BoardGame phrases

No one will get mad. We were all new, once.

The words/Phases.
Prototype.
A playable version if the game, hand-made (as opposed to manufactured in quantity). There are usually many prototypes for a game: you make one and play it with some people, then make a new one based on changes from that first playing, play the new one, make another, etc., until you reach a final prototype.

These are people who can play the game and give you feedback about it who don't know you and won't be swayed due to any relationship with you. If your friends help you playtest, they can give you some good advice, but no matter how hard they try, they'll probably either try to spare your feelings by not being too critical, or will point out things that aren't really wrong because they secretly don't like you. :)

Objective playtesters in the truest sense are people who have never played a version of that game before. Since you're going to make changes again and again, if a group played an earlier version and are now playing a later one, their play will be influenced by the old rules, by things that worked or didn't work last time, that kind of thing.

To summarize, if they're objective, they have no reason not to evaluate the game fully and give you the complete honest truth about this version of the game.

The mechanics (or mechanisms) of a game are the actual rules that make the game work. In Monopoly the mechanics involve rolling dice to move around the board, buying properties, drawing cards, paying rent, etc.

Tweaking game mechanics is about making small changes in the rules and/or the prototype (like making changes to the cards and what they do) in order to slightly change how the game plays. For example, in a game where players fight each other with, say, armies of elves, you may have set it up so that archers cost 4 (something, 4 gold, 4 whatever) and swordsmen cost 1. After playing a time or two you see that even though archers are really powerful, no one ever buys them for 4 because they're too expensive, so you reduce the cost to 3 and see if it changes how the game plays.

All kinds of mechanics can be tweaked. Sometimes tiny changes (like the one described above) have very little effect, while other times such tiny changes have a tremendous effect, changing the game a ton, sometimes much to your surprise.

In case it's not clear from all of the above, most game design is done iteratively: you design, play, redesign, play, etc., always making your best guesses when designing/redesigning.

It's just like copyright everywhere else, and you get it the same way (your work is automatically copyrighted when you put it in some physical form, but you can file for $30 at http://www.copyright.gov for more protections). A copyright, just like with everything else, covers the particular expression of your game -- the words of the rules, the pictures on the board or cards or box, that kind of thing -- but does not protect the idea. Just like someone can write a book that's the exact same story as The DaVinci Code, as long as they don't use the same sentences and such, so too can someone make a game that is just like another game as long as they don't use the same words and pictures.

Only a patent protects an idea, and -- generally speaking, though click the word "Search" above, next to the words "Forum FAQ" to search for more about patents and games here -- games usually aren't patented.

In Monopoly, the theme is being a landlord in Atlantic City, buying up property, improving it, and charging people rent. Note how this is different than the mechanics described above, which have to do with rolling dice and moving around a board, etc.

The theme of Magic: The Gathering is wizards dueling by summoning creatures and drawing energy from the land. The mechanics of Magic: The Gathering are about building decks, drawing a card, playing cards, tapping cards (turning them sideways to indicate that they're used), etc.

Great, welcome aboard!

-- Matthew