Spiritual Successors

Played XCOM: The Board Game a couple of weeks ago. Fairly entertaining experience, especially when we barely eked out a victory.
This got me thinking about the game, which made me start a list of games I'll need to pay once I feel I've progressed enough in my career choice that I can relax at home... Might take awhile longer :/

It also made me think of the spiritual successors and clones for the original game, and whether this remake will spawn new ones. Maybe it will, or maybe it just isn't as innovative as the original and mobile games are where such things pop up now.

I've played quite a few number of these games, and rate them much higher than most reviews.
While analyzing what made these games appealing I started coming up with my own ideas.

The aerial combat of sending interceptors against UFOs always seemed on the slim side compared with the squad level combat - what if it had more depth to it?
What if there was ground combat element of using armored vehicles against a massive alien invasion, while still having squad based combat for terror missions or clandestine operations?
What if I used elements from the "chariots of the gods" theories and give an ancient Egyptian or Mesoamerican theme to such a game, shrinking down the geoscape but expanding base management into more of civilization building game?

Starfleet Manager

Been to Japan for the Tokyo Game Show. I enjoyed it, but it wasn't as good as the GDC Eu + Gamescom combo are for meeting people, getting my portfolio looked at or for collecting swag.

After a few more hectic, 10 bed dorm room, days - I headed out to Seoul, where I'm writing this post from my room at a serviced apartment hotel.

I like it here in Seoul, and could see myself staying, if one of the game studios I've been giving surprise visits to and dropping my resume at decides to embrace me into their midst, despite the usual work permit, language barrier difficulties.

Korea Games Conference is next week. A couple of weeks later I'll head to Busan for G-Star to wrap up my trip in South Korea. If nothing changes, I'll be out of options but to start making real progress towards becoming a freelance illustrator.

Watching people play on the Tokyo and Seoul subways has been delightful, people of all ages and walks of life enjoying the same thing I do (and some even pay money to do sod maybe I'll have a slice of that in the future.)

Seen a few people play sport manager games, and started thinking about taking the concept and adding a theme I'd actually be interested in: Science Fiction.

Grand scale space opera to be exact - instead of recruiting star players to my fantasy soccer team, what if I micromanaged the promotion of spaceship recruits?

Batting averages replaced by damage reports?

Diplomacy with alien species, research fund allocation, communications with other players?

Developing the world in which these stats would "live" would probably be the hardest part, and the main reason this will probably be just another pipe dream. Maybe I could connect it with my sci-fi programmable deck builder game, which I still think about on occasion.

An Alien Defense Board Game

Been inspired to recreate the XCom: UFO Defense base building and financial engine aspects in a board game. If I ever take one of these games out of the idea phase, it would probably be something simpler, this is a good thought exercise and elements from it might pop up in other places.

The basic premise is for each player (2-4) to have start with a basic base, a few personnel - soldiers to fight, workers to build projects and scientists for research project. Each would start with an income as well as immediate finances.

UFO will pop up, players would need to intercept and shoot them down with fighter jets, then send in soldiers to grab artifacts.

Taking these artifacts back to their base, players would research them to gain money and special abilities that would make certain things easier, and give access to new buildings.

Eventually a game end event will occur, such as a mother ship showing up and players would have to work together to defeat it before checking who has made the most points, or something similar.

One of the interesting ideas that came from this exercise is the building / research mechanic: each project would start with a certain number, higher for bigger complexity. Each turn a worker/scientist on the project would place a counter, once the number is reached, the project it done.

Placing more workers would shorten build time, but increase cost, making it an important choice. 

History Lessons

 History was far from my favorite subject in school, I saw little more than a series of dates and dry facts to remember so I can pass the next exam and then forget about it.
It wasn't until college that I enjoyed sitting through a lecture. Maybe it was because I completely stopped taking notes which I would never go back to, started listening to what was being said, and imagined how it could be.

Outside of school I enjoyed history from books, documentaries and from certain games. What boy doesn't like to watch a warbird strafe a convoy over remembering the date some politicians signed a pact?

I also wasn't a huge fan of learning about Israeli history. I haven't felt like I belonged here ever since I was 14.

These day I find myself thinking back about what I know about Israel's history, trying to think of what I can use to make board games.
The first such idea that came to me was a push your luck game about the clandestine immigration of aliyah bet, as the refugees of the holocaust crammed into old ships and sailed to Israel, trying to overcome the British blockade to realize the Zionist dream.
Just trying to leverage my heritage to my advantage. I also wonder if I could get support from the government to help with the creation process, the marketing and the finances.

Thoughts going out to space again

Been walking on the beach, thinking how I couldn't extract a decent sound from X-Com UFO defense to serve as a notification on my phone. I managed to extract the bubbly button sound I wanted, but it's full of hiss and sometimes doesn't play correctly (that might be the phone or the conversion from .wav to .mp3)

Then the "We are the Mycon" bit from Star Control 3 came to me, and I thought I would try to get my hands on that (proving even more difficult to find, now that I'm home,) which got me thinking about this wonderful series of games again.

If I did something similar, I would like to make ships much more difficult to obtain, with a lot of questing and politics to go through to add one to your fleet. They, in turn, would be much more powerful, customizable and unique to each species. Combat would need to be changed as a result, so the quick melee battles where you bounce like crazy around the screen would have to be replaced with a turn-based or a slower real time system.

I'd also find a way of incorporating research, because research in games in the bomb.

SimCity Social is Dying

SimCity Social, the facebook game I am currently putting the most time into will go offline June 14th.
One of the first quests I played in said game was connected to the London Olympics, so it's not quite a year.
I had played Restaurant City for much longer, before it went down (another EA/Playfish game) while some other games, such as Pet Society (coming down the same time as SCS) I played because it felt like a waste of time, while others, like Monster Galaxy have become unplayable as facebook and browsers updated.

Is all this trouble an indication of the state of social games? Will more studios be as troubled as Zynga? Will the model of ingame microtransactions change to something else?

Guess I'll be waiting to see how it folds out (including what game I'll be addicted to next) think about new financial models, and keep dreaming I'll find a job in which all-night gaming marathons are an important part of research.

4X: Player Boards - Ships

Made a rough mock-up of the spaceship player board (each player will also have a board representing a colony.)
Each ship will be separated into 6 main areas:



-RESEARCH: Each player will start with one scientist meeple, moving it around according to the area which they want to research. Possible effect on this area might include additional scientist or blocking a wedge.

-FIRE CONTROL: Combat may only be initiated when this module is available. May be upgraded with add-ons that provide combat benefits, such as modifying dice rolls or drawing additional cards.

-SENATE: (maybe I can think up a better name) Necessary for political maneuvering, such as alliances or spying. Add-ons will allow for more of these actions, as diplomats (and spies?) can be dropped of on colonies belonging to other players.

-CARGO BAY: The trading module. Can store various goods to be traded with other players or otherwise. I need to do some thinking about this mechanic. More space for goods can be added.

-CONSTRUCTION YARD: Needed to build colonies, ship add-ons, repairing damage, etc. Add-ons would add more of these actions.

-BRIDGE: The core of the ship, destroying this module will force the player to rebuild a ship at his home planet. I don't want any player knocked out of the game, especially due to an unlucky roll, so how much he suffers would need to go down to play testing. Might just go back home and lose one turn to rebuild, or lose goods and add-ons as well. This part might have some add-ons as well, perhaps parts that would protect the bridge or additional improvements.

I may rearrange the parts, as they are linked to combat. Once you lose a fit, your opponent rolls a die to determine which module gets disabled. With a dice modification mechanice, a roll of 2 might be changed to a 1 or 3 to disable a different area according to the winner's wishes. No such ability would apply when losing to anything other than another player's ship.

4X: Rethinking

The possibilities of a 5th path bothered me, as I tried to come up with ideas that would stick.
Maybe a terraforming module could work, in which you could colonize more planet types as well as improve existing colonies came to mind (still need to do some serious thinking about the map.)
Another idea was to add a finance track, adding another form of currency to the map with it's own set of capabilities.

As I thought on this, another idea came to me which restructures research, in which colonies will produce major projects with long term effects, while ship research will allow you to use one-time effect. Or perhaps colonies and a player's ship could combine their effort to produce research.

Originally I had thought a player would be able to pick up at least one research card each turn, and once enough were collected, to be able to purchase a "super project" with game ending abilities (i.e. 5 construction + 5 research + 2 politics for a "fold space" card allowing you to move instantly anywhere on the map, even during combat.) with the reworked system, you might need 5 blue cubes, 3 green cubes and 7 coins to pick up a major card, less for minor.

4X: Paths to Victory

I would like each path to be supported by it's own research deck, to be mixed and matched. If I could have 5 of these paths, I could make correspond with a section of the player's ship, and adding another section as the bridge/life support, determine combat results with a die roll. I already talked about Combat, which could correspond with a fire control or gun bay section of the ship. With that disabled, a ship could no longer attack others, and its damage dealing cards would be ignored. It could still be attacked by others. Another path would be research/computers/information. This deck would allow a player to draw more cards from the decks, perhaps draw two, returning one to the bottom of the deck, the ability to choose an extra card from a different deck for the rest of the game, or drawing 5 cards from a single deck, keeping one and returning the rest in any order. Combat wise, a player could build smart weapons, which could modify the combat dice. I would have a politics deck, which will include cards allowing you to steal research from other players (as spies) or make allies to share technology, use their colonies to repair, or combine forces in combat. A construction deck to improve the sections of the player's ship and colonies. Again, this could have combat deck potential. (I could have a number of cards set aside, that would be added to the combat deck once a player uncovers the correct card.) Still thinking about my final deck.