Design Iteration and Ideation
- Hiding information from players (storing state and tracking with RFID)
- Collaborative play against on-board AI
- Goal for the board, different goal for players
- Resource allocation?
- Collaborative survival
- Tracking HP / status effects (visible/invisible, traps) / scoring
- 2-6 bear game
- Shop mechanics
- PVP battles where calculations are laborious
- Scotland Yard: One player "Mr X" has their location hidden from the other, "detective" players, who are hunting Mr X
- Nintendo Land - Luigi's Ghost Mansion: Similar to above, but one "Gold Ghost" player is hunting the other players
- Settlers of Catan: Players trading resources with each other (and with static merchant ships) is encouraged and almost required for success
- Spirit Island (/ Desert Island): Players play as spirits of the land and try to ward off the Invaders (who play autonomously i.e. by the rules)
Max: The game has to feel like a normal table-top game, rather than a video game. Any AI we make should be in the form of a GM, not a player, and a human GM should be able to take its place (though they may have complex rules to calculate)
Gabe: I think if we limit our hardware to rfid, servo motors and maybe some computer vision (I am unfamiliar in depth cv) then our chances of our project working well is much higher. I'm going to veto anything that's analogue.
A board with integrated technology could be expensive. A key design consideration for us could be how to make a more general board that is a platform for many different games.
- We wouldn't need to actually design any more than one game for the board, but a generalised board would nonetheless be a useful proof of concept.
- This would also allow us to make different maps for our Dracula's Castle game.
Any time a player puts a piece on a sensor, the game attempts to read it and perform the action immediately
- Players cannot move pieces around for planning
- Mistakes/accidental placements are pushed through immediately
- Definitely a very bad idea
Players can use e.g. a button to switch between two modes, one where the game does not attempt to read pieces, and one where it does and moves all moves through immediately
- Allows players to do their turns quickly, without constantly pressing a button to push moves through
- Also allows players to move pieces around the board freely
- Could still result in players making a mistake in their moves that then can’t be undone
- Possibly not super intuitive? Would also need to show which state it’s in
Players can move pieces around the board without the game trying to read in the tokens until the players press a button to confirm the move
- Always allows players to move pieces around freely, without keeping track of anything else
- Requires the most interaction on the players’ part to put moves through (2-3 per player turn), however perhaps not that different from a vampire player asking for confirmation of moves from the other players regularly
- What if, while moving pieces around the board for visualisation, the players forget the piece’s position, resulting in them attempting to make an illegal move?
- Don’t tell them anything other than that the move is illegal and laugh at them until they make a legal move
- Display which room a player is in when it is their turn, so the information is easily visible
- Or display legal move options before the player moves, but that seems like overkill
- Display the room the player should be in and/or their legal movement options when the player attempts to make an illegal move
- Just say “lol I’m gonna let you make that move even though it’s illegal”
- Having named rooms probably makes this a way easier problem to handle
- Required to have at least one button to end turn.
- We are unsure whether realtime turns with garlic and light feedback will be feasible.
- Need to play test whether immediately reacting to placing tokens is feasible.
- We will support both options since the hardware doesn't change, playtest and select one.
- The board needs to show where the tokens should go to make it clear. Possibly with circles depicted on the board.
- No LEDs on the board itself, vetoed because of hardware constraints and difficulty.
- Need LED strip to display player inventory.
- For garlics and light state conveyed to the user
- If we're going for real time information, we show the state immediately.
- If we're going button to advance state, show state when button is pressed.
- Alex: No RFID tokens for keeping track of where dracula is by the players.
- Named rooms for conveying error state and information.
- To convey invalid placement:
- Could show room name and an error message.
- Could show the map in a simple manner, and blink icons such as 🚫 where invalid tokens are placed, and 🧄 and 1️⃣, 2️⃣, 3️⃣, 4️⃣ for player locations. This is limited by the display resolution.
Design decisions:
- Add a button.
- LED strip around the board for player inventory.
- Display in middle of board, with the button.
- Each room needs a name, and therefore an artistic theme and therefore design.
https://davidmathlogic.com/colorblind/#%23648FFF-%23785EF0-%23DC267F-%23FE6100-%23FFB000, based on a palette from IBM design library.
Quick updating of UI after a player performs an action
To do: Make sure that any state updates are clearly and visibly communicated (some combination of lights and screens doing things)
Use of tokens to perform actions by placing them in the desired location on the board
Undo doesn't really work in this game without it breaking. Are there some ways to address this?
Possible: Users can undo movements (the only player action that isn't info-gathering)
Possible: Just let the players cheat and undo moves because at least that way we meet the heuristic
To do: Come up with a way to meet this problem that doesn't suck and also doesn't lose us marks for not addressing it
Words in the rules should mean the same thing throughout, and should be consistent with other game rules for external consistency
Same icons used in all places for the same things
Dependent on RFID sensitivity and reliability in practice
Possible: Button to confirm actions (avoids accidental actions)
Easily recognisable icons on tokens allows users to see a token and know what it is
Representative pieces for player/Dracula to make it clear what they are
Icons for water/sunlight/health/garlic near the LED lights so that information has an icon attached (also more accessible)
Possible: Little reference cards with what actions you can take on your turn so that players don't have to check the rulebook
To do: I have no idea how we can meet this heuristic at the moment
Board design and token icons are clear and easily readable
Board and screen interface are not cluttered with unnecessary icons/information and all info is neatly organised
Screen in the board to display information about what errors are and how to resolve them
Concise, well-organised rulebook outlining the rules, perhaps with "FAQs"/answers to questions that may be confusing
Probably also a documentation of errors and what they mean/how to fix them as part of the rulebook