My team’s game idea for P1 is a fantasy and fellowship-focused game where players become ’Tiger Moms’ and need to compete to have their children come out on top. Each Mom will need to accumulate a specified set of resources before the other Moms do in order to have their child be the best. Here are some questions that our prototyping process may answer:
1. Do players understand the mechanics of the game upon trying it for the first time? How do we ensure that onboarding players is smooth and easily understandable?
This is a crucial question because if new players don’t understand how to actually play the game, they will get frustrated and quit before experiencing the fun parts. We slowly built and decided the mechanics of the game, but this gradual development will be different than what may seem intuitive or natural for players, so answering this question will help pinpoint where we need adjustments. For example, we have 8 different types of cards, each with a different meaning; how quickly will players grasp the roles of each card? To answer this, I would create a tutorial prototype that walks new players through the core gameplay mechanics step-by-step using guided instructions and simple example scenarios. My prediction is that breaking down the mechanics into bite-sized chunks will make them click for most players. However, there may be some unnecessary complexity in things such as the number of different cards we have, and prototyping may help reveal this.
2. Is the element of fantasy salient enough to serve as motivation to play the game? Do people resonate with it enough to play multiple times?
Having a compelling overarching theme and fantasy setting is important for giving players a reason to stay engaged and immersed in the game world over many play sessions. One of the desired aesthetics for this game is fantasy; players will get to assume the role of an overly involved mother, who is not the intended audience. For this, I would put together a prototype in the form of concept art to establish the game’s fantasy premise and storylines and see how test users react to it. My guess is that tapping into the fantasy of being a Tiger Mom, a role that our target users have not experienced themselves but may have witnessed or know about due to media, will engage players.
3. Do players get bored before the game is finished? Are the elements of strategy intended in the gameplay salient?
Keeping players compelled all the way through to the intended finale (one player winning) is key for delivering a complete, satisfying experience. Players quitting partway is a missed opportunity. We have elements of strategy that we hope to have as a game dynamic, such as trying to deduce what cards other players need. But, since this is not directly a part of the mechanics, we would need to see what dynamics are actually created by the mechanics of not being able to see everyone else’s cards. To investigate this, I would create a prototype with gameplay scenarios that model the planned strategic depth, decision spaces, and progression across different phases of the game. I anticipate that with the current version of our game, we may need to add more wrinkles and opportunities for sabotage to keep players engaged and in communication with each other. However, I think players will grasp the elements of strategy, and will figure out that there are ways to figure out what cards other people have and need.
4. Do players feel like there is too much luck involved for this to be a fun game that involves experiential learning?
Strategy games need to feel strategic, not dominated by randomness. We use a die in our game and turns rely on the roll of the die, so it would be important to test whether this still leaves enough room for learning, and therefore fun. An implementation prototype focused on modeling the game’s core systems like resource accumulation and communication with other players would be useful to test this question. My prediction is that by making most systems deterministic with just a sprinkling of random elements for replayability, the game will strike the right balance between reliable skill rewards and narrative variability. I think the die roll will add an appropriate amount of randomness without alienating players, and will instead introduce some more tension and emotion into the game.
