Week 6

Overview

I revisited the scope I had planned at the beginning of the project, and edited it to fit our new plan. We also had a big discussion surrounding the Grand Beast and how it should look, as well as playtested the game multiple times and introduced Dylan to it properly. I also created the final pieces of art for the creature cards.

Scope

With some of the changes that have occurred throughout the project, I saw fit to edit the scope I designed back in week 3, and update it with more accurate information.

Week 6

This week is largely the same as what I had already planned, with the exception of Dylan's secondment now being this week rather than last week, and Max working on the design of the Grand Beast so that he can model it later. I've also put myself down for the creation of journey and item cards, so that we may test them this week, and if they work, I can begin creating designs for them too, ready for our 25th March deadline. I also noted down packaging, as in the design of a tuck box to store the cards in, which I will be looking at MPC to find a template for.

Week 7

Week 7 is pretty similar to Week 6, with me and Kat doing art, as well as me and Dylan doing playtesting. I've got Max down to design more characters, as that will be needed before modelling, and he said that he'd design the rulebook too. However, I may take this on, as I've got experience with designing these products now, and I'm very acquainted with the rules of the game.

Week 8

Week 8 is the big week to get all the cards and other products that need printing outside of the university completed. However, I will note that I made this date so that everyone else would be able to have their Easter free. If more time is needed, there's a couple week window in order to finish these designs, which may be needed if we're including journey and item cards, which still need to be designed.

Week 9/10

Week 9 is still a little difficult to plan for. Week 9 is after Easter, by which all card designs will have been sent off for printing, and should be arriving imminently. That doesn't really leave much to do with the project. Max should have finished all his designs, and should be working on models to be printed, if not have some already for printing. If he's behind on this, perhaps me or Kat could help. I can do modelling in blender, however, my sculpting skills aren't incredible, so I'd need to work on this prior to helping. Other than that, perhaps the whole team could work on some marketing material to get the word out about our game. The weeks after will follow much the same pattern as this week, up until hand in

Equipment information (sharepoint.com)

Grand Beast

I confirmed with Kat which creature she was working on this week, to avoid creating any copies of work and wasting time. We also had a big discussion regarding the grand beast. Max sent some designs based off of his research, and we agreed that we liked the idea, but Max wanted to use his artwork for the final design. This was a hard topic to approach, as I felt that the art wasn't up to the standard that Kat set for our cards. I didn't want to hurt Max's feelings by saying this, but I felt it necessary for the success of the project. Understandably, Max was upset with this. However, we agreed that we'd work with the design that he created. I also suggested some card designs for Kat to work with to make the Grand Beast card more dynamic and powerful.

Grand Beast (Cont.)

Based off of his designs, Max made a clay model of the Grand Beast. What I have noticed is that it's fallen over overnight, and I saw that the base isn't flat, so I'll need to tell that to Max. There could also be a problem with weight distribution, but we'll have to fix the surface first to see if that is a problem too.

Playtest 5

I playtested the game using creature abilities with my partner. This isn't a problem with the abilities, but what we found immediately is that he tried to roll to capture a rarer creature, and lost his d4 straightaway. This ended up causing problems with catching many creatures later on. What he suggested was to rebalance the rewards and penalties, so that no one constantly loses their d4s, and can't get any back. This also led to the question of how few dice can a player have at any one time. They should always be in with a chance to catch a creature, and shouldn't need to pass up 5 different creatures to find one they can catch. I can try and schedule in a playtest where we keep the same base amount of dice (the ones players start with).

As for abilities, I needed to clarify when players could use them. I even found myself confused over when I could activate certain abilities, so I'll be adding either a description of when they can be used, or some kind of short notation to indicate when.

Playtest 6

I playtested again, along with Dylan and a couple others, as he hasn't been able to show in person, so this was his first time really getting to know the game. There were some issues that needed clarifying, such as needing to roll for both values listed as capture requirements. There were similar issues as my last playtest, with a lack of d4s, but also there were a lack of d10s. I suggested that having a minimum amount of dice will counteract this, which we tested later.

Playtest 7

We playtested again, this time including the abilities I had created previously. There were some clarifications that were needed for how some abilities worked, but I was aware that would be the case, I just didn't have enough space or time to write them all down for a paper prototype. This issue will be addressed in the final card designs. Phil had a couple thoughts on the flow of the game. He thought that waiting for other players to make their move was a bit slow. However, I'm not really sure how to address this problem. Having everyone interact with the cards and the dice at the same time would make it hard for everyone to focus on their own roles, so I'll have to ignore this in favour of a more orderly flow in the game. Everyone took well to the use of abilities in the game, and in particular Phil noted that abilities that disrupt other players, like the swapping of dice, were a lot more fun and engaging them simpler abilities, such as editing a roll. We'll keep this in mind when designing Journey cards, and possibly Item cards if we get round to them. One final thought is that there definitely needs to be a minimum number of held dice, as it's very difficult to pull yourself back into a favourable position when you have minimal opportunities to capture creatures.

Playtest 8

During this playtest, we used abilities, as well as gave everyone a minimum set of dice, so that they couldn't fall below one of any kind of dice. This version of the game is a lot fairer on the player, and gives them a chance to capture and creature, rather than having to skip a bunch to find one they can catch. This isn't exclusive to this particular playtest, but I have noticed that people are pretty reckless with playing their dice, and aren't very conservative when using them. Maybe this could be considered when creating more mechanics? Finally, in order to make more engaging effects, perhaps there could be some kind of cancel or block effect that players can utilise to guard against another player's attack.

Card Art

I worked on art for the final couple of creatures that Kat has designed, completing the roster of creatures we have for the game. I'm particularly proud of these two, and feel that through the art direction set by Kat, I have been able to better my skills, especially digital painting. I of course asked for feedback for if there might be anything that needs changing according to Kat's vision, but she says she loves the art.

Next Week

With art for the creatures done, we really need to finalise names for them all, as well as flavour text descriptions for the creatures. I'm also going to finalise some UI for the cards, namely the dice rolling boxes. We're also going to have to quickly prototype and iterate Journey/Item cards if we're going to include them, so that I can make appropriate art for them ready to be printed.