fredag 26 september 2014

Board Game Analysis - Game 2: Carcassonne

Introduction
The first assignment in the course was to play three different board games and make an analysis of them. Get an understanding of their components, core systems, properties and player behaviours. The goal with the assignment was to get a basic idea of game analysis overall. But most importantly, to get an understanding of game systems in order to prevent us in the future from designing the same game systems multiple times by mistake.


Game Description
Carcassonne takes place in a medieval setting, where lords are building and shaping cities and agriculture under their rule, constantly contesting for the best lands and investments.
Components
The game consists mostly of small cube shaped cards. These are tiles, depicting small pieces of a map consisting of roads, towns, cloisters and grasslands. There is no game board, instead the players slowly puts the game space into shape in the form of a map by placing one tile each round. All tiles have drawn pictures that are essentially compatible to each other. No matter how you angle the tile, it always seems to fit with the tile you’re placing it next to.
The game progress is measured in points, so the game also comes with a meter in shape of a very basic game board with up to 50 spaces to help keep track of the players’ individual points. Every gained point moves the player’s pawn on the board the respective amount of spaces.
The players gain points by placing out pawns on the game space, each player getting eight in total. One pawn is used on the meter while the others are placed on the tiles.
Game Rules and Progression
Before the game begins, a start tile is placed which has a part of a city, road and grassland depicted on it. This is the first tile, which the players can begin placing tiles adjacent to.
The players draws the tiles face down from a pile and has to show the other players before placing it.
The players gain points by placing their pawns as mayors, farmers, robbers or clergies. A pawn can only be placed on the tile the player has recently placed on her round. Mayors are placed on city tiles, farmers are placed on grassland, robbers on roads and clergies on cloisters.
The player only receives points when the certain terrain type the pawn stands on has been completed. For example: If a player places one of his pawns on a city tile, she only receives points from that pawn when the city looks completed with walls surrounding the buildings. As she receives the points, she also recovers the pawn that gave the points for further use.
The example described how mayors work. As for the rest:
  • The robber gives points when the road he’s placed on is connected between a city, cloister or crossroads.
  • The clergy gives points when the cloister he’s placed on is surrounded adjacently and diagonally by other tiles.
  • The farmer gives points at the end of the game depending on how many completed cities the grasslands he’s placed on are connected to, with roads and rivers separating the grasslands.
The player cannot place a pawn on areas other players have already claimed, or place multiple pawns on her own areas. However, if she places a pawn on for example a city tile that’s separated but later connected to another player’s city area, she shares the points with the other player when the city is completed. Same applies to robbers and their roads.
However, farmers work differently. The players share the points earned from grassland areas if they have equal amount of farmers on them. But if one player has more farmers on the area than the other players, only she receives the points from those grasslands.
The game’s end phase starts when all tiles have been placed. Players receive points from pawns on unfinished areas but considerably lower amounts than from completed areas. Points from farmers on grasslands are calculated and given out. The player with the most amounts of points wins the game.
The version of the game used for this analysis also contained an expansion pack, which adds river tiles that are placed before the game starts as an alternative to the regular start tile. As the players places the river tiles, they can also choose to place their pawns on them as they also depict roads, a town, a cloister and grasslands.



Analysis
The game space growing and shaping after the players’ own choices is the core system. The players always place their tiles drawn from the pile to best suit their own agenda. However, it’s almost guaranteed that the other players will get involved and make use of the areas and tiles you placed for your own gain. Like chess, this game requires major strategic thinking. Trying to think several moves ahead and predict how the other players will act and react.
The luck of the draw however, can ruin and drastically change your plans. This makes the game a little bit friendlier for players that aren't so good with strategy.
Overall game process
Like with any new board game, the first two rounds were spent to learn and get used to the game. How the cities with mayors and roads with robbers worked was simple enough, but it wasn’t until the third game we all fully grasped how the farmers worked. Unlike the other pawns, the farmers are long term investments. You either have to think very far ahead or just hope that the farmers you place will have completed cities in their grasslands, the grasslands aren’t separated by too many roads and rivers and the other players won’t have more farmers than you placed on the areas.
Usually the players’ pawns would be spread evenly and connecting your cities with others’ was an often used strategy. The fact that the player has to show the others the tile before placing it ensures that the others will try to comment and affect her decision. During late game, a lot of discussion and debate happens on where the placement of the tiles and pawns would benefit which players the most. One strategy was to slowly build your tiles away from the other players’ influence; this however would also mean that the other players wouldn’t be able to place tiles that would be to your benefit as well. A lot of times, you either directly or indirectly help the other players with your placement of tiles. You can also sabotage for the other players by blocking off their unfinished areas or leave a tile two placements from the unfinished areas that are hard to fit.
Players would sometimes enter pacts to build cities together or work towards common goals, but ultimately they would try to lead the effort for their own benefit.
There were times when the players would sacrifice benefit for visual pleasure: Fixing a city that looked weird, building roads that actually connected to something, matching environments etc. The drawn art on the tiles compels the player to be creative and build a living and vibrant world with each placed tile, while benefiting the player as much as possible.
Targeted Audience
The game has a very mild nature and is easy to learn the basics of, although multiple games are required to get the hang of. Therefore, children in their early teens are most likely a good minimum. Almost all ages from there on and groups will enjoy this game. The game’s cover and concept however will sound a bit complicated at first and experienced gamers will associate it with city management games like Sim City, Settlers, Civilization, Populous and others.
Summary
Carcassonne is a unique game, considering that the game space is continuously built by the players each round. It gives a new level of strategy, as your actions can either limit your opponents’ actions or give them new possibilities and more room for their own plans. The game feels both competitive and cooperative, as you try to put a kingdom into shape while profiting as much as possible. It gives a positive feeling even if you lose, as you watch the results of you and your competitors’ efforts.
The art on the card tiles are visually pleasing and give out vibes of the old city management games from the late 80s and early 90s.
The game is a part of a franchise and has a pretty large following in Europe and the US, winning two awards. With up to nine full expansions and 20 mini expansions, the game can last up to one hour without expansions to several hours with expansions: Adding new mechanics, options, terrain, buildings, pawn occupations and in depth strategic elements.
The game has been adapted to consoles, PC and portable appsa and has inspired several new games and spin-offs.
The game can be very addicting. An experienced player we talked to even went as far as nicknaming the game “Knarkasonne” (“Knark-” being the Swedish word for drugs). With the random nature of draws from the pile, it’s always interesting to see what the game world might end up looking like after each game, which makes it hard for the game to get boring. It makes you wonder just how much of the experience is changed when adding all the available expansions for the game.

The game is recommended for any game board fan or casual player. Being a great blend of creative and strategic gameplay. It is best experienced with the maximum amount of four players, adding even more strategy and hectic exchanges in words between players.

2 kommentarer:

  1. Hi Gustav.
    As for the core game experiences I must say that I agree with you on that it is about placing the tiles and shape the world for your own gain. To use those tiles to build up your empire and place your followers in strategic places to get score at the end of the game. Although I don’t agree with that the game requires major strategic thinking like chess or risk. Because the tiles you draw are totally random and you never know what you are going to get, sure you strategize for the future and hope for what you are going to get. But most of the time it is more like you play with the card you get and there is nothing you can do about it. Except you want to place it strategically but I still don’t think it comes close to what chess have in the ways of strategy. It is just too random.

    Now I arrive at a part where I tell you about the assignment, because I can see that you are missing stuff or it’s me being blind. First off it’s supposed to be at least 1600 words. You were close but it was not 1600 words. With what you have written you could achieve this and even wright more if you wrote about all the things you are supposed to analyze. I can’t clearly see the objectively best and worst side(s) to the games of the analysis. For those I would say the best one is how the players build the world so it’s never the same if you replay it. The worst is that it’s always a random tile you pick and not that you have like 3 to 5 on your hand so you can actually plan what you are going to do. I can’t see that you have written about the most interesting system either but I will assume it is the core system about placing the tiles and in that case I would agree with you and say that it’s because of how the world never look the same.

    Then I think you should have done something to close of your summation of the analysis because right now it continues to only talk about it having several expansion and having a big franchise and it inspiring other games and that it has won awards. This is new information that you haven’t talked about before and thus should not be in the summation because it’s sonly supposed to be about the rest of the text but in shorter format and never have new information, only the same information you have already talked about.

    I do agree with what you have said in the targeted audience section, but not the part about it requires multiple game sessions to get the hang of it. If you just read the rules even if they are a little complicated at first you should know the game after just one game, maybe two. And that brings me neatly to another part I want to talk about.

    You said that some people would help each other building a city so both would get the points but you forgot to talk about or didn’t know about the rule that says “At the end of the game, when there are no tiles remaining, all incomplete features are scored. Points are awarded to the players with the most followers in a feature.” This will make the people in the same city fight to have the most followers in it so they get the points and the other doesn’t. As I and my group understood it if it was a tie the players would split the amount of points.

    What I would recommend for next time is to write about all the parts we are supposed to in the analysis and write as much on them as you can so you get the 1600 words. Now you added info about expansions and awards just you so would get the required amount of words, but still you did not make it. So look at the assignments info and really write about those parts and you won’t have a problem next time.

    SvaraRadera
  2. Also I want to talk about this part “The game is recommended for any game board fan or casual player. Being a great blend of creative and strategic gameplay. It is best experienced with the maximum amount of four players, adding even more strategy and hectic exchanges in words between players.”. Recommending a game to everyone that is board game fans or casual players are like recommending chocolate flavor ice cream to someone just because they really like ice cream. For instance I really love ice cream and I really, really love it, but I hate most chocolate flavored ice cream, but I love chocolate. Not all game board fans like strategic games or all game types, not every casual player likes all types of board games. You should really be more specific, this is something that they teach us in our school, something we have to think about when we create a game. We need to know who we are making the game for and what those types of people like. We can’t say that we make a game for all humans or everyone that loves board games. Because then we will fail in making our game for the group we want to make it.

    With all that said I must say that I really like that you explained at the beginning how the game works, how it is played and how you score. That help the readers that haven’t played the game to better understand what you are writing about when you talk about the best and worst sides to the game and, what you find most interesting and what you think is the core game system.

    So to sum it all up I agree with you on the core game system, you don’t write about all the things we are supposed to write about and if you did you wouldn’t have problems to get to 1600 words. You can’t add new information in a summation of the text unless it is arbitrary to the text. Don’t recommend a game to everyone that likes games. And don’t forget to read the instructions for the assignment.

    Ps, there is also examples of old analyses in the instructions so you can see how others have done it.

    /Marcus Svensson

    SvaraRadera