The Final bits for the board game

These are the final printed cards, printed on two pieces of thin card and stuck together. I also wrote the background story for the manual.

1867
The War of Totems and Towers

As the sun rose over the hills of Texas, a war was raging on. A war between Cowboys and Indians, an ancient tale of pride and brawn. In the midst of this great war were four brave soldiers, two Cowboys and two Indians who sought an end to this fight. Both brave groups had the same brilliant idea, to capture a member of the others group. The two brave Indians captured the Sheriff from the Cowboys, securing him in their land. The two brave Cowboys captured the chief of the Indian tribe, and secured him in their land. Thus beginning the final chapter of this epic battle. The Cowboys and Indians both began building their defences, in an attempt to defend their land against the opposing group. The Cowboys began building guard towers, to foresee attacking Indians. The Indians began building Totem poles, a symbol of peace and security to ask the Gods for help and strength. The four brave warriors who captured the enemies leader, all ventured out to save their group member, while sending back pieces for the defence. As the epic battle wages on, who will build up their defences first and save their groups captive?

Board Game Project Conclusion

After all the group effort, the project is finally complete, and in my opinion it has been a great success. We successfully found a niche in the market, and utilised each persons skills to create a beautiful and engaging game for our target audience. I was given the job of firstly testing the board game on my two cousins aged 7 and 10, to see how they reacted to it. From this I knew we were successful with our idea, because they loved it and wanted to play again. After this test, and really pushing our idea through criticism, we were each given our individual jobs. I relished in drawing the different animals for the enemy spaces, and did lots of different designs to get them perfect, which I also did for the reward card designs. I found my enemy squares designed themselves after I had the animal drawn, and I feel they came out perfectly, finding the balance between making them look ferocious but also child friendly. The reward cards also came out very well, with the R on the cards looking really good and I am really pleased with how they look. Altogether I feel that this project has progressed really well, and our finished product is something different and original that we can all be proud of.

Trap Spaces

After doing some research into the sort of traps that one would find in this area at this time, the main two that we could put on the spaces on the turntables were a rope trap, and a bear trap. These are the original concepts for each of the spaces:

After colouring, I decided to do them like the enemy squares, as the realistic background was not going to match the look of the board. These are the coloured versions:

Reward Cards, final designs.

After studying an American dollar as to get the colours and patterns correct on the notes, I coloured the R on the cards, and designed the background. I eventually finished with two designs:

1. This design clearly shows the turntable, conveying what the card does to the player (the card lets the player turn a turntable on the board.)

2. This card isn't as abstract as number 1, as looks less like a turntable. However it does work well as a design.

After discussing with the group, we all decided we liked the first design better, however we discussed that it would look more like the turntables if it had numbers on it. Therefore these are the final card designs:

Enemy Squares!

First of all, I decided on having a square rather than a pop up animal, and focus on the head rather than the whole body. This meant I could go into greater detail with the facial details. My first two designs were focused around the cougar just to get the layout of the text and positioning of the animals head.

After discussing with my group, we decided we liked the text on the first design, and the look of the animal on the second. So in my set of enemy square designs I mixed the two together:

After getting the thumbs up from the group, I went home and digitally coloured each square, keeping to my reference images for the accurate colours of each animal.

This is the final enemy squares. I changed the snakes face from the original sketch as I felt it looked a lot better this way. I chose the grey background as to give a dark feel but not make it too bold. The red text gives an element of danger to the writing, and the animal has been labelled by text as to also help teach the children what animal it is.

Reward Cards research

After getting the job of the reward cards, I immediately started looking at different card designs in games and seeing which ones were effective and those that weren't. I first looked at an old game of monopoly, and studied the chance cards.

These cards are extremely simple, with just bold words and the occasional simple drawing such as the arrow. The writing is in the centre of the card, in typed in capital letters. This makes the words bold, and jump off the card. The use of bold writing on a plain background is very effective in drawing the attention to the words, and not overcomplicating them, which is a look I used on the back of the cards.

I also looked at the cards from 'Pay Day'. These cards were all very colourful and had detailed images on them. However the text style was similar to the monopoly cards, with a white background and black text, to stand out on the card. The front of the cards also portrayed exactly what the card was, for example a post card had the look of a letter on the front of the card. This makes it easy for the cards to be identified.

After deciding on the style of my cards, I began looking at Red Dead Redemption to examine the types of rewards that were around at that time. From the game I realised the main three were:

• Poker Chips
• Hides
• Money

From this I got the idea of creating an R (for reward) out of money. This was one of my original concepts:

 From this I developed this idea:

Changes and Jobs.

So, after we decided on the new look for our game, we were all given our jobs. Our new version of our game includes:

• Turntables
• 3 packs of cards (Chance for Indian and Cowboys, and reward)
• Captives in the centre (the initial damsel idea was considered sexist, so we changed it to men)
• Enemy squares (freeze you for a go)
• Chance squares
• Reward squares
• specific areas where you collect a piece of your defense
• allocated areas for the building

The job I was given was to first research the sort of animals there would be in this area for the enemy spaces. I needed six, and finally settled on:

COUGAR:

This is my study of a cougar, which helped me realize how its face looked when it was angry. This helped me when drawing my cartoon version. 

WOLF:

This is my study of a wolf, and from this I noticed how the whole of the nose scrunches as the mouth snarls. Also, how the pupils are very small.

CATTLE:

SNAKE:

BEAR:

STAG:

I initially thought it maybe nice to have the enemies as little pop ups on the board, however this proved to be a difficult and long winded idea, so I decided just to focus on the head and have it on the square.

TEST PLAY!

This is the play test in which our prototype board was played by Jack (10 years old) and Owen (7 years old). This was the real test to see if this game appealed to our target audience, and whether they understand the rules and most importantly whether it was enjoyable. Overall it was a great success! They both enjoyed the game, and asked to play afterwards which is a good sign! Owen got a bit upset when he had a piece taken away, however talking to his parents they feel that this is the age when they have to learn they cannot win all the time. He soon got over it though, and even though Jack let him win, they both wanted to play again. Sue (their mother) also enjoyed the game and helping them play it. She said she feels it would make a really good family game, as everyone can get involved, and the children are also learning which is a plus.

Popular Games Research

After our visit to Toys'R us, I decided to do some research into popular childrens games and try to see why they are popular. I first looked at the popular games for ages 3-6. I obtained the information from this source as it put together the most popular games for each age group.
www.babyzone.com


3-6 years
Candy Land 
www.hasbro.com
This game is played as children pick cards to move their gingerbread man to the matching coloured space, and the first to reach 'Candy Castle' wins. The game is very simple and easy for children to play, and since its release has become very popular among its age group. The idea is very simplistic, with a 'Snakes and Ladders' feel to it, but with unique look and bright vibrant colours. There is also a Winnie the Pooh version of the game which means it is very adaptable, meaning more and more versions can be made of the same idea.

Cranium Cariboo Island
www.toysrus.com
The creators of Cranium have created a brain challenging game for young children, making it immersive by having them explore an island discovering castles etc, and in the end opening the large treasure chest in the middle and getting a reward. The game teaches children about colours, shapes and numbers as well as letting them have fun in the process. The game is quite technical in its design, with a plastic liftable treasure chest, but the children react best to the material rewards the game gives.

Other popular 3-6 games:
Chutes and Ladders
www.hasbro.com
This game is simple and well known, with a bright colourful board to attract children and gives rewards and punishments of going up a ladder and going down a chute.

Duck Duck Goose
www.amazon.co.uk
A board game version of the popular childrens playground game. The players have to collect a specific colour of ducklings to make a nest, then the plastic mother goose is sent round the board and when it says 'goose' the players grab the adjacent duckling to see if it matches the colour they are collecting. It is a simple game, but with visual rewards of little plastic ducklings and a timed activity to get the duck makes it exciting.

Popular Adult games similar to our idea:
JAMBO! (12+)
www.boardgameratings.com
Players are traders, trading and selling tea, hide, fruits, salt, silk and trinkets to be the first to earn 60 gold. Cards are used to represent objects and items to trade as well as animals and people which can be used to hinder your opponent. This game is slightly complex, thus the age range, but it has won many awards as it is an engaging and unique game.

The Settlers of Catan (10+)
www.mayfairgames.com
Players are required to expand their colony through building settlements etc, and trading items and animals. The first player to complete 10 points wins. The game is quite complex, with lots of components and 60 minutes playing time. However, this game has been very successful with it having many expansions and different versions.

Toys'R Us!

The initial research we undertook as a group was going to toys'r us and looking at games which are in the same age group as ours. We noticed that games for our age range 7+ were a lot more advanced that we had first thought. Lego games (see left) were similar to our game as you had to collect pieces etc, and these were the same age group as ours. They are fairly complex, so we decided not to go too simple, as we don't want to bore the children. This is when Shaun had the idea of turntables on the board, to mix the gameplay up and make it a bit more competitive. We also decided that the players would be rescuing a 'damsel' from the centre of the board. What I gained from looking at these games was also the different style of art used for the different age groups. For example, lego is cartoon, but mature cartoons, whereas 3+ games (see right) have a very childish look about them.

Ideas, Research, Ideas, Testing.

The past few days of the board game project have been, hectic to say the least. Day 3, we tested our initial board design in our group to see how long the game would take to play, and whether it worked properly. 

Paper version of the board made by Robin

 The test went well but it was apparent that the game would take a long time to complete. The main things we liked were the noises spaces and the idea altogether. After this test, I drew up a quick idea for a board which was similar but had a space in the middle for the building element of the game, and this would look like a battle field. This is when we decided to have Cowboys and Indians, and have it a battle between the two. The Cowboys would be building a guard tower, and the Indians a totem pole to act as their defenses, and whoever built their defense first would win the game. After getting a thumbs up from the group, I organised with my younger cousins for them to play a prototype and see how they like it. I drew up a cardboard version with some counters and chance cards, and took it for them to play.

The totem pole

The board with pieces and cards

Close up of corner

The test went well, with both boys really enjoying the game, and wanting to play again afterwards! Jack is 10 years old and Owen is 6 years old, 7 in November. A side note on the test is that Owen is a very sensitive boy, and generally doesn't like losing at any games (he is lucky he has such a nice brother!) which is why he got a bit upset whenever he was losing or he thought he was going to lose. However, talking to Sue and Nigel (their parents) they think this is a good thing to have in a game, where the players lose pieces as it teaches children that they won't always win at games, and this is the age when they should be learning things like this. They both enjoyed making the noises after they got into the game (they both started a bit shy, but it was because I was filming it)  and after a while they both really enjoyed it, building their tower and working out which routes to take. Jack, being a lovely brother let his brother win as Owen got a bit upset when he was losing, but they both enjoyed the game thoroughly. Afterwards I asked Jack and his mum Sue a couple of questions about the game (see video), but Owen didn't want to be filmed. I asked him if he liked the game and he said yes, and i asked if he would play it again and he said he would. I asked them both if they liked the idea of having hats, and they both really liked the idea of dressing up as it gets them into their character. 

Perseverance!

Day two of our project started on a high, with the group meeting together early to discuss ideas. We had our idea of a Native American Indian game sorted, with new ideas coming onto the table such as the idea of having 2 playable characters on the board, one being an enemy and the other being a chief. The idea of this would be that players could freeze others on the board for one go by 'hopping' over them. However, we decided for children this may make the game too complicated. In the end, we decided to keep it as we had already arranged, with four tribes, with one movable player each, each with a different design. Each tribe would also have its own name and flag. We decided on Old Crow, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse and Wild Turkey. These would give a comedic edge to the tribes. We also arranged to have the camps contain four items:

My small concept of the camp

• A Teepee
• A Totem pole
• A horse (or some sort of animal)
• A campfire

We had also discussed having four packs of cards, one for the totem pole, one for the teepee, one for the town (miscellaneous items, horse and campfire) and chance. However, after discussing it with the group I thought it would be best to just have a pack of chance cards which were mixed, as children like the anticipation and excitement about what card they are going to get. After discussing this, I went and designed my own concept of the cards and presented them to the group. They were well received, but we decided we would each have an input to the design and I would finalize the design and put them together.

My negative chance card concept

However, we briefed Nigel on our idea and found a few flaws. We had to decide whether we either made it more complex so it appealed to adults or we made it simpler for children, as it was too complex for children but too simple for adults. After a long discussion with Nigel we decided we really like our idea, and think we could make it really good. Also, we liked the fact that no one had made a childrens game for this project before. We agreed it would be challenging but if it worked, it would be magnificent. It was just a case of doing a lot of research into children, successful childrens board games and also doing a lot of play testing with children. I offered to test the game as much as possible as I have many young relatives, and also record it. At the moment, we are all researching into popular childrens board games and what children like and with some perseverance I believe we can make our idea into some great.

Day One - Board Games Project

Day One of the board games project, we have been organised into our groups and we began brainstorming ideas. The initial idea was a card based game that was similar to 'Pokemon' but with a board and a different set of rules. We decided it had to be simple, and a game that children can play with their families.We decided to focus on 7+ age group, as we agreed that this is the typical age a child will play board games with their parents as a family on holidays such as Christmas, and we also wanted to try to make the game educational in some way. To research this type of market, we visited Toymaster toy store in the town. From this visit we ruled out the whole of our first idea due to the sheer amount of card based board games on the market already (such as Pokemon, top trumps, etc.), and because we felt, in comparison to the other family board games our idea was far too complex for our focus age group.
After this, the idea of a native American Indian based game arose, with the player having to build their camp, and the first to complete their camp was the winner. The game would be played on a board with players picking up chance cards as they go, each chance card having a different effect on their camp or others camps. We decided that we would try to aim the game at ages 7+, which meant giving the art a simplistic, cartoon look.

Rough Character concept

I also had the idea of instead of having four tribes, having two native Indian tribes and two european settlers. This would create a different look at the game, with a race to build up their camp first. However, after briefing this to the group we decided this would make it more of a team game, with the two of the same type would feel as if they are working together. 
We all decided that we would each design 2 chance cards, one positive and one negative to get ideas for the basic look of the cards, as well as carry out some research and do some general designing. Then on day two, we will all present our cards and ideas and each get our place and role within the group.