Watch at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_I-esGVVvM

Recorded 14 October 2020 in the Virtual Playtesting Discord server.

Timestamps

1:06 – Introduction
2:53 – How did you get started making solo modes for games?
5:35 – Why do people play games solo?
7:29 – What does ‘player interactivity’ look like in a solo mode? How do you handle ‘trading’ and other things like that?
9:45 – When is an AI bot to compete against the best fit, and when does a simple “score x points/achieve y goal in a time limit” work better?
16:16 – Beat your own high score much maligned – why?
18:44 – How do you ensure that solo games are replayable? If a player wins once, what’s the incentive for them to play again?
23:24 – How to get the right balance between a solo game being too simple that it hurts the replay ability of the game against a game that requires too much micro management that takes you away from actually having fun playing the game?
29:07 – What’s the best way to know if you should develop resources to making your game solo playable?
33:56 – How many decisions should the player be making on behalf of the AI?
35:18 – What do you think are the mechanics most suited to solo games? What separates them from mechanics that are good for multiplayer games but don’t suit solo games?
38:28 – What challenges do you find making a solo variant on a strategy game that has no randomization? For clarification something like Hive.
42:03 – What is your experience with playtesting solo games / modes? does it take longer as you are only getting one person’s feedback at a time, or do you try to entice more spectators during your playtesting?
47:17 – How do you add a solo mode to a game without adding too many extra components just for that mode? Do you have any strategies or formats you use to keep this extra component cost down?
53:15 – Do you have a max play time for a solo mode design that you’d never want to go above? (How long is too long for a solo game?)
57:05 – As a publisher with a limited total budget for development of the game and for a solo mode, to what extent can you justify spending that on solo mode development rather than development of the game as a whole?

Further reading about solo modes by David Digby:

• http://www.thegamespeople.co.uk/designing-solo-modes-part-1/
• http://www.thegamespeople.co.uk/designing-solo-modes-part-2/
• http://www.thegamespeople.co.uk/designing-solo-modes-part-3/

Takeaways

• When making the solo mode, study the multiplayer version, particularly the two-player game.
• Identify interaction points – what things are worth keeping and what are best abstracted away
• Solo games have three different modes: puzzles, challenges, and opponents
  • Puzzle: single solution with a win-loss condition
  • Challenges: framework or set of restrictions where success has a variability to it (a ‘beat your own high score’)
  • Opponents: an artificial opponent
• Which mode is best? Depends on the original game itself.
• Getting the difficulty right is really hard to do – you want to be just winning or just losing. Have easy, medium, and hard options, then multiple plug-in options to help tailor it to the difficulty the player finds challenging.
• You’re going to play this solo mode a lot. Gear up for that reality.
• You want the player to spend most of their time on their turn, not on dealing with the AI / admin work.
• Take the lead from the publisher – solo mode is ‘what experience do you want the player to have?’, and a product decision.
• Solo modes are a virtual necessity for Kickstarter games, less so for casual / mass-market games.
• Some games / mechanics don’t lend themselves to solo (e.g. spatial awareness). This mechanic is a red flag since it’s hard to do right.
• Eureka moment is when the AI beats me – pulls off something you haven’t expected, or you get that really close game.

Solo modes to study:

• Gaia Project
• Star Realms
• Caverna and Forgotten Folk expansion
• Feast for Odin
• Concordia (David’s fan-based design) https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/180061/solo-mode-automus

Watch at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omly_dgIue4

Recorded 25 September 2020 in the Virtual Playtesting Discord server.

Timestamps

00:30 – Introduction
02:04 – How did you get started making escape rooms?
06:39 – Is there a market for these games, or are they custom-made?
07:44 – I am working on a sort of escape the city game, instead of escaping a room, where you do puzzles with a storyline fitting the specific city while going through the city for about 2 hours. Do you have any things to keep in mind when making such “escape room” or similar people / organizations that already do something like this?
14:00 – What was it like working with the Scooby Doo IP?
16:06 – What sort of tech is used in the virtual escape room?
19:14 – What’s the upper limit of players you can get into a virtual escape room?
21:20 – What do you wish you knew when you started making escape rooms?
23:40 – How do you playtest virtual escape rooms?
24:31 – Have you had to dumb down puzzles for the public?
Switching gears to the Pitch Project…
26:05 – What is the Pitch Project?
28:46 – How many sell sheets have you received so far?
31:00 – What platform will the pitch be on?
31:47 – How did you pitch publishers for this event?
34:04 – After the Pitch Project, what is coming up for Jay Cormier in 2021?
35:57 – As many people adjust their pitch to the publisher they pitch to, any tips how to do this well?
37:18 – Are ‘simpler’ games likely to score better than more complex strategy games given a third of the scoring is based on how well the game mechanics have been communicated?
39:34 – Looking back at your design journey, what do you wish you knew about getting better connected to the industry?

My takeaways

• Never be afraid to embrace tech to accomplish your game’s core goal.
• I’m reminded that limitations can be arbitrary (like Twitter’s character limit) or real (like trying to hit a certain MSRP or component count).
• When things go from physical to virtual, a lot of things and assumptions have to change.
• Layer / scaffold puzzles – the first puzzle is easy to solve, then you ramp it up. Teach the mechanics in the first puzzle, like a tutorial.
• One puzzle / system can be easy in isolation. Adding in more puzzles and systems add more complexity. Add grouping to avoid confusion or creating accidental red herrings.
• Puzzles, like games, are always easier to you, the designer. Things have to make sense, but also have that ‘A-HA’ moment.
• Connections and a friendly, professional personality always help.

Recorded 9 September 2020 in the Virtual Playtesting Discord server.

Timestamps for questions

00:45 – introduction
01:58 – What are some trends in board game design and publishing (i.e. themes, mechanics, production, etc.) that you think will stick around for a while? what are some that you think will fade?
04:43 – Which statement do you agree with more:
a) All good board game mechanics have been invented, to make great games all we can do now is re-implement existing game mechanics, OR
b) There are still many great, undiscovered game mechanics that will surface in the future.
07:05 – Who is your favourite board game designer and why?
08:37 – What are the biggest flaws in your favourite games, and why do you forgive them?
11:47 – What are your favorite questions to ask after a playtest? What do you look for most during a playtest or what and how do you write down feedback during and after a playtest?
14:34 – How are you currently doing playtesting during these wonderful times of coronavirus?
16:12 – Do you have any advice coordinating blind play tests or general advice to get the most from it? Any survey questions you think are good to ask?
18:44 – How many different designs are you working on right now?
20:54 – How do you keep things straight (how are you taking notes, tracking information, etc.)
22:16 – If you look back at games that you have designed and have been published and consider how they have been received by gamers, what sort of changes would you now make to them? And why do you think that might have been missed during development?
27:45 – What did your pitch for Rome and Roll look like? Pretend you’re pitching us now, or tell us how the meeting went.
32:00 – Think back to your first few pitches. How did those look?
36:14 – What have you done to be in the right place at the right time?
37:21 – Can you talk about your attitude and approach to collaboration? How have you worked with collaborators in the past?
41:05 – How do you identify what a weak part of the game is?
44:14 – When you are bringing together multiple different mechanisms in a complex game how do you make your first prototype? Do you have a series of mini games? Do you have modules that you plug in or pull out?
47:04 – Do you know of any perfectly designed and executed mid-heavy games by indie publishers & first time game designers? What makes it perfect?
52:41 – Put on your prognosticator hat – from a 10,000 meter view, where do you see board games going in the next few years? What do you think is coming up in the industry?
53:22 – Do you win your favourite games more often than not? Or do you have a play group which challenges you?

Catch up with Dávid Turczi on his Board Game Geek profile.

Great takeaways

• 14:28 – “Polishing turds will never make steaks”
• 37:00 – “It’s not about whose idea it is. It’s about how good we can get it.”
• 38-minute mark – Dávid talks about understanding the difference between ‘how can I help?’ and ‘where can I be helped?’
• 39:41 – “I can expand other people’s ideas, and other people can improve or polish my ideas.”
• 49-minute mark – Dávid talks about player interaction, and how caring is more important than racing. What other players are doing should always matter.
• 50:59 – “Everything [in a game] interlocks with what everyone else is doing in a positive way, in a positive interaction sort of way”
• 51-52 minute mark – Dávid talks about player interaction, and how being able to predict what’s coming makes you more engaged.
• Don’t be afraid to stay out of the mainstream.
• Be prepared to give two very different pitches to two different publishers.
• Never underestimate the power of sheer, unadulterated luck
• Know yourself — know your strengths, how others can take your idea to the next level.

Love these events? Check out the interview we did with Zev of Wizkids, or join us live for the next one!

Or watch at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=an3b55n9Ge8&feature=emb_logo.

Recorded 29 July 2020 in the Virtual Playtesting Discord server.

Timestamps

1:39 – Since WizKids works quite a bit with licensed properties, I’d like to learn more about that side of things. It’s always seemed like a chicken/egg dilemma to me: Do their games get designed with a particular IP in mind, or are they developed first and later considered for being a licensed game?
4:17 – With no physical conventions, what are the best ways of unpublished designers to get in touch with publishers?
7:02 – How would someone contact you / the Wizkids team if they have a game to show you?
8:45 – In current situation the amount of real life social interactions has drastically decreased in a development process. Such as attending conventions and what not. What are the substitutes?
11:44 – Are there any types of games you see as growing in the next few years? Similarly, any types of games where the market seems oversaturated?
13:24 – Solo modes seem increasingly popular on Kickstarter games. For games publishers outside Kickstarter, how much importance is placed on solo modes?
15:52 – Could you name 3 games that came out last your that you wish Wizkids had published?
18:43 – When deciding if you will publish a game, how important is it for the game to bring a new unique mechanism?
20:00 – Given the evolving dynamics in tabletop publishing and distribution during the pandemic, do you see any shift in the considerations a designer might think about when deciding whether to go with a publisher versus self-publish via Kickstarter?
22:34 – Do publishers get “scared” of designs that are maybe “too developed”, that already have bunch of art, detailed rule book, has been playtested a lot and so on…. Is there a general rule of thumb on those or are you open to anything and does the approach change in that case?
25:45 – Do you ever work to license Already/Previously Launched games on Kickstarter? Does a previously Kickstarted game have a potential “second life” to a publisher?
27:28 – Is it alright to pitch a game with a license in mind, or is that the kiss of death—particularly if it would be a license the publisher doesn’t currently have?
29:04 – If you had to guess based on your personal knowledge, how much of a board game’s cost would go back to the IP holder?
30:27 – Have any of your games ended up completely different than when they started, and what did you learn in the process?
31:41 – As folks move to put their prototypes online through platforms to playtest, some have just started finishing them up and then selling them there. Do you think this will encourage designers to forgo publishers and print, to just go ahead and do an online digital version?
34:35 – What should be on a sell sheet, and how does a sell sheet sell your game?
37:27 – How ‘shiny’ does the prototype need to be to pitch? If you were to see a prototype that was hand-written and in sleeves, would you consider that?
39:30 – What is the first thing you want to hear in a pitch? What is something you never want to hear in a pitch?
42:44 – Of the games that have been pitched to you and then were published, on average how complete were the prototypes that were presented to you / how much development did they need before they were released?
45:00 – Does the lack of a solo mode hurt a pitch?
45:48 – Does there seem to be a market for games that use anime licenses or aesthetics? Looking from the outside it seems like an underserved market.
48:10 – How important is theme marketability when pitching?
49:41 – What are the pros and cons on developing a game from scratch with an in house team, as opposed to picking up an (almost complete) game from a designer, or even putting a call out to multiple designers (with a specific brief in mind)?
51:33 – Regarding selling / marketing, what are you using as your tools to market games today?
53:30 – To what degree should a pitch mention expandability? How/When does a publisher decide things like “waves” or “expansion packs”?
54:44 – On average, how long does it take to release a game from the time of signing?
56:15 – How much research do you do in the designer themselves before signing a game?
57:16 – In a showdown between yourself and Mr. Zee Garcia, who is the more important ‘Z’ in board games?

Or watch at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIlRGFWiqgE&feature=emb_logo

Had a great time with this one! This workshop covering scripting in Tabletop Simulator was recorded by Nick Gaston on 26 July 2020 and presented in the Virtual Playtesting Discord server.

Go to the mod that he used (in the Steam Workshop).

Download the scripts talked about (.txt file)