2005-05-20 : Game Chef Musings
You've probably all noticed that the Game Chef competition has started. This is the "musing what I'll do maybe" post. Feel free to comment with your own musings.
I believe I'll take "wine" and "companion," I wonder which for a third. And though his worthless friends guffaw his sudden show of fire | Another round of bourbon and it's easy.
The mechanical limitation is an interesting thing, isn't it?
"There is no character sheet" seems like a good topical choice. But the one I actively dislike is "players' hand gestures have game-mechanical significance," and of course I'm drawn to what I actively dislike.
Anybody else? See anything looks tasty?
1. On 2005-05-20, Judd said:
I just vomitted out my first idea but I'm really not sure how much of what I vomitted I'll use or how much was just a first glance notion.
We'll see.
Looks like great fun.
2. On 2005-05-21, Ben Lehman said:
Entomology, baby. Entomology.
Hand gestures is extraordinary. I'm full of awesome for it.
And fixed characters I was going to do anyway.
But I think that there are too many mechanisms. Two or three would have been better.
3. On 2005-05-21, Valamir said:
I don't disagree Ben. But there was a lot of discussion as to whether the limitations would be so limiting as to discourage entries or more seriously if they'd wind up limiting the contest to only those folks who were already predisposed to far outside the box game design.
The extended list was something of a compromise.
Me personally—- I came down on the side of "Iron Game Chef ain't for weenies".
So...if you think its too easy...pick more than one. In your case, since you're already going for two...try for three and see what inspires you.
We know the inventor of Polaris ain't afeared o' no steenking limitations...;-)
4. On 2005-05-21, Doug Ruff said:
I love the limitations, I think they are a good spur for creativity. On the other hand, the "fixed character" limitation feels a bit, I don't know... easy compared to the rest. I've taken it for my submission "The Dinner Party" (I have a title already!) but it feels like a bit of a copout.
Was the list designed to present a sliding scale of challenge?
5. On 2005-05-21, Vincent said:
I tip my hand:
From Newgate Prison the condemned prisoners were conveyed in open carts along Holban, St Giles and Tyburn Road (now Oxford Street) to the Tyburn Tree. The procession would stop several times, including at the Old Bailey in Newgate Street and the Bowl Inn in St Giles. At these places the condemned prisoner would be offered wine.
from this site about Tyburn Tree
6. On 2005-05-21, Piers said:
Which is where the expression "One for the road" originates.
7. On 2005-05-21, Ninja Hunter J said:
Based on a historical period! That' more like permission than a limitation!
Entomology! Bill Bourroughs, here I come!
Accuser! We've got Kafka in the house!
Wine... something about wine... something about altered states of consciousness...
No character sheet? I've got Under the Bed going already!
Creator-designed cards? Ha ha! I even have advice on how to print them!
BUT!
- Fixed characters... OK... well, I always find that kinda stifling. Gotta think about that.
- Resolution must use colors... feels gimmicky, particularly as I'm a graphic designer and consider excessive color use to be a plague of our time. Not to mention that 10% of men are color blind.
- Hand gestures have mechanical effects... RoShamBo, maybe? I dunno.
- Cards, hand gestures, and dice? Why don't we throw in a board, some pawns, some running shoes, paddles, and a face guard? Jimminy cricket, that's a lot of mechanics.
8. On 2005-05-21, Neel said:
Weird. One of the little games I've been toying with basically already meets the design criteria they list. Maybe I'll actually take a crack at it.
9. On 2005-05-21, Ben Lehman said:
J, you know that you only need to use *one* of those criterion.
Here's a blurb for what I'm really doing:
Civilization in falling. The flower of prosperity that bloomed around the Zhou kings has fallen into so much chaos, and the local lords have set themselves up as tiny would-be kings.
Within the chaos, though, a hundred philosophical flowers have bloomed, each with their own answers to society's ills. Will yours be the one that will guide the dynastic lords into righteousness and victory, or will you lie forgotten in the ashes, your books burned, your students killed, lost to the ages of history?
A Hundred Flowers
yrs—
—Ben
10. On 2005-05-22, Ninja Hunter J said:
HA HA! I MA TEH FOOLZ0R!
11. On 2005-05-23, Albert said:
The menu looks intriguing, but I'm afraid that, as predicted, the debut of my one-shot Kabuki larp on Saturday killed off my energy for game design.
Besides, I just got a massive infusion of playtest data for Kabuki's conflict mechanics. I need to keep up my momentum on that if I want to get any polishing done.
As soon as I catch up on schoolwork.
-Albert
12. On 2005-05-23, Michael S. Miller said:
Vincent, I got quite a chuckle out of:
But the one I actively dislike is "players' hand gestures have game-mechanical significance," and of course I'm drawn to what I actively dislike.
This coming from the guy who claims that every game he designs is a reaction to Ars Magica, the only tabletop RPG that I can think of that already has hand gestures with mechanical significance! Vincent, sometimes you're so ... Vincent. 8^)
13. On 2005-05-23, Clinton R. Nixon said:
One comment: this is effing hard. Ever stare at a screen for minutes and minutes on end?
Argh.
14. On 2005-05-24, Tobias said:
I jumped aboard - literally. Check the 'Companion Fever' thread on the IGC forum.
15. On 2005-05-25, chris moore said:
I have a game chef entry idea, but I can't get to the game chef forums (my work computer filter). Can I post something here for feedback?
16. On 2005-05-25, chris moore said:
I have a game chef entry idea, but I can't get to the game chef forums (my work computer filter). Can I post something here for feedback?
owl132001@yahoo.com
17. On 2005-05-25, Vincent said:
Chris: sure. Rather than just posting it here in the comments, though, email it to me. I'll give it its own post.
18. On 2005-05-25, Andy K said:
This coming from the guy who claims that every game he designs is a reaction to Ars Magica, the only tabletop RPG that I can think of that already has hand gestures with mechanical significance!
Woah, it does? Can someone enlighten me here?
I have a game chef entry idea, but I can't get to the game chef forums (my work computer filter). Can I post something here for feedback?
Also, if you're on the mailing list, you can submit questions/feedback there and we can hit you that way.
One comment: this is effing hard. Ever stare at a screen for minutes and minutes on end?
Hmmmm. One thing I noticed was that, IIRC, you picked up a handful of limitations. Maybe try scaling back one or two and seeing if that freedom loosens something up?
-Andy
19. On 2005-05-25, Ben Lehman said:
My advice—Don't even think about the limitation until you have most of the rest of the game down. The rules limitations are pretty simple. The ingredients are the hard part.
yrs—
—Ben
20. On 2005-05-25, Vincent said:
Andy: In Ars Magica, to perform magic your wizard needs to speak and gesture. Quiet voice and subtle gestures = mechanical penalty, clear voice and bold gestures = no bonus or penalty, loud voice and dramatic gestures = mechanical bonus.
It's the characters' hand gestures that are significant in Ars Magica, not the players', but still.
21. On 2005-05-25, Doug Ruff said:
I'm sitting myself down for a heavy session writing up the rules and character sheets for my "Dinner Party" entry. I'm feeling a bit inadequate right now - I think I'll have a finished game at the end of it, but it won't have been playtested properly and the layout will be crappy. One week is a tough deadline, especially for a born procrastinator like me...
Having said that, I'm already looking forward to tweaking it into something publishable once the competition is over.
22. On 2005-05-25, Eric Finley said:
Oh, man. I'm working really hard to get my brain in high gear for this contest. My problem is simply that, upon looking at the ingredients, something jumped out at me, so clearly a fit that the perfection of it has prevented me from seriously considering anything else... but so fricking ambitious that I'm coping not so much with writer's block as sheer terror & trepidation.
What jumped out at me was real simple:
The Last Supper.
It has to be a one-shot, played potluck, with the GM as Christ. Not for the philosophically inflexible.
But ow, the implementation, and the doing it with respect, and the scary of it all...
- Eric
23. On 2005-05-25, Vincent said:
Eric ... don't turn away from that. If you can help it.
24. On 2005-05-26, Andy K said:
Exactly. Don't worry about consequences.
Some guy masquerading as a Russian wrestler is working on a game in a similar vein:
http://www.1km1kt.net/forum/ftopic357.html
When I first saw that, I was like, "Uh....", but heck, it doesn't just look like it's there for shock value. It looks like there's a real game in there (albeit a game very similar to My Life With Master).
So make your Last Supper game. Do not mind who it offends. Rather, be concerned with how to make it work. If the game is fun, people will play it.
25. On 2005-05-26, Eric said:
Hell, I'm not worried about who it might offend. I'm just worried about doing it justice. My own sense of the aesthetic of the thing is all I'm worried about offending.
But yeah - I've taken the plunge. What comes will come.
(Hoo-hah about "ve vill be ze Iron Chef!" is hard to pull off with a matter-of-fact Canadian accent.)
- Eric
26. On 2005-05-27, Tobias said:
Companion Fever, my entry, is done.
http://www11.brinkster.com/tobiasopdenbrou/ygaddl.html has a link to dl the .pdf. Check it, if you like.
27. On 2005-05-27, Vincent said:
28. On 2005-05-27, Tobias said:
Tx
29. On 2005-05-29, Moose said:
It's like 6:30 AM and I just submitted my game. I was going to throw in the towel yesterday, but 11th hour inspiration saved (?) me. I just hope it's coherent, considering my sleep-deprived state.
http://www.actionroll.com/gildedmoose/pdfs/dognwolf.pdf
Anyway, I had to tell someone.
Best,
Scott
30. On 2005-05-31, Vincent said:
31. On 2005-05-31, Eric Finley said:
Looks tres cool, Scott; yours is one of the shortlist I'm definitely looking forward to going over in more detail. A pity that the language pun (l'heure entre chien et loup) will mostly be lost on the judges & readers.
Andy messed up the fontage when PDFing mine, so until that's fixed either by him or me, rather than go to the 1KM1KT archive, you can find The Last Supper as Word files plus fonts here. Woot indeed!
So, Vincent, what happened - snot death of the universe? Or just inspiration petering out?
32. On 2005-05-31, Ben Lehman said:
New Scott Knipe game! Yayx0rs!
33. On 2005-05-31, Moose said:
You guys make me blush. I was happy just to finish a game - it's been so long, you know - so that I could be there with the rest of you.
And Vincent, I'm as curious as the rest?
34. On 2005-05-31, Vincent said:
Yeah, the snot death. Also some other responsibilities, of the solo parenting variety. Also my use of "companion" was pretty feeb, maybe now I'll make the game with just "wine" and "accuser" and good enough.
35. On 2005-06-01, Vincent said:
Hey Eric, http://www.hellequin.net/TheLastSupper.zip is giving me a 404.
36. On 2005-06-01, Eric said:
Hmm. So it is. Ah - it ended up in the wrong directory. Fixed now.
37. On 2005-06-01, Eric said:
Mind you, one does wonder (gleefully) whether "Snot death of the universe" might not be secret-decoder-ring code for "Member of the secret council of ninja judges, with misleading ramblings on his blog." Phbbbt!
38. On 2005-06-02, Vincent said:
Well ... allow me to neither confirm nor deny the secret council thing, but do believe me that the snot was all too real.
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