Get on Board: An Intro to Board Games, Pt 3

Read the second part of this article here.

Mage Knight by Vlaada Chvatil, which simulates a computer RPG
Mage Knight by Vlaada Chvatil, which simulates a computer RPG

The Crossover
There used to be a generational gulf between board gamers and video gamers, with the former often dismissing videogames as mindless, and videogamers largely ignorant of the existence of designer board games. But as more young people weaned on videogames join the hobby, the gulf is being bridged – which is good for both industries.

The worlds of board games and video games are closer than you think, the obvious crossover being the RPG genre. The iconic Baldur’s Gate was based on the Tabletop RPG Dungeons and Dragons world and rule set – indeed, it made no attempt to hide this, even labelling damage output in the form of dice rolls. Ever since then, real time RPGs have battled with how to handle their systems of stats and hidden rolls without losing grip of the tactile immediacy of the video game medium.

The influence from tabletop RPGs are clearest in Baldur's Gate
The influence from tabletop RPGs are clearest in Baldur’s Gate

In turn, boardgames have recently sought to reverse engineer RPG elements. Games like the co-operative Legends of Andor attempt to create a fantasy story that unfolds with each turn of the card, giving players a strong narrative justification for their actions through a mission based structure and even simulating a video game style tutorial in an opening mission, with the game cleverly introducing each mechanic and rule as you play. Other games, such as Descent and the recent Pathfinder card game, are built around a campaign designed to be played over numerous sittings, evoking the length and structure of video game RPGS, with each game played powering up players and affecting future games.

Even that old standard bearer Risk is in on the act, with Risk Legacy by Rob Daviau mixing up the formula. In Legacy, rather than play an isolated game, players will run through a campaign of fifteen games, with the winner signing the board each time. Through the course of the game, cards are torn up, the board is changed with stickers, players name continents, whole new factions are introduced from secret, sealed compartments in the box, and even the rules of the game itself are warped, altering the narrative and power relations of the game, almost giving it an MMO quality of world persistence.

Sealed envelopes in Risk Legacy introduce new mechanics, as well as the concept of spoilers
Sealed envelopes in Risk Legacy introduce new mechanics, as well as the concept of spoilers

Vlaada Chvatil’s Mage Knight is possibly the most extreme example of a game that attempts to hardwire a computer RPG’s systems into a board game. This epic game sees players rampaging around a hex based fantasy over-world map (not unlike the Might & Magic series) gaining experience for killing monsters, which not only count as victory points but allow players to level up their unique heroes by adding powerful new spells and artefacts to their personal draw deck, or by boosting their armour and hand limit. Meanwhile, spells are powered by different coloured mana crystals, a finite resource that can be gained through adventuring or by certain cards. The complexity of the game comes from the fact that a hand of cards can be played in many different ways to achieve an end result, simulating the complex inter-relationships between abilities on a skill tree (think the equivalent of re-speccing your character in Diablo, but every turn).

Clever videogame design is about how to trick people to play the game, not about the game mechanics themselves, and fluent experience is more important than intriguing challenges.

In fact Vlaada himself is not only an incredibly important figure in the Eastern European board game world, co-founding the publisher Czech Games Editions, but he is a great example of a board game designer taking cues from video games. Vlaada has worked in the video game industry and, speaking to The Opinionated Gamers, admits to applying techniques and tools gained there to develop his own games by working on prototypes virtually with all cards and rules designed in a computer simulation.

But it’s not just the approach to game designer that has rubbed off on him from his days as a video game developer, but his interest in adapting ideas: “I wish to translate some experience and feelings of my favourite PC games (like Civilization, Dungeon Keeper, or Heroes of Might and Magic) to a board game.” His breakthrough game was Through the Ages, which created the same narrative as Sid Meier’s Civilisation, only using cards. Though not as heavily themed and produced as his later games it betrayed his recurring interest in exploring complexity and his unwillingness to water down his ideas. In the same interview he states:

One of the Tamagotchi inspired monsters in Dungeon Petz
One of the Tamagotchi inspired monsters in Dungeon Petz

“From my point of view, the big difference between computer games and board games is the role of the design. Not that it is unimportant in a computer game, but a much bigger part of the game budget is the visual presentation, marketing etc. And that’s a problem, as you have to invest a lot to these items, and when you do, you want the money to return. Thus you have to target as wide audience as possible; you cannot do full budget video games for geeks. Clever video game design is about how to trick people to play the game, not about the game mechanics themselves, and fluent experience is more important than intriguing challenges.”

Whilst video games iterate slowly, each game building on and adapting the ideas and genres that have gone before, board games often revel in introducing completely outlandish concepts, and the audience clamours for it. Vlaada’s games, although unified by complex systems and a nod to computer games, are a case in point as they are all astoundingly different from one another, and include games like Space Alert, a frantic, timed co-operative sci-fi game in which players try to control the guns, engines and shields of a space ship by programming in actions as a ten-minute audio track announces threats. The whole thing has a feel that is strangely similar to indie hit FTL with its tense, procedurally generated encounters and its top down cut away perspective of the ship. But perhaps his biggest homage to video games is Dungeon Lords, which could be considered an adaptation of the classic PC game Dungeon Keeper. Here is a worker placement game (like Agricola described previously) in which players kit their dungeons out with fiendish traps to foil the plans of roving adventurers. Its follow up, Dungeon Petz, is a brilliant sequel, the idea being that the dungeon lord of the first game has died leaving his imp minions jobless, so they’ve set up a kind of petting zoo for monsters. Like managing several hyperactive Tamagotchis, the players are tasked with meeting the weird creatures’ growing list of needs including keeping them entertained, cleaning poop out of their cages and trying to prevent them from growing tentacles and disappearing into another dimension.

A board detail from Twilight Struggle
A board detail from Twilight Struggle

Whilst a few lapsed video game designers have taken to creating board games, the video game industry is well and truly infested with board gamers and board game designers. It’s a well known fact that industry legend Ian Livingstone, Life president of Eidos, was co-founder of the Fighting Fantasy game books and high street behemoth Games Workshop, has been regularly playing board games with the likes of Peter Molyneux since 1986 (they even compete for a cup, with Livingstone writing up each season in a sarcastic newsletter). Meanwhile Ananda Gupta, the designer of Twilight Struggle, an ingenious card-driven war game that simulates the power struggles of the Cold War and which has spent several years as the highest ranked game on Board Game Geek, is also a key figure in Firaxis and lead designer of the XCOM: Enemy Within expansion. Video game designers play board games and it’s not hard to see why. Whilst most gamers enjoy the end product, the game doing the heavy lifting of crunching numbers in the background, a designer needs to think in systems and balance, something that board games offer in a pure unmediated manner.

In his recent GDC talk A Study in Transparency: Why Board Games Matter Soren Johnson, lead designer of Civilisation IV and founder of new indie studio Mohawk Games, which is developing the resource heavy RTS Offworld Trading Company, discussed the subject of computer strategy games borrowing elements from board games. He argued that board games were defined by their transparency of systems, which is something video games, particularly in the strategy genre, could learn from. In an interview I conducted with Ananda Gupta he echoes these thoughts, saying that what video game designers can learn from board games is to “make sure systems make sense and are consistent and clear” in order to fulfil what he calls the ‘social contract’ between player and designer. Additionally, he believes that the influence can go both ways, and says that board game designers can learn from their counterparts in the video game industry by making games that “think about the literal moment-to-moment player experience”, by making streamlined rules and mechanics that don’t interrupt the flow of the game and keep all players engaged.

Original artwork from Bioshock: The Siege of Columbia
Original artwork from Bioshock: The Siege of Columbia

Whilst board game theory often indirectly influences videogame design, normally the influence in the other direction is more direct, with a growing number of board game adaptations of popular video games. Ken Levine of Bioshock fame is an avid gamer and therefore when it came to commissioning the Bioshock Infinite board game, he deliberately sought out boutique independent studio Plaid Hat Games. Interestingly, BioShock Infinite: The Siege of Columbia is one of the first board games to be created in tandem with the video game, rather than as a last-minute cash grab. It simulates the civil war depicted in the iconic flying city, with players taking control of either the Vox Populi or the Founders whilst trying to avoid Booker and Elizabeth, who move around the board messing your shit up. The board game creates a fascinating accompaniment to Irrational’s game, forcing the player to see things from the other side as they adopt the POV of the video game’s morally dubious NPCs.

There have been many other recent high-profile adaptations of video games into the unplugged format including Resident Evil and Gears of War, by Corey Konieczka (respected designer of Battlestar Galactica and Descent: Journeys in the Dark), but most interesting is the attempt other games have made to inject the spirit of video games into a more static format. An interesting example of this is Puzzle Strike by David Sirlin which seeks to simulate games like Puzzle Quest as a mash up of the gem matching and fighting genres. It does this by adapting the deck-building mechanic initiated by Dominion, replacing cards with chips that are purchased from central supplies and drawn from a bag. These chips represent moves that can be used to smash gems in a pile in front of you and send them over to your opponents like deadly confetti. This is a fast-paced, tension-fuelled game that captures some of the frantic nature of the video games it emulates.

Sirlin unsurprisingly has a background in video game design, having worked as lead designer on Street Fighter HD Remix (he has some incredibly interesting and technical articles on game balancing and design on his site). His experience balancing that game led him to attempt to distil the high level tactical play of Street Fighter into a fast-paced card game called Yomi, which demanded an agile mind of the players rather than the dexterous reflexes of the video game.

Some of the chips in Puzzle Strike
Some of the chips in Puzzle Strike

As video games grew in scale and ambition, the mini-game became an important component in creating depth in both the world and the mechanics. As a result, there have been several notable manifestations of board and card style games in the medium, from the made up Triple Triad in Final Fantasy VIII, Caravan in Fall Out New Vegas or Pazaak in KOTOR; to the fascinating use of traditional games like Nine Man Morris in Assassin’s Creed 3 or Koi Koi in Yakuza 3. Meanwhile, Pokémon plays so much like its collectable card game counterpart that it’s hard to know which one came first and Hearthstone is a physical card game in spirit, that harnesses its digital nature to create audiovisual feedback and complicated rules that would be difficult to implement in a physical game (persistent damage, scaling health). Also it’s worth remembering that before breaking into consoles, Nintendo started off its life printing traditional Japanese Hanafuda playing cards.

The Steam implementation of Memoir 44 is very faithful and considerably cheaper than buying all of the sets
The Steam implementation of Memoir 44 is very faithful and considerably cheaper than buying all of the sets

Meanwhile, board game companies like Days of Wonder have embraced mobile platforms like the iPad in recent years to reach a broader audience hungry for apps, and this wider exposure to the medium is at least one of the factors pushing up board game sales. Days of Wonder’s whimsical fantasy area control game Small World was a day one launch on the original iPad and they enjoy great success with their digital version of Ticket to Ride, a family friendly train game that involves building routes across a variety of countries using a rummy style set collection mechanic. Even though the app outsells their physical game by three to one, it has the effect of broadening the market exposure of their core product, and so the company enjoyed a spike in sales following its release. This is a pattern that is repeated with almost every digital board game release, which demonstrates that the electronic counterpart of the game complements rather than replaces the physical version. Indeed, Days of Wonder seem to be spearheading the drive to digital in the board game world, and their best selling World War II strategy game Memoir 44 is available to play on Steam, including achievements and an online matchmaking lobby. They have even gone so far as to create an integrated social network element to their website, not a million miles from initiatives like Rockstar Social Club. Meanwhile, companies like Playdek, responsible for the successful implementation of the deck building game Ascension on iPad and several more since, have also emerged to adapt pre-existing games to mobile devices for companies unable to do so in-house, and their innovative approach to interface design has been celebrated for expressing the tactile nature of board games through dynamically interactive elements.

The iPad version on Ascension was the first card game port on the platform
The iPad version on Ascension was the first card game port on the platform

Indeed the mobile space has created a risk-free environment where developers can explore their interest in board games, fusing them with video games, such as Hitman Go, which references board games in both gameplay and aesthetics. This in turn increases the discoverability of board games to the video game crowd. These crossover games, along with digital implementations of actual physical games, including Playdek’s immersive ports and bespoke takes on the form like Duels of the Plain Walkers or Hearthstone, coincide with an unparalleled upsurge in the quality and quantity of board game production thanks to new production models like Kickstarter, which are in turn fuelling the uptake of board games over a much wider audience. Now more than ever, gamers are likely to embrace both physical and digital games, opening the way for both media to benefit from the other. As I hope I’ve demonstrated here, there has never been a more exciting time to get interested in the broad and multi-faceted world of board games.

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