Background: We are designing a game that involves players guessing each other’s relationships in a social network.
1. How to reveal partial information during the game while keeping the core secret?
We want to find a balance that allows players to grasp key clues without completely losing the suspense. To achieve this, we will use paper prototypes to test two revelation methods: “only tell the guesser” and “everyone knows”. I think that most players will prefer a mixed of “partial private + public hints”.
2. How many types of relationships should there be?
In the initial version, we may limit it to 3 basic relationship cards to ensure players can easily get started, and then try a more extensive version with 4-5 types of relationships. We think that too many relationships will create a memory burden, but it could also lead to more exciting interactive conflicts. We hope to test and find the best balance for the number of relationships.
3. Are relationships one-way or two-way?
We are considering that if A likes B, it doesn’t mean B also likes A, which could make the game more conflictual and full of twists. However, we need to be careful in management to avoid player confusion. We will first design a completely one-way version of the prototype, and then a completely two-way version, to observe the differences in player experience during actual play. We suspect that one-way relationships will be more interesting but will require careful design to avoid confusion.
