Related: Local Designer Series: Christina Ng and Yeo Keng Leong, Designers of Three Kingdom Redux
1. So although it is not done yet, what can you tell us about your new game in the works, Race for the Chinese Zodiac?
It is a racing game based on the Chinese myth about the Great Race that formed the Chinese Zodiac. The story goes that the Jade Emperor summoned all the animals to a race to decide the order of a 12-year cycle for mankind to keep time and the top 12 finishers would be immortalised by having their species named after a year in the Zodiac.
We designed this game with the wife's in-laws in mind as they were unable to playtest or try our first game, Three Kingdoms Redux due to the heavy amount of text involved. As a result, only the wife's brother was able to partake in the design process of Three Kingdoms Redux. Thus, we wanted to do a shorter and more text-light board game for our next project so that they can be involved too. We do hope to play the finished published version with them in 2019.
2. What do you think are the essential prototype pieces and tools a budding game designer needs to have in their home?
We do not feel there is anything in a particular that is essential. For us, imagination, knowledge of probability, prior board gaming experience and concepts of game designs probably comes first.
Tools wise, once you hit upon an idea, then you can decide what kind of game components you will need to make the prototype. Initially, usually cardboard and paper are sufficient.
3. When it comes to game design, do you focus on the game mechanics or the theme first?
We design from the setting/theme up. We first think about the setting we want and then ponder over which or what game mechanics suits the game best that will bring the game's theme to life.
For example, in Three Kingdoms Redux, worker placement represented the many generals of the era and the alliance mechanic, the changing nature of alliances of the era.
As for Race for the Chinese Zodiac, simultaneous card play represented the racers having to make decisions on the go at the same time. And the nature of the different actions which are drawn from the various actions taken by the animals is based on the folktale itself.
4. Where do you usually find your playtesters and what are the biggest challenges in the playtesting period?
Playtesters have mostly been our family and close friends. Finding playtesters who are willing to try the same game design repeatedly has always been a big challenge. The Keyword is “repeatedly” as it is only in the later stages that we seek out new playtesters, to get fresh views.
This is because the initial intensive playtesting stage requires the same playtesters to yield the best results. Now for a shorter board game, this issue is not as severe but for a board game as long as our previous game, Three Kingdoms Redux though, it was a major issue but we were fortunate enough to get around that with the support of a few close friends and family member (Wife's brother).
5. How many times do you think a game needs to be playtested or at what point do you think a game is "done"?
There is no definitive answer to this. For us, we set our own expectations in our hearts on how fun and balanced we want the board game to be and just keep playtesting and tweaking it until it passes those expectations. We value quality over quantity.
Given we have day jobs, it means our design process is always a long drawn out process. Thus, why we have been experiencing a four-year long design and development period for just our first two games.
6. What kind of board games do you think the current growing board game market is favouring?
When a new sector grows and matures, it usually moves towards the masses. It is therefore not surprising to see board games appealing to the mass market. A few examples being shorter game times which accommodates larger player counts, games with nice miniatures and certain settings/themes such as Zombies and Vikings.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Zhou Huibin is a smith of words who majored in Philosophy & History from the University of Western Australia and whose life has followed the flow of his hobbies. He seeks continual contentment in his ponders, reading, writing, painting and board games which fills almost all of his time.
Well proven by the United Airlines debacle, planes get overbooked.
Inspired by these events and his own flying experiences, local designer Daryl Chow who has upcoming games with international publishers like Z-Man Games, Hans Im Gluck and more has teamed up with local publisher Randomskill Games to bring you Overbooked.
Overbooked sees you in the shoes of an airline booking passengers on a plane while still trying to keep them as happy as possible by adhering to their requests and prevent the lose-lose situation of overbookings. Will you become Finland's Pride like Finland Airlines or will you become a 2nd United Airlines? Find out with this fun little board game called Overbooked.
Firstly, before we continue, what you will see in this article is a very much finished copy of the game but do note there might still be changes made during the Kickstarter campaign for the game coming Oct 18th.
Now the first thing that will capture you with Overbooked is it's light-hearted artwork by Sandy Solihin and after you have admired the box cover for its artistic value, don't put it away as it is needed for the game. Just turn the box cover over and you are once again greeted by another great piece of colourful artwork which is used as a scoring track for the game.
Related: Local Designer Series: Christina Ng and Yeo Keng Leong, Designers of Three Kingdom Redux
Inside the box, you will then see the 4 player boards that parodies 3 world famous airlines and 1 particularly infamous one. The style of the boards is reminiscent of what you would see if you were picking your airline seats online. The plethora of coloured discs that comes with the game represents the passengers you want to keep happy.
They are as follows, firstly couples (red), who of course want to be together and do not want to be seated beside other couples, children (White) who have to be watched over by the people in seats to their North, South, East and West and of course lastly the different travelling group of friends (Green, Yellow, Blue), who want to be seated together as much as possible to take better group selfies.
During your turn, it is as simple as choosing one of the Tetris like Passenger cards, placing one voucher cube for every card you choose to pass on to get the ideal passengers. Then you must place your passengers in that exact shape (rotating the shape is ok) of the card. You must place all of them and if you can't, you have to do the dreaded kick by removing an existing member of the flight to accommodate the new arrival. This passenger will obviously be unhappy and vent publicly online and thus is worth negative points at the end of the game.
The game ends when one type of passenger pieces have run out and after every player has taken their turn for the round. Victory points are counted up for pleased customer types, voucher cubes, fully filled aisles and that total is deducted to any overbooked passengers. The person with the most points becomes the pride of the Airline world.
The game plays in less than an hour even with 4 players and is a breeze to teach and play. By the end, you will also get a picture worthy view of the flight that you have helped to seat and it is either satisfying to have so many happy passengers or hilariously funny how many people you had to kick out of the plane to accommodate your first day on the job of course.
I have tried the game and was very much smiling at the ease of play and jokes made when a hard to please passenger situation turned up. The picture above was my flight that I played and I just happened to win as the best airline with Singa Airlines but that is not important...well a bit.
The Kickstarter for Overbooked will be coming out in October and if you want to get in and book a seat on this great deal of a flight. Do remember to visit their Facebook for more details or better yet, meet the designer himself at the regular meetup he hosts with his fellow Cardboard Crew members at House of Commons on Fridays, details are found here.