Recent content by Scott Jon Siegel

Game Design Friday: Masquerade! The creator of Masquerade!, a "board game of debauchery and disease," wants your help refining the game's design. Are you up to the challenge? Read Full Article

omg teh interview! omg teh interview!, a mini-game expansion to omg hire me, is far better than real job interviews because you can wear your pyjamas and chew gum the entire time. Read Full Article

Game Design Friday: omg hire me What better way to take the edge off of looking for your first job than to make a game out of it? Permalink

Game Design Friday: Turfy Turfy is a risky dice game of adolescent warfare that takes place on that most sacred of grade school locales: the jungle gym. Read Full Article

Simplified Systems "'A game is a game is a game,' writes Gamelab CEO Eric Zimmerman in an e-mail on the topic of tabletop adaptation. 'The fundamental qualities of how games are defined, how they are played, and how they can be designed to create meaningful experiences for players does not vary...

You Have to Lock the Entry! In "the free card game that anyone can edit," players rush to complete wiki entries while destroying the efforts and edits of their opponents. Read Full Article

Game Design Friday: myNo myNo is a hybrid game, conceived as a cross between the real-time pattern recognition of Set, the rolling and scoring of Yahtzee, and the fast-paced momentum of Pounce. I wanted to use a lot of dice, and I wanted the game to be really quick, playable in under twenty...

Well, a GG can choose which of his rolls to commit to which attribute, although a GG who rolls triply poor is indeed a bit "fucked" as they say. Can we think of an elegant design solution to this problem? The problem with this idea is that it turns the world-creation into a collaborative...

Game Design Friday: Gygaxian Gygaxian is a competitive creation game, with several "dungeon masters" (known here as GameGods) battling for control over the direction of a fantasy world. The sole Player moves about this world, in search of whatever treasure or other ultimate goal he chooses...

Game Design Friday: Petrol Panic (Final Version) In the not-too-distant future, the price of gas has skyrocketed astronomically, but far be it for hard-working citizens to let this get in the way of their vacations. Each holiday, families take to the freeways in their sport utility vehicles to...

Hi Roadhog: Those are all tremendous ideas, several of which I had in fact considered during this past month's development on Petrol Panic. Some of the problems you foresaw with the design have been fixed, and other ideas will be addressed in the post-design writeup of the final version...

It's a great suggestion, Kwil, but my concern is definitely that it's too much math for a relatively low-impact boardgame. Still, it's interesting to make the price of gas reflective of how much players are buying or selling (essentially mimicking market values). The con of this (besides its...

Game Design Friday: Petrol Panic (Part One) In the not-too-distant future, the price of gas has skyrocketed astronomically, but far be it for hard-working citizens to let this get in the way of their vacations. Each holiday, families take to the freeways in their sport utility vehicles to beat...

Fictionless A bit stuck for game concepts this month, I decided to try blending classic mechanics together in an attempt to create something new. ... I liked the idea of players rolling the dice and being unsure of whether they should move the number of spaces or sell the roll to make a profit...

9am Class No college student likes signing up for a 9:00 a.m. lecture on Monday mornings, but sometimes you just need the credits. It?s a simple enough class, and your only real challenge is remaining conscious the entire two hours. The prof just loves calling on students for answers, but...