- Are physical challenges or drawing challenges more engaging over multiple rounds? Our team wanted to incorporate some element of physical play (such as charades) or some form of drawing, one of which would likely serve as an overarching mechanic. It is important to make sure this mechanic will prove entertaining throughout the entire game. Because these are very tactile mechanics, a look and feel prototype would be appropriate. I suspect the drawing mechanic could be more easily adapted to serve as a core mechanic, while a physical mechanic may prove more limited in scope.
- Is a voting mechanic more cohesive with team or individual competition or both? One mechanic our team was interested in was a “survivor-type” voting mechanic, which would be paired alongside mini-challenges. Determining the form of competition would strongly direct future decisions about the mini-games we choose or develop. A role prototype would be most effective as the type of competition strongly impacts how players view and interact with the game. I am leaning towards a combination of team and individual competitions, as it lends more variety to the gameplay.
- Does varying the number of hidden roles increase tension in an interesting way? Another interesting mechanic is hidden roles and potentially having a variable number of hidden roles to increase deception. However, this may make the game unbalanced if one team gets unlucky with the distribution. We would want to test this with a role prototype to see how players react with changing this mechanic. I suspect adding hidden roles would increase the strategy but only to a point. If the number of hidden roles is too variable it may feel like random chance rather than a strategic play.
