thread: 2011-09-15 : PAX Dev: You Should Play Bad Games
On 2011-09-16, Jay Loomis wrote:
That's a great point about Monopoly and the excitement being on other people's turns.
I think the important thing to realize as a designer is that playing bad games and analyzing why you hate them—where exactly they break down—is really important. Monopoly isn't a terrible game: it's a mediocre game with terrible pacing and endgame.
Another example: I was playing Dixit the other day and exclaiming how much I liked it, when somebody mentioned that it's the same game as Apples to Apples. Thing is, I HATE Apples to Apples. It's clearly not the same game, even though the mechanics are nigh identical. Change it from a game about knowing how your friends make verbal associations to one about visual symbolism and metaphore and I'm sold. Who knew? You've got to play to know.
