” and that gave me an interesting idea. I chose to interpret it as rewarding played for paying attention to what the player before them does. Imagine a game where you have a range of actions available to you (build, move, research, invest, and harvest). Each action costs resources and provides a benefit. Applying “What did he just say“ yields the rule: If you choose the action that the player before you chose, that action costs less (or may even be free).
Can we justify this metaphysically? Can there be a situation where it costs X to do a thing, but if other people do the same thing immediately afterwards, it costs them less than X? Producing in volume works kind of like this: It costs X to produce (say) 500 units, but (1.20 * X) to produce 1,000 units. This is also true if the service provider has to travel to you to offer the service (and passes the travel costs on to you), but is happy to charge other patrons less since the travel costs have already been covered (This implies an interesting game structure and theme…). This is also true if it’s a business where there significant setup costs (or costs to get the production line running, but it’s easier to produce once the line is active. I’m sure there are other examples, but there’s no need to list all of them. For now, we’ll simply accept that there are several ways to metaphysically justify this mechanic.
What are the consequences of letting following players use a prior action at reduced cost? The obvious one is that the first player to take a desirable action will (unfairly?) bear more of the cost than other players. Also, it’s likely that players will tend to take the same action in clumps. If you choose to build, I’m incented to build, and the player who follows me is also incented to do so. This rule could have the unintended consequence of causing all of the players to play in the exact same (if not very similar) way. A less obvious consequence comes from strategy: I may choose an action that I know you could not afford to take, even at the discounted rate, simply to prevent you from copying my action (and gaining the benefit of the discount).
It’s an interesting idea, but I’m not convinced that it’s a fruitful direction to take a game in. I think you’d have to ensure that each player started off with fairly different resources (like the beginning of Settlers of Catan) to ensure that all of the players don’t end up playing the same game.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: thought : gaming
[1]
For the past few weeks, I’ve been working with friends all across the USA to assemble the second promotional video for Inevitable. Inevitable is a board game that Jeremy and I are independently publishing. We’re getting 500 copies made at a commercial printer, and we have high hopes that we’ll be able to follow that up with another run of 1,000.
The movie (like the game) is weird, outrageous, and funny, and I’d be flattered if you’d take a moment to watch it. Thanks!
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming : icp
About five months ago, just after I was hired at Steve Jackson Games, Sharon came home with a box of a co-worker’s mis-printed business cards (about 200 cards). We spent an evening writing short ideas and suggestions to inspire innovative board game design ideas (if you’re familiar with the Oblique Strategies deck, this is in the same vein) on all of the cards (Actually, Sharon wrote all of them. I just helped think of them.).
Once we finished, we called them “Un-Sticky Notes,” (Get it? Eh?)
Here’s twenty of ‘em, selected at random:
- Everybody wins.
- Allow multiple paths to victory.
- Provide multiple goals.
- Enable solo play.
- What would a girl do?
- Let the game win.
- Share the pawn.
- Apply clever technology.
- Get messy.
- You’re it.
- Sabotage.
- Assume a benign universe.
- Be more consistent.
- Let them dream.
- Do something impossible.
- (The X, Y, and Z axes, drawn.)
- Steal something.
- What’s the last thing they’d expect?
- Do something dangerous.
- Disguise it.
I really like the cards. Every time I draw one, it kicks my creative mind into gear. Of these, I’d like to discuss Everybody wins. That’s a funny (as in odd) one, in that if you implement it in the broadest, most literal sense, you could argue that it takes a game and changes it from a game into an activity. After all, if everyone who’s playing wins, and everyone who’s playing always wins, and there’s no distinction between “levels” of winning, then why play?
It’s easy to abandon the idea of a game where the players always win every time, but I think there’s interesting space to explore there. Two directions that my mind wants to go with this are a game where the path you take becomes the focus of the game (instead of the outcome) and… Oh nuts. Writing that one pushed the other one out of my brain. At any rate, there are plenty of movies that tell you the end at the beginning of the movie, yet we watch and enjoy them (American Beauty). Could there be a board game that does the same thing? Will players assign victory-like conditions to aspects of play within the game? (“Hey, you found the silver and the gold widgets! Yay!”)
Perhaps I’ll type more on this later. I have to excuse myself for now.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming : thought
[5]
The title says it all. As of ~11:30 today, I no longer work at SJG.
Odds are, I’ll start posting parts of my in-development game design book on this blog.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming
[6]
Many moons ago, AEG licensed Pressure Matrix from me – it was the very first game I sold. Shortly after that, they licensed The Isle of Doctor Necreaux and published that.
They recently announced that they’re going to demo Pressure Matrix at GenCon:
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/536082/pressure-matrix-at-gen-con
Yay!
(I should ask ‘em for a PDF of the current rules and board tiles.)
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming : icp
[2]
Howdy all.
It’s been an interesting two weeks. I’ve hit the 90-day mark, so I’ve been given a security code for the alarm system. That’s oddly reassuring in a funny way. It’s kind of like hitting an benchmark, like being told, “Okay, you can hang out here a little longer.”
About 10 days ago, I realized that I’m screwing around too much with other designers’ designs. I’m trying to do too much work myself and not sending enough of the design work back to the original designer. Consequently, I’m striving to cut back on messing with the designs and build better communication with designers. I’m starting low, but it’s an ongoing process.
That’s one of several goals I wrote down in my notebook. Let’s see what else I have there…
(Pulls out notebook)
Okay. On 6/12/10 I wrote:
* Figure out what’s publishable.
* Stop screwing w. it yourself.
* Go to the designer(s).
* Get some direction from Phil / SJ.
* (Redacted)
I’m happy to say that I’ve made progress on (if not accomplished) each one of those goals.
With Origins coming up, lots of people will be out of the office for part, if not all, of the upcoming week. I’ll be on holiday for the duration of the following week leading up to July 4th. Consequently, I expect to get a lot of SJG stuff done, then get very little SJG stuff done. It’ll be an interesting two weeks.
On a different front: Inevitable is coming along very nicely. Our Kickstarter campaign ended and was a huge success. We’re entering the very last phases of playtesting and doing a little last-minute comparison shopping for printing services and dice suppliers. Once that’s done, we’re going to create 100 copies – and virtually every one is already accounted for! After that’s done, we’ll create another 100. If demand for them is anything like the first 100, they’re going to sell through very rapidly.
Not much else to say for now, I suppose. have a great week!
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming
[1]
Howdy all.
Sorry I haven’t been here for a wile, but I just got done hosting Protospiel South and The Inevitable Project just ended its funding drive at Kickstarter. It’s been very, very busy.
A little on Protospiel South: It went tremendously well. Everyone who attended seemed to have a good time. We had just as many attendees as we could handle. The crafting table was a success and got used (although I may have gone a little overboard on the quantity of colored paper). Each meal had just enough (or a little too much) food to feed all attendees. The Austin Chronicle ran the calendar entry that we submitted to them and even made some art to accompany it.
I’m certainly going to have it again next year. Same days (Friday, Saturday, and Sunday of Memorial Day weekend), but in a different hotel. The Best Western Atrium North was fantastic and very nice, but we filled their largest room to capacity. Next year is certain to be larger.
A little on Inevitable: Donors pledged $9,435 (!!!) to see it get made. That’s absolutely incredible. Now we have to nail down final prices from printers, etc., get it all printed, assemble it, and ship it. This is tremendously exciting, and Jeremy is doing amazing work to see it completed. If you haven’t looked at the Inevitable Leaks Blog, you really ought to. The money is hi-larious.
On SJG:
I’ve been sending out new games for playtest. I’ve made an effort to contact designers with pending games to keep them appraised of what’s going on. (Note to self: Ask the MH guy to create the cheat sheet / play aid that you don’t have the time/skill/resources to create!) I need to remember that I’m good at deconstructing the game to fix the problem and apply that skill more often.
It’s nice to have a job again. This job is still awesome. Now that I’ve been there almost three months, I’m used to the typical flow and can start getting into more complex projects, like establishing procedures, etc..
I’ve readjusted to working. As I plunged into it, I dropped a lot of other stuff I was doing, like game design (ironically), reading, cleaning, cooking, shopping for food, etc.. I’m resuming those things, and that’s nice. For example, Sharon had a nice discussion with Steve Jackson at Protospiel South about dice games in theory and practice. Since then, Sharon’s been thinking a lot about dice games. Sharon and I made up two dice games this afternoon while waiting for our (incredibly awesomely fantastically delicious) doughnut at Gourdough’s. When we got home, I mocked up a board for the game that needed one and we played both of them. The board-based one which we made together is quite fun. The all-dice one I made was a little bland; it needs… something.
There’s not really a lot of “insider advice” here, I suppose. Okay. Here’s one tip: If you go to a game design convention (like any one of the Protospiels) and reps from a game publisher are there, present your game as if they were considering it for publication – even if their public policy is that they are not accepting outside submissions. Don’t get all in their face about it, but make your game(s) look as good as they can. Bring your “A” game. This may be the best and most relevant tip I gleaned from the past two weeks. A corollary: If you have a game that’s thoroughly playtested – a game that’s really done – that doesn’t really need playtesting, but you’re shopping it around… Bring that out and show it off.
A final note: Royce – It was fantastic to meet you and your friends. I wish I spent more time to sit and talk with you at Protospiel South. I genuinely regret not doing so.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: thought : gaming
[1]
We interrupt your regularly scheduled update on lessons learned while working at Steve Jackson Games to bring you this special call to action:
Jeremy and I are working hard to create a professionally-printed limited print run of 100 to 500 copies of a satirical dystopian board game we’ve made. The game’s name is Inevitable. To help make this happen, we created a Kickstarter project for Inevitable. This has been ludicrously, wildly successful. Our Kickstarter sponsors have blown our $3,000 goal out of the water – nearly doubling it.
This is simply awesome.
It also puts us very, very close to a secret “stretch goal” that we figured out several weeks ago as we were crunching the math…
Our current plan has us ordering a some of the components as a package from one vendor (specifically, the box, cards, and board). As you know, our initial run of the Deluxe Set is 100 units, but we get a sweet per-unit price break if we order this package in a quantity of 500 or more. This will make it cheaper for us to produce the initial run of 100 sets, and will also leave us in a really good position to produce 400 more “second-run” Deluxe Sets if (when?) the first run sells out. (We even have a lead on free storage space to hold the surplus components in the interim.)
It makes good business sense, but it means that we’re facing an initial printer bill of around $8,500. We have a few investors in line who are interested in helping us to make that goal, and we’re each prepared to pitch in as much of our own money as is necessary. So, basically, you don’t need to worry about whether the game will get made— it will. (We’re still on schedule for a summertime release.) But when we saw that our Kickstarter campaign had gotten to nearly $6,000 we began wondering whether one final push might take it all the way to $8,500, which would cover that initial printer bill in full.
If you already gave, we thank you, and we’re not asking you to contribute more. We’re already amazed and humbled by your generosity. But we’d love it if you’d simply spread the word. Let your friends know about Inevitable, and encourage them to get involved. (An easy link to share is this one: http://kck.st/cqqYv5) If we got only 33 more donors at the $75 level we’d be there. And then… then we’d start planning an awesome release party.
Our initial $3000 goal seemed hopeful, and we hit it in eight days. $6000 seemed wildly optimistic, and we’re almost there now. $8,500 seems – well, frankly, it seems impossible. But we won’t know unless we try. 22 days remain!
Sincerely,
Jonathan and Jeremy
PS: Tell us anything you might need to help spread the word. Want a snappy flyer that you can print out? Want a batch of free postcards sent to your house? Want a sneak-preview of the full rulebook? We can provide these things.
PPS: HappyCOM-9 adds “DENIZENS: MAXIMIZE YOUR COMPLIANCE BY SLAYING ALL WHO WOULD OBSTRUCT OUR GLORIOUS PROGRESS. “
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: gaming
[2]
When I sat down to write this week’s notes, I thought I hadn’t really learned very much. My starting outline looked like this:
Brainstorming – Taking notes, listening, capturing info, etc.
Being the good guy – Project X (Not the real name of the project, of course.)
Targeting – Do your research! Steve Jackson: Lego dinosaurs. Project X: An elegant, engaging mechanic.
…and I started at the end, writing about targeting your game submissions at the correct publishers. 45 minutes later, there’s the formidable screed below. I suppose that means I’ll save the bits on brainstorming and being the good guy for another week.
That said, let’s discuss targeting…
Targeting –
There’s a thread on the designers’ forum at Board Game Geek that started as a designer sharing his joy and fear about sending his first prototype to a publisher. The discussion has flirted with evolving into an analysis of the game and how to make it, “less dry.” My contact with the designer of “Project X”, looking at the past submissions (accepted and declined) at SJG, thinking about how I submitted games to publishers, and learning about what games have and have not been accepted at SJG… All of these have me thinking about targeting your game submissions. I suggest the following:
Note that some of these suggestions overlap with ones I made earlier. That’s kind of inevitable, I suppose.
1) Do your research on the company.
It’s not enough to simply find out if they accept unsolicited submissions or not. Look at their past and current product line. Play at least a few of their games, if you can. Only contact the publisher if you think your game is a good mechanical and thematic fit for their company.
2) Dissect and deconstruct your game. Figure out what makes it stand out from the other games. Distill that into one sentence. Figure out what makes it most appealing to produce, from a publisher’s stance. Distill that into another sentence. Use these sentences whenever you can: In the cover letter, on your sell-sheet mock ups, on the prototype box…
3) Do even more research – this time, on the people in the company.
Everyone has favorite things – favorite mechanics, favorite themes, favorite components, etc… Find out who’s going to receive your game, or who the ultimate decision maker is in the company. Learn what that person’s favorite things are. If your game includes one or more of those things, that increases your chances of getting accepted.
Note: I’m not under any illusions about how difficult it is to do this. It’s hecka-hard, but it is not impossible. Go to conventions – especially industry-only conventions like GTS – and hang out with people in the business. Find your target and offer to buy them dinner or a drink, then have a casual and friendly conversation. I know it sounds hard to do, but it’s getting to the convention that’s hard. Politely asking someone to share their knowledge is easy by comparison.
Also, use the power of the internet to research your target. Look for blogs written by the people you’re targeting. Using Steve Jackson as an example, it’s not hard to find personal thoughts and notes he’s written, or to find articles about things he’s participated in recently and in the past. Given what I’ve learned, if someone made a Lego game about dinosaur pirates in the SCA (however preposterous it may sound), it’d have a leg up on the competition at SJG. (Note: SJG is not accepting submissions right now. Do not send a submission. All unsolicited submissions will be placed in the circular file or returned if an SASE is included.)
…The following notes are for when you send your game to the publisher…
4) Include your design notes!
This is something I wish-wish-wish I’d done for every prototype I sent. You wouldn’t send a prototype off without the rules, right? Of course not. Without them, people can’t learn how to play the game! Your design notes serve an equally important role for a publisher. They tell the publisher why you made the decisions you made. They tell the publisher that you’ve already considered the ramifications of what will happen if they change X, Y, or Z. They prove to the publisher that you’ve really worked on the game.
You are keeping design notes, right?
5) Include your playtest notes!
I wish I’d done this too, for very similar reasons. These prove that you’ve playtested your game, recorded the feedback, and how you incorporated that feedback into the game.
If you haven’t playtested your game, strongly reconsider sending it to a publisher. Playtesting is vital. It uncovers a million little flaws that are entirely invisible to you. Do it now, while you can still address and correct each flaw. If you don’t, the publisher will find each and every flaw during their playtest. You don’t want that to happen.
6) Include any special supporting tools you created to design the game.
Do you have a special spreadsheet that helps you automagically balance out point costs? Include it. Did you create a program that helps you randomly generate room tiles? Include it. Not only do these things show how much work you’ve done and how much you’ve thought about the game, they let the publisher know that these tools are available to them (making their job all the easier) if they choose to develop and publish the game.
7) Make a “how to play” or a “about the game” movie.
Two years ago or more, when I first heard about a publisher requiring a movie with every game, I freaked out and got all indignant. “What do you mean I gotta make a, ‘how to play,” video? I’m already designing the game, playtesting it, laying out the rules and components, creating the prototype, researching publishers, and maintaining a contact list! Now I have to master video production as well??? Gaaah!”
I’ve changed my tune, and it’s not because of working at SJG. It’s because of the Kickstarter project Jeremy and I created for Inevitable. If you go there, you’ll see the pitch video Jeremy and I created to encourage donors to pledge. Our Kickstarter project is much more effective for having that video than it would have been without it. Videos are not only a very effective way to convey complex game concepts, but they allow you to connect with the viewer in a personal way that writing does not.
On making the video: Relatively speaking, it wasn’t that hard. I’m using a fairly modern iBook running OS X 10.6. I used iPhoto, Garage Band, and iMovie to make the video. iPhoto, Garage Band, and iMovie are all part of the iLife suite, which costs $80. That’s a powerful tool suite that’s super-cheap. It also takes technical actions (audio and video editing) and makes them tremendously accessible. I’ll grant that I was an Apple tech support agent for 6+ years, but I’ve never had any video-oriented training. That’s why there’s no “real live action” footage in the video. It’s more like a slide show than a video, really. Still, it gets its point across just fine. If you’re computer-competent, and you’re willing to put firth a little effort, you can make a video. I guarantee that it’ll make your submission stand out from the others. Y’know how many of the submissions I’ve seen at SJG have demo videos? None.
Okay. Steps 4, 5, 6, and 7 were less about targeting and more about good game development, making your game submission stand out, and increasing your chances of getting your submission accepted by a publisher. That’s okay, I suppose. The advice is still valid. It’s also worth noting that I never followed those last four pieces of advice when I sent submissions to publishers. I truly and sincerely wish I had. If I had that advice four years ago, I bet I’d have more games under contract today.
Two more things:
1) Yesterday I was in the “Hotness” list on Board Game Geek! I was designer #13, just six steps below Matt Leacock, my current game designer idol. Woot! (Today I’m not even on there. I tell you, people are so fickle!)
2) Protospiel South 2010 is coming together nicely. I have to go raise the pre-registration price to normal pricing, but a three-day pass is just $30 – cheap! If you’re going to be in Austin, TX on Memorial Day Weekend (28, 29, and 30), I strongly recommend dropping in. I think it’s going to be very productive.
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: epiphanies : gaming
[1]
Note: The advice in this post is not mine, but someone else’s. In some cases, my opinion may differ.
Sorry this one is late. I don’t know if I was caught up in my own things or what, but I didn’t really catch anything new to jot down last week. However, my office mate had a lot to say about his preferences for artists who submit portfolios. With his permission, I’m paraphrasing his advice here:
1) Have a website that showcases your work; an online portfolio.
Don’t include your portfolio in an attached Word document, or PDF, or anything like that. My office mate really hates to open (or download) PDFs. A URL that points at your website will be fine, thanks. If you don’t know how to create a website that showcases pictures and art, check out Flickr or DeviantArt. They’re both relatively easy to use and they won’t stop an art director from checking your stuff out.
2) Keep your, “Hi there,” note short.
There was one that he especially liked. It was something like, “Hi. I’m Bob. I make art. You can view my portfolio at http://www.somewebsite.com/portfolio. You can contact me at ###-###-#### or by replying to this email. Thanks, Bob” In reality, the note wasn’t quite that casual, but my example was probably longer than the real email was. My office mate liked it because it was short, to the point, and didn’t imply that the writer expected a response if his art didin’t fit our needs.
3) Your art is what matters. Your reliability is as important, if not more so.
This is a corollary of sorts to #2. Your education and training is less important than your ability to produce and what you produce. Professional references are also very useful to include.
4) Thumbnail + larger version + full-resolution options = happiness.
This is an extension to #1. If your website has a page of thumbnails that you can click on to get a larger, screen-sized version, that’s good. If visitors can also view high-resolution versions of your art, even better.
5) Don’t rely on a specific screen size.
If you’re making your website yourself or hiring someone to do it for you, don’t rely on viewers having a specific screen size if you can help it. Odds are that any art director will have a monitor that’s more than big enough to view what you choose to display. A related tip: Please don’t force the browser to resize the window. It’s irksome.
That’s about all I have for this week. It was a good week, and I’m looking forward to Protospiel South 2010. That’s one month away. Wheee!
— Jonathan A Leistiko :: thought : gaming
Invisible City Productions is a collective of game designers, writers, and artists who provide this as a space for the creators of secret media to come together and touch antennae.