Think Tank: Now with more brains!

Much to the amusement of my fellow attendees at the local IGDA chapter, I followed up last month’s rant about a board game of “human brains inside tanks” by arriving at the meeting carrying a prototype of just such a game. Here’s the cover:

(Images swiped from the Internet and used without permission or malice, but with a bit of ironic glee. Don’t worry, folks, this is strictly placeholder art. No one’s trying to rip you off.)

After a fun and enlightening presentation on camera-controlled video games (both in Flash and on the PS3) from our super-talented friends at PUNY Entertainment, I asked if anyone wanted to playtest Think Tank.

There was a moment of silence. Sure, it’s fun to talk about a game of brains in tanks. But to actually play it? Then the moment was over and I had two playtesters and enough spectators that my ego was suitably salved.

The game didn’t catch fire and kill us all. (I didn’t expect it to — alpha testing usually catches that sort of terminal meltdown before the game sees the public — but you never know.) It didn’t suck. It was even somewhat fun. And those who played it would be willing to play it again.

In other words, it was pretty good, but not great — and therefore not good enough.

That’s fine. That’s why I do playtesting. And that’s why, after a game of Twilight Imperium on Saturday, I make one of my friends play Think Tank with me.

This time, I was the player getting nailed by the bad cards. My tanks were spinning in circles and running into walls, taking damage with each hit until they died. It didn’t look like that part was fun when Chris at IGDA was suffering through it. And it didn’t feel like fun for me either.

We did away with the random cards, and that made the game more fun. But it also made it more… obvious. Now, “obvious” might not seem like a bad thing. It’s very close to “intuitive,” which is always good. But here’s the difference:

When a game or mechanic is intuitive, players say, “Of course that’s how it plays! Brilliant!” and are surprised that no one has thought of this before.

When a game or mechanic is obvious, players say, “Of course. And… then what?” They’re left waiting for the twist, the innovation, the extra something that says they couldn’t have whipped this up themselves during their lunch break.

I’m mulling some ideas. Maybe a mana-like resource for playing cards. Maybe keeping the card play the same, but add more interaction to the board. Maybe add variable powers to the tanks themselves before or even during the game (mmm… power-ups…).

I’ll try to have something worked out by next month’s meeting. If nothing else, Martin might want a rematch.