About Me
- Michael Filipek
- I am currently a student at the Ringling College of Art and Design, and a Junior in their Game Art program. I work hard to one day achieve my dream of working in the game industry!
Print and Play!
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So for our Game Design class, we were tasked to find and play some print and play games in order to understand the mechanics of game design, and understand what makes a game fun. With just paper and rules, Print and Play is the ultimate test of weather a game is fundamentally fun or not.
The first game I played with my buddy was called Sword and Sails, and is at heart a poor-man's Risk. It only has one page of rules, and is simple to understand. It's a very fun game which takes no time at all to set up and play, at least with only two players. I feel with more players it would be a blast, but would take a lot longer than 20-30 minutes! Also, the game relies on small pieces, so cutting those out and keeping track of those would take ages and would be a pain with more than two players.
I ending up winning the game by controlling all of the Empire of Hellas. I noticed after a couple of turns that to win you only had to take over one empire, and with empires such as Hellas and Germania that only needed 4-5 tiles to take over, I used the cards to my advantage and took over. I always loved strategy games like Risk, and this game scratches that itch, and without the inevitable phase of stacking units to completely destroy the Earth in Risk.
After playing Sword and Sails, my friend and I switched to a more puzzle based game called Triles. The game is a two player game where each player takes turns to place tiles until they win by having none left. It is extremely simple, and fun, it is kind of like pictorial chess, where one must make moves in anticipation of future moves to win. You place tiles in order to continue your colored wavy line, trying to cut off the opponent from forming their own lines, or to create certain shapes which let you take an extra turn, or discard a tile. It is a slow game, sort of like Sword and Sails, a thinking game. While interesting, it was not as fun as Sword and Sails for me.
Finally, my companion and I played a game that I found that interested me called Light Speed. It was advertised as an extremely fast game, came with not too many pieces, and only two pages of rules! Honestly, it was my favorite game out of the three we played. The game is an extremely fast paced game where players place ships on the field, and the orientation of the ships determines where they fire their lasers. Because of the fast paced game, most of us ended up shooting empty space as much as we shot our own ships by accident!
The great mechanic behind the game is that it depends on the players to set the pace. The "placing" phase ends when the first player to place all their ships yells "Stop!" Because of this, everyone races against each other to place all their ships on the field and get the advantage. However, speed is not necessarily the key to success, as one player who did not place 3 of his ships ended up winning one round! I just love the simplicity of the rules, and how nothing is left to chance, only the order of the ships drawn. However, there are two ways to win, either by destroying your enemies, or dodging lasers deftly and mining asteroids. Seeing as how this game can also be extended to play with up to 5 players (and honestly, you could even play it with as many as you want for an unforgettable experience!) it is a clear winner for fun and simplicity. Lastly, the pieces are large and not a pain to keep track of, which makes the game that much more enjoyable.
Entering the battle phase!
Ships ready to fire...
The aftermath...
After playing all these games, I realize that simplicity and accessibility are 100% the keys to enjoyably. While my partner and I were searching for games, we found tons of great sounding games, but either could not find all the pieces and rules to print them out and play them, or were presented with tens of sheets to print, cut, and assemble into games that looked simple! For example, we found a game called "Quick Joust" which looked promising, until we found the game came with 10 sheets of cards to print and cut, along with 12 pages of rules! Therefore, the main thing to think about while creating a small game to play for about 30 minutes is MAKE IT SIMPLE. No one wants to read 12 pages of rules and cut tiny pieces out for 2 hours just to play a 30 minute game. Also, if making it print and play, keep everything you need to play in one PDF! Some games were spread so thin it was a huge pain to hunt down and isolate what was needed, what was optional, and what was a translation.
The first game I played with my buddy was called Sword and Sails, and is at heart a poor-man's Risk. It only has one page of rules, and is simple to understand. It's a very fun game which takes no time at all to set up and play, at least with only two players. I feel with more players it would be a blast, but would take a lot longer than 20-30 minutes! Also, the game relies on small pieces, so cutting those out and keeping track of those would take ages and would be a pain with more than two players.
I ending up winning the game by controlling all of the Empire of Hellas. I noticed after a couple of turns that to win you only had to take over one empire, and with empires such as Hellas and Germania that only needed 4-5 tiles to take over, I used the cards to my advantage and took over. I always loved strategy games like Risk, and this game scratches that itch, and without the inevitable phase of stacking units to completely destroy the Earth in Risk.
After playing Sword and Sails, my friend and I switched to a more puzzle based game called Triles. The game is a two player game where each player takes turns to place tiles until they win by having none left. It is extremely simple, and fun, it is kind of like pictorial chess, where one must make moves in anticipation of future moves to win. You place tiles in order to continue your colored wavy line, trying to cut off the opponent from forming their own lines, or to create certain shapes which let you take an extra turn, or discard a tile. It is a slow game, sort of like Sword and Sails, a thinking game. While interesting, it was not as fun as Sword and Sails for me.
Finally, my companion and I played a game that I found that interested me called Light Speed. It was advertised as an extremely fast game, came with not too many pieces, and only two pages of rules! Honestly, it was my favorite game out of the three we played. The game is an extremely fast paced game where players place ships on the field, and the orientation of the ships determines where they fire their lasers. Because of the fast paced game, most of us ended up shooting empty space as much as we shot our own ships by accident!
The great mechanic behind the game is that it depends on the players to set the pace. The "placing" phase ends when the first player to place all their ships yells "Stop!" Because of this, everyone races against each other to place all their ships on the field and get the advantage. However, speed is not necessarily the key to success, as one player who did not place 3 of his ships ended up winning one round! I just love the simplicity of the rules, and how nothing is left to chance, only the order of the ships drawn. However, there are two ways to win, either by destroying your enemies, or dodging lasers deftly and mining asteroids. Seeing as how this game can also be extended to play with up to 5 players (and honestly, you could even play it with as many as you want for an unforgettable experience!) it is a clear winner for fun and simplicity. Lastly, the pieces are large and not a pain to keep track of, which makes the game that much more enjoyable.
Entering the battle phase!
Ships ready to fire...
The aftermath...
After playing all these games, I realize that simplicity and accessibility are 100% the keys to enjoyably. While my partner and I were searching for games, we found tons of great sounding games, but either could not find all the pieces and rules to print them out and play them, or were presented with tens of sheets to print, cut, and assemble into games that looked simple! For example, we found a game called "Quick Joust" which looked promising, until we found the game came with 10 sheets of cards to print and cut, along with 12 pages of rules! Therefore, the main thing to think about while creating a small game to play for about 30 minutes is MAKE IT SIMPLE. No one wants to read 12 pages of rules and cut tiny pieces out for 2 hours just to play a 30 minute game. Also, if making it print and play, keep everything you need to play in one PDF! Some games were spread so thin it was a huge pain to hunt down and isolate what was needed, what was optional, and what was a translation.
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