XB2001 - Paper Based Design

XB2001 started by taking a brief look at our tutor's past work, and promptly beginning our work for the semester.

To being we were to create a paper based designed game in groups with each group given a different task. My group received the task of created a 2 player game with the rules that it must be turn based and on a tiled board, similar to the way in which chess is basically set up.

The result of which was a board game called "Chicken Cross" which pitted 2 players at the task of crossing the road before the other chicken sitting on the opposite side of the road with a grid overlay.

The game's rules were as follows:

• Players draw 5 cards from a shuffled deck, each with a special effect on the game. 

• Players then roll at the start to determine who goes first.

• Player movement depends on dice roll. They can move left, right and up as many units as possible determined by the dice roll.

• Before a player moves they can place down a card which may have one of the effects listed below.

•   First player to reach the other side of the road wins.

• Additionally a dice will feature 3 faces coloured red whilst 3 are green to signify if a cards effect is positive or negative.

 Card                                        Effect

Cone                              Player places small obstacle taking up 1 grid on the board

Barricade                       Dependent on barricade type, blocks player movement

Traffic Jam                     Coloumn of cars cross the board for 2 turns blocking movement before
                                       moving on.

Oil Slick                         Area of 2x2 grids is placed on the board where a player either is granted +2
                                       moves if the player gets a green dice roll, or -2 moves if the dice roll is red.

Chicken Flight               Grants a player the ability to fly over barricades and other obstacles.

Citizen Help                   Enemy player misses a go.

Vehicular Drag Back     Roll dice, if even number appears the enemy player's next move will be
                                       halved, if however it's odd the card effects the other player.

Truck Smash                  When used the truck will either knock back the enemy player on a red dice
                                       roll, or knock the player forward 6 spaces

Once we had physically made the game we play tested it a couple of times to test how fun it was, and it was actually good fun. However the board was far too wide which made it very easy to avoid obstacles and it ended up being quite an easy and uneventful game. Although that is why you play test these things.