Here’s an overview of my crazy “brains in tanks” game, Think Tank.
The Idea:
The idea here is a theme: that of sci-fi tanks driven by human brains. This theme implies a few game features such as, oh, I don’t know, tanks… probably on a board of some sort, probably fighting each other. The most obvious execution is that each player has one or more tanks on the board, and they fight. What’s the board look like? What’s the victory condition? Meh, those are details. We’ll worry about that later.
Target Audience:
I’m seeing this as a “light war game.” That is, it has the trappings of a war game (tanks blowing the crap out of each other), but lacks the complicated rules associated with traditional war games. Plus it has brains, which makes it a little “wacky” and off the radar of the traditional war gamer. Still, no matter how light and wacky, it’s still a war game, which means it probably won’t appeal to your mom or the Monopoly crowd.
So. Our audience is probably male, ages 12-30, who already play board games of this sort. We might refine this later, but for now, let’s aim it square at the heart of the hobby-gamer market.
Play Length:
As a “light” game, it shouldn’t go more than an hour. In fact, I have a feeling you’ll be able to play it in 30 minutes, so let’s say 30-60 minutes is our target duration.
Number of Players:
It’s always easiest to design for two players. But games that accommodate more players have a wider potential audience (i.e., can sell better). So let’s say 2-4 players, but design primarily for two players at the beginning. Once that’s working, we’ll worry about integrating the other two players.
Budget and Components:
Hmmm… Since there’s no publisher to set the budget, I’ll just take this opportunity to lay out the components I have in mind:
- Box, Rules, Insert – Standard stuff, with a box and insert large enough to hold everything, and rules no longer than they need to be.
- Tanks – Ideally, these would be plastic, about the size of Matchbox cars, in four different colors — but they could be cardboard for a lot less money. I’m thinking five tanks per player (so 20 tanks total in the game), and will design in such a way that it doesn’t matter if the tanks are plastic, cardboard, or marshmallow peeps.
- Cards – I always assume 100 cards. It’s a nice round number, and we can add or remove cards if necessary later.
- Board – Probably need a good sized board. I think I have a 22″ x 33″ board around for the prototype; let’s use that.
- Player Boards – I’m envisioning a “tank control panel” for each player. Probably card stock, printed on one side, about 8.5 x 11″.
- Punched Board – We’ll need tokens for damage markers and… other stuff. I’m sure I’ll think of something. Let’s call it one sheet of punched board, 8.5 x 11″.
- Dice – I’m not sure where I’m going with the dice, but know I want some. Let’s say four six-siders for now.
So we’ve got our rough idea and parameters. But how’s the game play? Good question, and I’ll get to that in my next post on the core mechanics.
