Finalizing the design

Today we did some play testing of games to help other  groups with their games. Another group also play tested our game to see if the rules were clear, if the game was interesting and made sense, etc. We also split up the work that was remaining to be able to finish up the game by next time including who would work on the website, how we were going to find and formulate a box for our game, how we were going to improve our game board( move around the spaces that were marked as chance spots), how to improve the cards and acquiring the physical hoop.
We also discussed adding elements to our game as it was suggested that an additional strategic element be added to our game. We decided to add in foul shots and double dribbles using chance cards in order to add more basketball like elements to our game.
Finally we decided how to phrase the rules of the game in order to simplify it in the best way possible.

Class 5: Deciding what still needs to be done

Today we started out with deciding what still needs to be done in order to have a prototype of our game for next week which is ready to be played. This included making a list of the materials we would need to have a physical prototype of the game. We decided to split up who would finish what components and then got to work on them. A formal set of the rules was typed up which involved lots of discussion to clarify what we were finally deciding on as the rules underwent a series of changes in the past few weeks.

Other than that we worked with photoshop to put the finishing touches on our game board, and came up with the tasks and questions for the chance and the trivia cards. This also involved deciding how many chance and trivia cards we would need and what exactly they would look like and how they would be be incorporated into our game. We decided that the chance cards would correspond to certain spots on the game board itself while the trivia cards would be used to give an alternative to the physical component of the game which might no appeal to anyone. Similarly, we also decided to make the trivia cards multiple choice so that even those who do not have vast amount of knowledge about basketball could still play the game and win. However since the game is supposed to revolve around basketball we decided to only make the cards worth 1 point so that a player who keeps choosing the trivia cards as opposed to shooting the actual ball would not be able to gain massive amounts of points through that.

Finally we also discussed what game pieces we wanted to use and decided to use small checkers pieces for the time being for simplicity's sake. We might choose to make fancier player pieces next week if we have more time to acquire such pieces.

Class 4: Playing the game

Today we decided the dimensions we wanted our grid to be (12 squares by 7 squares) and played our game with a series of different possibilities to see how interesting/challenging our game was. This involved trying out different number of pieces per players, having more than one player on a team, having the board be different dimensions, adding a physical/ mental aspect to the game, changing up the rules so that each number of each die meant a different move each player could make etc. This made us realize which rules made the game easier/harder and also brought out some possibilities which did not change the difficulty of the game but simply made it more or less interesting.
We also realized how much strategy was involved in playing our game which came out when we were playing the game with players who knew more/less about basketball. After learning a little bit about photoshop, we started searching for basketball game boards to base our game board on. Our goal for today is to finalize the rules for the game so that next time we can start making our game board and figuring out the cards that will make up the mental portion of our game. We have yet to figure out the physical portion of our game which involves a basketball hoop.

Class 3: Establishing Rules for our Game

Today we worked on developing our basketball game to come up with the basic rules and then play the game with the basic rules we came up with to see if they were logistically feasible. We came up with an idea to combine strategy with luck by using some of the basic rules of basketball and then adding our own twist to it by having pieces on the  game board and using dice to determine when the pieces are moved. We decided that we would have about 2/3 pieces per player on the game board and then the strategy would be deciding how to move the pieces so as to get your piece to the other side with the ball while being on offense so that you can use the physical basketball hoop to try and shoot and score points. Ultimately the points you gain from this game come from the basketball hoop so the physical skill is pretty important. To tackle the problem of people who are not as good at the physical components not wanting to play the game we decided to possibly include trivia cards about basket ball so that people who may not be as good at the actual basketball, but rather are  good at knwoing facts about basketball would still want to play the game.
To simulate the actual basketball feel in the game board we decided we would have 2 colored dice, one green and one red where the green die would represent offense and the red die would represent defense. We are still in the process of coming up with set rules for the game such that both players would have a fair shot at gaining points in the game.

Class 2: First Grid Game

After much discussion wdr have decided on a basketball based grid game. We are still discussing the number of players involved in the game but the game is based around a basketball court but has a chance element involved which has dice and pieces moving around the board concerning the numbers on the die.

This game involves an external component which is a basketball hoop and the points the players can accumulate come from the baskets they make using the physical basketball set which we think will be provided with the game.

The logistics of what we want the game to be, i.e. how many players, how to decided offense, defense, the point system which determines how many spaces a player can move when they roll the die and which pieces they can move are yet to be decided.

Right now we are moving towards having two seperate boards, one for moving the pieces around the board and a half court for the actual shooting of the basket.