Is there any way?
Or any game that you know of?
That prevents players from cheating while playing alone?
The only way that I can think of is that a player can play for more then 1 player --> RPG style. And feels obligated to each to reach success. An example in this is that with RISK, I always liked for any color to win. So I did my best for any color that they would have the best results.
But how to trigger players for doing that?
I know of a handful of single player games, but none of them has any cheating precautions, because if you do cheat, the only person you are cheating is yourself...
There's one particular puzzle that is well-known. If you cheat there and claim you solved it in less moves than someone else, they're going to request proof you can't deliver on. For me, that's usually enough incentive not to lie.
HelloGregor on youtube has an interesting solitaire method... definitely worth a watch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsSbJhGH0cQ&list=SPF62104FC7A7FE21A
There are many single-player games, and it is a favorite subject of mine.
The BGG definitive list of single player games geeklist currently includes 591 games:
http://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/11710/always-alone-the-definitive-list...
I can also (sorry for mentioning this probably 5 or so times here in the last months, but it is definitely THE place to start if anyone wants to look into designing or playing single-player boardgames) have a look at this years bgg solitaire game design competition, that is going into the voting phase right now:
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1002891/2013-solitaire-print-and-play-co...
Cheating? Who would you cheat but yourself? The closest to cheating-prevention in a solitaire boardgame I have seen is the mission cartridge sleeve in Ambush! that prevents you from accidentally seeing paragraph numbers for unexplored locations (because if they just listed the numbers in order it would be far too obvious what are in nearby locations even if you did not try to cheat):
http://boardgamegeek.com/image/93878/ambush?size=large
(It is of course trivial to cheat anyway if you WANT to.)
Of course players of gamebooks are known to cheat A LOT (that includes me) because most books are pretty much impossible to win without a thousand replays unless you bend the rules a bit ("oops, turning left was insta-death; guess I turned right then"). I never saw a solitaire boardgame that was so badly balanced that I felt like cheating was an option, and I think (or hope) that modern gamebooks are better. Speaking of gamebooks those are of course closely related to solitaire boardgames, and you might pick up something interesting by eg looking at the entries for the 2013 Windhammer Prize:
http://www.arborell.com/windhammer_prize.html
(Looking forward to downloading and reading/playing those books, but have not taken the time yet.)
I don't see the point of trying to prevent cheating in a one player game. The only reason to play a single player game would be to entertain yourself...and honestly, if the player is entertained by cheating...let them. Most people are going to follow the rules and those that don't...no matter what kind of game you make they can still cheat, even if it's just by saying "I win!" and putting the game away.
In short, I think you're trying to design away a non-problem. Your time would probably be better spent on making the game fun enough that playing by the rules provides a satisfying experience.
Point taken. Even 2 or more players could cheat. I never forget those games with my cousin when playing monopoly.
But what would be more fun?
- The player has to win with his one and only army, while missions could be so hard that the player eventually has only 10% chance of winning? (Last mission)
- The player cheers for 2 or more armies. Balanced in such a way that each side has a fair chance of winning. These missions could also be played with 2 or more players.
I am also tackling another problem by doing this:
Writing AI is harder then letting the player think for both armies.
Strategy is very complex in my game, in such way that writing AI would be nearly impossible. I don't know what the AI and the player is going to have as armies after a set of time. I could go guessing, but that leaves me with a huge tree of possibilities. More then 33 different units, not counting main structures. In any combination.
Anyway, by not letting the player know how the story would continue unless the player plays the mission. I am hoping in stimulating them by "less" cheating. And each well played battle will give its own story, perhaps even to remember.
No, there are entries by many first-time designers, and designers that have never published anything except for contributing to such competitions. It's a great way to learn and to get feedback on designs (look at some of the entry threads and you will see that many designers get a lot of quality feedback there).
If you look at some existing one-player games you will find that they are DESIGNED as one-player games. They are not just any two-player games that have then had some kind of AI added to it. You design in the enemy army as part of the game system, not as an AI second player. Luckily there are 30+ years of experience in designing solitaire games that you can borrow ideas and mechanics from and thanks to so many reviews and rulebooks being available free online you can research this very easily.
There are (have I learned from forums) some players that prefer to
play a two-player game solitaire to playing a game designed for one
player. Doesn't work for me though. Don't think I ever saw a game that
was marketed as being for one player but required the player to play
both side.
I thought you took the point about not bothering about cheating? :)
Stop worrying. If players enjoy cheating, let them. If they don't
they won't. Although as in my example from Ambush! I don't think it
hurts to make it more difficult to accidentally cheat.
Gamebooks can't stop cheating despite the stories, because you can
easily go back to remake bad decisions. I don't see how to prevent
that. Even the digital app versions of some old gamebooks that now
exist have included an option to go back, because the developers know
players want to be able to cheat.
They can cheat any time if they want to. It is impossible to prevent if I think about it. But they would only do so if they prefer a side in combat.
Although, not being faithful to any side would mean they play fair for both sides.
The "book" would allow 1 player to play for 2 sides. But it would also allow 2 players to fight each other. If I design the book in such a way, then the player rather not cheats because he/she would like to follow the story that happens by chance. A random story.
Now here is a question:
Would players love to have a certain chronological path of the story?
Examples: Only a few chapters get a turn, Chapter 1,4,7,9 or Chapter 1,2,8 or Chapter 1,3,4,5,8 etc.
Or would they rather have the whole story in any order?
Examples: All chapters get a turn, Chapter 1,7,3,4,9,2,6,5,8 or Chapter 1,7,4,3,8,5,6,9,2
Making it difficult to make mistakes? Hmmmm, I made mistakes myself occasional in calculations. The only way in preventing this is to get experienced in the calculations. But the game itself, I don't know if accidental cheats could occur. The biggest difficulty would be the special rule about +1 on the range of units. Which is unfortunately necessary for the balance.
They can cheat any time if they want to. It is impossible to prevent if I think about it. But they would only do so if they prefer a side in combat.
But you often do that even for no reason. I have tried some two-player games solitaire, and it is very difficult even if I wanted to to not play one side more than the other.
If playing 1 player is no different from playing 2 players, ie there is no AI, then it is just a 2-player game imo that some people may choose to play alone (which people do very frequently anyway). You are talking about something that is more like a story generator?
The only game I know of that has an interesting play-both-sides mechanic is
Peloponnesian War where you play one side until it is going too well, then you switch to play the enemy side, so you are always on the losing side. Have not played it and do not remember the details like how the AI works for the side currently not being played.
Sorry, can't help because I don't really understand what you are doing.
Worrying about cheating is generally not productive. Those who are inclined to cheat will find a way to do so whether or not you've got a check in place for a specific thing. For example, if you're playing Power Grid and always count what people hand in to pay for things to make sure they're not cheating, this will not stop them from sliding extra money from the bank into their pile. This is doubly true in solitaire games. Not something to worry about.
I will say that you should aim at rules/usability that helps to prevent ACCIDENTAL cheating. For example, if you have 15 variables to account for when calculating income that have to be factored in separately every time, SOMEONE is going to accidentally give themselves too much or too little. Either streamline the variables, or have the board/whatever self-monitor via the mechanics.
Also to note, lots of co-ops that don't have an information restriction are playable solo, even if they don't say so specifically. Pandemic and Warhammer Quest, for example.
Well, I guess the game has 2 players as a minimum then. The third and beyond party could be played randomly or fixed by these 2 players. 1 Player simply can cheer and cheat for whatever side he/she wants.
There is no need for a story book then. Although, I could give directions for the players to learn the game through some sort of difficulty settings, instead. The missions themselves can be all stand alone missions. For the players to choose from. Memoir44 allows you to choose as well. It also gives me freedom to think of more missions that don't fit into the story.
By the chapters, I meant if players like to see everything from the book. All chapters sort of speak. Or that they rather play multiple times to see complete different chapters each time. Although mission 1 would always return.
I used to work for a game company called Victory Point Games. A large part of their library is dedicated to single player board/card games. One of their game lines is called "State of Siege", where you're, more or less, defending a central location while enemy units are slowly creeping towards you. Most of those games are historical, but there are some great ones like Dawn of the Zeds.
I'm not too familiar with one-player board games, but I'm actually going to be designing one, because the idea I have seems best suited to one person rather than a group. So this is my opinion:
I don't think it can be prevented. However, I would think most people who choose to play one-player games would follow the rules and self-regulate, because it's more challenging and more fun to do that. If you cheat, you might win, but there would be no satisfaction in that win because you would know you cheated.
From personal experience, I've played several solo games of Agricola, and haven't cheated once (at least not on purpose, had some confusion with the rules). I didn't want to cheat, because I wanted to beat the game the right way. I would find no satisfaction in winning by cheating.
I know, another post about escape, BUT, I find that I actually add extra gems (which makes it harder to escape in the end) just to up the difficulty level of the game. The base game is a tad too easy for us older people but the game is still super fun, even the solo variant.
The kind of people that are playing solo board games are the kind that most likely are going to be playing it for the challenge and fun of it. I doubt cheating will be a problem.
In my current game, I have devised a "Solitaire" Scenario which has a goal of allowing ONE (1) player to play a game ALONE. Previously, in prototype #7, it was a VERY challenging and daunting task. I have to admit it was HARD to win the game (and beat *The Derelict*).
I'm not sure prototype #8 will be as difficult. After playtests, I determined that I needed to LOWER the health points required by a player's Homeworld (think base). Basically in game with several players, the number of health points was TOO HIGH. It took too long to defeat an opponent. So I had to lower the amount to 18 health points (down from 30)...
Doing this, I was unsure what needed to be done so that prototype #8 retained that TENSION as in solitary game play of prototype #7. So what I did was lower The Derelict's Resistance (Defence) from 12 to 9. So your Homeworld is weaker so should be The Derelict.
Next I gave The Derelict a "Special Ability" while lowering it's Firepower to 3. So 18/3 = 6 successful attacks. Not too bad. The "Special Ability" is that every three (3) turns, The Derelict's Firepower is boosted by +2 (So 5 Firepower). What this does is RIP through a starship's defences like in prototype #7... every 3 turns. Otherwise the starship is AVERAGE on attack.
I hope these measures will somehow conserve the TENSION in prototype #7. Because in that version, the solo scenario was WORTHWHILE playing... I can't imagine a player WANTING to cheat. So you win - by cheating... This is counter-productive. Why would you play if you are going to cheat??? Might as well NOT PLAY and say that you're saving time by not playing (and therefore not losing...)
So I have not put any special "measures" so that player's don't cheat... But what's the point in cheating?!
It surprises me that people still answer the first post. :D While I moved on. But that is ok.
Anyway, these are the decisions that I made for my game:
1)- The game is for 2-3 players, and 1 to 4 AI. So are the missions and maps. (A hexagon map is dividable by 2, 3, 4 and 6 corners)
2)- A cooperative story, where the 2 players compete in being the best. Yet they sometimes need to work together for reaching a goal. The third (perhaps fourth or more) army is the enemy and played by both players: 1 or 3 decided by random. 2(+1=3) or 4 is fixed control or again decided by random. A third player could be the AI, but he/she is going to have a hard time. Unless he/she has 2 or more AI to play with.
3)- A cooperative story for 3 players. AI is handled in the same way again. A fourth player could handle the AI.
4)- Missions can be played separately. An extra paragraph for each mission gives extra bonuses that players could get for completing the missions. These bonuses are given in the next round.
5)- Each map can also be used for skirmish. Where 2 to 3 players truly can fight each other to the "death".
6)- If there is one player, he/she simply has to root for each army. There is not going to be missions designed for 1 player.
Meanwhile I have other things to do on my game.
-Fixing the manual, I don't understand certain part myself :).
-Fixing the structure tech tree. Renewing the costs for structures, almost there.
-Resolving 2 rules that are in tactical conflict which could destroy my game if not solved, a 50-50 solution perhaps? Needs testing, a lot.
-Whenever, writing new mission idea's. Later on I can put them in chronological order.
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Glad, I asked this question. Thanks for the replies.
I took a look at the 591 list, BIG LIST!:
The best ones are puzzles and/or skill games (Labyrinth).
Puzzle style;
You can't cheat with puzzles. But they are an one time only. If I where to turn my game into a puzzle, I would have to remove all the gamble. (No Event Cards, no dice rolling, no terrain influence, etc.) But it is possible. However designing these "puzzle" missions would require me to solve them too. Like solving a chess puzzle, but then more complicated. I'll keep it as an option. However, once solves... I don't think they would be fun to do. Would they?
Skill style;
I have no clue on how to implement this into a war game.
Some on that forum say that a dice fest can still be a fest. I guess I should trust players then. But I am rather be sure and safe, and make it as hard as possible for them to cheat anyway.
Competition:
Interesting, however as an amateur, I will never enter such a thing. Sounds like a competition for the real workers.
But once again, a BIG list. And I see you in there as well :) .
Ambush:
Interesting game. But also cheat friendly.
Books:
Now we are getting somewhere fast. I always had a feel like that I had to put the conditions in a book for each mission. The book would be a story. And 1 or another success would lead to another page. However, it would be 2 or more armies fighting each other. For the player to do so. It doesn't matter who wins. But the player can play the story on the board itself. Depending on the dice rolls, the story follows. However, I need the missions to be very balanced. Because the outcome ratio of for example 60 to 40 is already decisive for the rest of the story.
One of my idea's would be, that army A wants to destroy Tank prototypes. Army B wants them to survive. It is up to the player to see what Army B could do best. Then to see with dice rolls if Army B succeeds in your plan. But the same goes for army A. For that mission, I could set up several "winning" conditions. That would influence the entire story later on.
Of course players need to cheat if they are ever to read every page and play every possible start of a mission.
HelloGregor:
Right, that method is... interesting. But then again. Each color has it's own personality when I play Risk. When I play Monopoly, I set goals for each pawn (sort of personality for the pawns). So notching new in there for me, sorry.
anonymousmagic:
Which puzzle are you talking about? Rubic's cube? :) Which I can solve, but not in the way intended :) .