solo play

Are you talking about a game that can be EITHER solo or with others? Regardless - I think there is a definite need for a strong, interesting solo mechanic, and not just some add-on afterthought either...

Open the floodgates, doho!

Sure I do. I also prefer performing with a jazz band over merely listening to a CD, and I prefer dinner with congenial company over dining alone. But sometimes I'm stuck without a jazz band to play with, or any good companions to share my meal, and then I must make do.

If you don't want to play solo games, or design solo games, then I suspect you're a member of a very large majority. But that doesn't mean that solo games are pointless or uninteresting.

So what's a good solo game like?

Most games are designed so that you struggle against your opponents within the context of the game. You don't struggle against the game, per se. So without opponents, there's nothing interesting to do.

However some games are designed so that the game system itself offers significant opposition. Cooperative games such as Arkham Horror and Shadows Over Camelot are good examples; there may be some non-cooperative games that fit the bill too. These games can be played solo because you do have an opponent who is always available: the game itself.

I would personally like to see some innovation in solo-play board games.

Not that I don't like playing with others...I do quite a bit.

But the aspect of a "puzzle", so to speak, is always fun.

There are those Triangle board games with golf pegs where the object of the game is to remove all by one peg by a series of checkers-like jumping patterns.

That's a pretty simple, but good solo-play game...though not really much in the way of repeated play...which is where I'd like to see more innovation.

Further, I would personally play any evolutionary/progressive game by myself if the object was to sustain something or the system ran off of avoidance contengencies to keep something from happening.

That could also be continually fun to come back to over time....like one plays solo-chess at the coat rack.

I think one potential way to look at solo-play board games is to see them as novelty games.

*shrug* dunno...but it's interesting to me at least.

I think there's plenty of room for solo board games and puzzles alongside traditional multi-player games. Different people have different preferences, and also different social opportunities. Providing choices for everyone sounds like a great idea to me.

As others have already touched upon, there should probably be some distinction between puzzles and games for one player. For example, is a Chess problem of the sort "white to move and mate in three turns" a game or a puzzle? I would say it's a puzzle because it has a known starting and ending condition, and the player's job is merely to trace the path from one to the other. There's nothing working against the player except knowledge of the potential movement tree, which can be mapped. I would categorize such problems as puzzles, even when, as in this example, such problems are based upon games. Likewise, I would categorize peg solitaire as a puzzle. The many moves necessary to reach the end are not hidden or actively working against the player. They just need to be mapped. Doing so may not be trivial, but it could be done.

Y'all may disagree with me, but I would categorize something as a game if there is any sort of antagonist. In most games, this is one or more other players, but I would also count passive antagonists such as random or hidden elements. So in, for another example, Vanished Planet, which can be played by one or more players, I would count the randomly drawn event cards as an antagonist, and therefore classify Vanished Planet as a game, even when played solo. On the flip side, I would classify something as a puzzle if there is no antagonist, even if there are multiple players. An example of a multi-player puzzle would be the island building exercises in Don Bone's excellent Sunda to Sahul.

So I think there is room, and a market, for both games and puzzles, played both solo and with multiple players. Don't be discouraged! Go ahead with your design, and good luck!

Clark

Sounds like a great GDS challenge... hope Bryk is listening!

http://www.davincigames.com/giocarea_eng/18/index.htm

Clark

Being the Chief Redactor of GiocAreA I was going to add just this information to this thread, then I saw your post.
Thank you!