Author: Scott

So this is kinda neat. I’ve landed myself a columnist gig over at Joystiq, one of the biggest gaming blogs on the entire net-o-sphere.

Every other week, I’ll be publishing Off the Grid, a column dedicated to pursuing gaming in its less-than-digital formats. In my first month I’ve already introduced the world to area/code’s Crossroads, and ranted about why analog games are still cool. I have a lot of exciting ideas for interviews and other features to include as part of my column, so I’m awfully psyched about the whole thing.

I’m also working a bit as a normal blogger on the site, covering analog-related interests, and events like the Come Out and Play Festival in NYC. In about a month, I’ll be covering the Montreal International Game Summit in, well, Montreal, which should prove to be a pretty interesting experience.

For the interested parties, anything I write for Joystiq will end up at this link, which is handy. Writing for these guys is a great opportunity, and I’m looking forward to producing some solid, solid work under their banner.

» Joystiq via douglas on Flickr. Thanks!

Any scholarly institution is bound to have its ghosts and ghouls, and Bard College is no different. The spirits of former students still roam the halls of Olin to this day, writing ironic messages on the bathroom walls and sitting in on classes without doing the readings. One such soul is the Spectre Academic, who possesses his corporeal peers in order to gather their school supplies to fill his haunted backpack. And YOU have just fallen under his will.

How to Play:
Because of the collaborative nature of the game, Spectre Academic is best played in classrooms where all students are seated around a large table, facing each other. Spectre Academic MUST BE PLAYED WHILE CLASS IS IN SESSION. The game begins at the start of class, and ends when the professor declares class over.

The object of the game is to have one unique school-related item in front of EVERY student by the end of class.

To play, place ONE item on the table in front of you, at least 12 inches from the edge of the table (possibly more to keep it separate from the supplies you’ll actually be using).

What to place: School items are materials you would expect to find in the average student’s bag. They include basic items such as pens, pencils, markers, notepads, and paper clips. A school item can also be something commonly brought to class, like keys, water bottles, and watches.

What NOT to place: The Spectre Academic is old, and new technology confuses and alarms him. Do not use an iPod as your one item. Also, this is a male spirit, and will take offense to being offered makeup or other feminine products.

The item CANNOT be something you’ll be using during class. The pen you’re writing with and the notebook you’re writing on won’t count, so place a second pen or a second notebook out in front as your one item.

You also CANNOT place the same item as anyone else in class. If two students put out notebooks, one of them must swap for a different, unique item, or else the game cannot be won. (A pen is a pen, regardless of color. But different-colored markers can be played, as long as the color is easily identifiable).

And don’t forget that you can only have ONE ITEM in play. Your materials for class obviously don’t count, since you’ll be using them and they’ll be closer to you.

The chain: The Spectre Academic can get a little anal retentive when it comes to how his stuff gets organized. It is therefore important to arrange the spirit’s materials in a WELL-DEFINED CHAIN. Each item must be placed parallel or perpendicular to the edge of the table, and all items must be lined up with each other. Incidentally, this will also help your peers identify which items are in play.

Collaborating: It’s beneficial to tell as many people about the game as possible before class begins, in order to maximize its potential success. DURING CLASS, NO ONE MAY MENTION THE GAME. If anyone talks about or asks about the game (including the professor), the game is over.

That said, you may silently help out classmates adjacent to you by placing or repositioning items in front of them, as long as it does not draw too much attention.

End of Play: At the end of class, at least one participating student should stand up and say “The Spectre Academic was here.” If all students successfully played the game, the players should all applaud for exactly three seconds, then stop and resume normal activity.

“Winning” the game means you’ve been temporarily freed from the spectre’s possession. If you find students playing in other classes, however, you should feel compelled to join in…

Spectre Academic. Game Design by Scott Jon Siegel. September, 2006.

» Old classroom, Ruby, Arizona by ricksoloway on Flickr. Thanks!

This is what happens when del.icio.us isn’t working. I find cool things and can’t add them to my virtual brain. Makes me grumpy.

» Cool thing #1: This comes via Wonderland. After a Second Life system crash, many users were seen wandering with missing objects as part of their avatars. This girl’s eyes went all 404 on her. The creepiest part is that if you squint, they look normal.

» Cool thing #2: During some research into feedback loops, I stumble upon the collected game design rants of Marc LeBlanc. The veteran game designer has kept all of his lecture notes, materials, and powerpoint presentations over the years. At the moment I’m thumbing through Formal Design Tools: Feedback Systems and the Dramatic Structure of Competition. It’s a damn good read, and I look forward to perusing his site more fully when I have the time.

» Cool thing #3: Meteorry’s Flickr account, in which he has been “collecting” Space Invaders in Europe. Incidentally, I only found this while searching for a cool “404” photo for this post. Yay!

» Place de la Bourse (PA_404 error) from Meteorry. Thanks!

It’s the 13th of September. Tomorrow morning in NYC, Nintendo’s holding a press conference, where they will undoubtedly reveal oodles of info about their new console, the Wii, as well as the release date and price.

I’m writing this post because I’m excited. And because I feel silly about being excited, and feel even more silly for feeling silly. No deep analysis of my desire. I’m just happy the Wii is around the corner, and I’m looking forward to playing.

» IMG_9566 from fannysparty on Flickr. Thanks!

So yesterday two days ago on Monday, I decided to work on designing a pen-and-paper version of Thumb Wars (or what I suppose some people just call thumb wrestling), which I’ve cleverly entitled ThumbCraft.

What I’d like to do is break down the simple gameplay of thumb wrestling into the quirks and aspects of a typical round. Let’s start with the rhyme:

One two three four, I declare a thumb war. Five six seven eight, try to keep your thumb straight

Okay, so there’s not a lot to work with in there (I was thinking about somehow incorporating counting to eight, but I’m having my doubts about that now). What we do have, however, is an important tip: try to keep your thumb straight.

So let’s say that part of the game is monitoring the “straightness” of you and your opponent’s thumbs. It’s the thumb equivalent of a life meter, so to speak, except that the value fluctuates depending on you and your opponent’s moves. We’ll table this idea for now, and move on.

For me, the typical round of thumb wrestling goes like this: Once the rhyme is finished, I usually attempt to trick my opponent (usually Bonnie) into dropping their guard. If your opponent keeps her/his thumb completely vertical, it’s essentially impossible to pin, as your thumb won’t be able to reach. To combat this, I usually go for a fakeout. I let my thumb waver into reachable territory, or sometimes let it lie flat altogether. When my opponent goes for it, I react quickly, pulling a fast reversal and pinning her/his thumb before they can pin mine.

So I’m seeing some interesting values emerge here. We have the value of the thumb’s straightness, which determines whether or not that thumb can be pinned. We also might be able to put a value on each thumb’s dexterity, which may determine whether a thumb can evade another thumb’s pin.

This is starting to sound interesting to me. I like the idea of a game where some values are public, while others are private, and I want to use dice in this game (partly because I’ve been reading about dice games, and partly because I just received some cool black Chessex dice). So, what if during a player’s turn, they roll two dice. One die’s value is thumb-dexterity, which a player keeps private, while the other die’s value is thumb-straightness, which the player makes public.

It’s only an idea, and not a particularly concrete one, but it’s somewhere to begin. My next step should be figuring out how these two theoretical values would interact with each other, and what decisions a player can make during each turn (if the game is entirely about dice rolling, there’s no strategy, no meaningful play, and no fun). After that, it’ll be time for iterative playtesting! Yay!!

» Thumb wrestling is universal from manowatt on Flickr. Thanks!

Here’s the skinny. I have a cute idea for a game, and I’m going to try and blog my design process. The reason for this is two-fold: 1) I’ve been wanting to blog more about game design, as I think it might help me get my thoughts straight. 2) I’ve been looking for an excuse to generate more blog content (like more than one post/week), and this is it.

So, here we go.

Concept 1: create a “sequel” to Thumb War (you know, “one two three four, I declare a thumb war”), adding more complex mechanics and strategy into the simple backseat-boredom game.

or…

Concept 2: create a paper-and-dice version of Thumb War, converting the game of thumb dexterity into a slick little strategy game which can be played in minutes and with a minimal toolset.

Although the first concept sounds more worthwhile (I always lose to Bonnie at Thumb War, even when I sneak-attack), I’ve decided to work on #2 first, since I have some pretty new dice which I can play with.

I’m a little O.C.D. about naming things, so I’ve already made some decisions on possible titles. Right now, it’s between “War Thumbs” and “ThumbCraft” (I like ThumbCraft slightly more, I believe). If I end up designing both concepts, I’ll most likely name the pen-and-paper version “ThumbCraft,” and the thumb-based version “War Thumbs,” so I’ll use those names in referring to the two tiny projects. I’ve already googled both names, and have found that they are not widely used by any other games (at least none popular enough to register in the first page or so). I told you I was weird about names.

The next step will be sketching out some rough mechanics for playtesting. Tomorrow, maybe?

» I challenge you to a thumb war! from tifotter on Flickr. Thanks!