Critical Play: Competitive Analysis

Skribblio is centered around players drawing and guessing various drawing prompts. To begin, one player will pick one out of three prompts automatically generated based on a large word bank. Players are rewarded with points for both (if they are guessers) guessing the word quickly, and (if they are the artist) drawing well enough for others to guess the word quickly. 

=

Since the game relies on quick, messy sketches by your average person (and not experienced artists), it’s an extremely fun party/social game. The game also “handles abuse” in a very elegant way: while it’s true that individuals could write out the drawing prompt in words instead of drawing it, doing so simply ruins the game. As such, people generally just don’t enjoy playing with people who abuse the nature of the game. Another interesting mechanic is that players are able to opt to kick out another player: something that could handle those who abuse the game by writing the prompts out instead of drawing them, but could simultaneously lead to people ganging up to kick someone out of the game. I personally would remove this feature to avoid the latter scenario from happening.

 As for the design of the game itself, I think that sketchy feeling and animation (simple, two-frame animation) to the webpage gives the game a more retro and homey feel. While it could definitely be converted to a stark, minimalist style (like Cards Against Humanity), it would retract from the feeling of the game itself. As such, while the game may look hastily-made and unpolished on the surface, the very nature of the visual design of the game lends itself to the style of how gameplay works.

About the author

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.