1. What are the basic elements in UNO?

The basic elements in UNO are the following:

Actions: Taking a card from the deck, placing a card on the discard pile

Rules: Each player, in turn, either 1. puts down any card of the same number, symbol, action, or color from their hand, 2. obeys the action from the previous player’s card, or 3. draws one new card from the deck. The player must say “uno” when they only have one card left in their hand.

Goals: Get rid of all cards

Objects: Cards

Playspace: Flat surface with a deck of Uno cards

Players: 2+ players

 

2. Swapping an element between Soccer vs. Basketball

Consider swapping an action between soccer and basketball, where the meaning of “dribbling” the ball is swapped.

Instead of the traditional games, one kicks the ball in basketball; one bounces the ball in soccer. Perhaps it is still physically possible to play each game. However, the design of the goals in each game does not match the action in the new games. Since the physical goals of each are designed for the action of the game (a soccer goal is on the ground, whereas a basketball goal is in the air), it would be quite a frustrating experience, both to play and to observe these new games — especially the new “basketball” game (what are the chances of kicking a ball and the ball landing inside a basketball hoop?).

3. Space of possibility in the “Hide and Seek” of toys 

My father and I often played a game of “hide and seek”, but with my toys. Player 1 hides a certain number of toys around the house, and once done, Player 2 goes and looks for the toys. Player 1 wins if not all toys are found, and Player 2 wins if all toys are found.

Basic elements in the game:

Goals: find all hidden toys

Actions: hide/look for toys

Objects: toys 

Rules: one player hides toys around the house – it must remain indoors. The remaining players must find all hidden toys within the limited time. 

Playspace: house

Space of possibility: depending on the type of toy and type of house, this game could look a little different. Is the toy a huge stuffed animal that could only be hidden in cupboards and beds, or is it tiny like a toy inside a Kinder egg? Is the house a mansion with infinite rooms or an apartment? Can one person remember the 100 different locations of 100 different toys they hid? This game can take different shapes or forms depending on the player’s possessions and abilities. Therefore, the space of possibility of the game seems to be dependent on several elements: the player’s toys, the player’s finding/hiding/memory abilities, and the size of the playspace. 

For example, when my father and I played this game when I was little, I would often forget where I hid the toy, and a week later, a random plastic carrot would emerge from my mother’s pillow. That’s when we switched to hiding teddy bears instead of tiny plastic kitchen vegetables, and we limited ourselves to hiding 5 teddy bears at a time. 

4. Real-time vs. Turn-based game

Consider the snake.io game (real-time game) and rock-paper-scissors (turn-based game). 

Play log for snake.io

• Player 1 logs into the game and starts as a small snake
• Player 1 eats a smaller snake and gets bigger and faster
• Player 1 eats another smaller snake and gets bigger and faster
• Player 1 collides with and gets eaten by Player 2, a bigger snake. Player 1 loses; it is game over

Play log for rock-paper-scissors

• Player 1 has thrown a rock; Player 2 has thrown paper
• Player 1 has won; it is game over

Comparison

It seems like turn-based games tend to have fewer possible actions than real-time games; the player has control over their snake’s movement with left/right/up/down arrow keys, which create a large array of possible movements or a collection of small “decisions” that the player makes. However, in rock-paper-scissors, the player can only have three options for their action in a single turn. The number of possible outcomes (win/lose) is the same, and both games’ outcomes depend on what the other player decides.

Space of possibility: You can strategize for both games – in snake.io, you can think of ways to surround smaller snakes with the length of your body to surround them before you get eaten. For rock-paper-scissors, you can strategize based on human tendencies (for example, it is most commonly said that most people default to throwing rock on the opening move). Perhaps the space of possibility is slightly bigger for snake.io, because there are more possible actions you can take to strategize further.

References

All images were taken from https://www.irasutoya.com/, except the snake.io image from https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/snake-io-switch/