Fake Board Games as Video Games

As a developer of both board and video games, I'd have to say that you're correct in identifying "space" as the primary unit of limitation, not only in terms of component real-estate but in terms of "state space", that is, things that some part of the system needs to be keeping track of. In the example you gave, Advance Wars (a fantastic game, by the way!) such statistics as ammo count and HP count are kept track of for each individual unit; while this isn't ENTIRELY infeasible in a board-game environment (say, using Clix-type pieces for units, or spin-down dice as counters) it's definitely unwieldy and what some would consider "fiddly", and usually requires a reduction in State Space in order to make it work; Units in Advance Wars have 10 HP, to make that work in Skirmish Wars it was reduced, essentially, to 2. Ammo would probably need to be similarly kept-track of, or more likely, abstracted away entirely.

Abstraction is one of the tools that is used by both board game designers and video game designers, though in different places; For programmers/designers, abstraction is well known as a programming technique wherein complex systems are simplified by relating them to simpler ones with consistent methods of accessing and changing the systems. All of this is in the back-end, though; too often, video games err towards the side of simulation (I'm calling this an error, though many gamers would disagree) and provide control over insignificant aspects of their systems. A board game designer, having to contend with limited state space and real-estate, may choose to abstract something about the game away; for example, the ammo count in Advance Wars really only has two important states: Some Ammo and Empty, and it's refilled by going to a city and remaining there a turn. Why keep track of exactly how much ammo there is? Why not, instead of keeping track of 100 bullets, keep track of the state of "having some ammo" and some increasing chance that the state will change...

Anyway, you're doing the opposite thing of what I am talking about, implementing a board game as a video game with some advantages of that approach, which is something I have thought much less about... very interesting discussion indeed!

I agree about it being an error, but I do not agree about calling it "towards the side of simulation". Simulation does not have to imply adding detail or complex rules. The book Simulating War (Phil Sabin, 2012) is recommended reading on that subject. What you refer to is more about err towards the side of complexity. It is too easy on a computer to add complex algorithms and lots of data, overwhelming the player and making for very inelegant and difficult to balance games, and there is little correlation between all that added complexity/data and making a better simulator.

Well, that increasing chance is in my mind also as state that has to be tracked, unless you mean that the accumulated chance after a number of turn increases. I also find ammo/fuel counting in "simple" games like Advance War or Panzer General (or Panzer Tactics DS) annoying. Board wargames have solved that problem using simple trace of supply lines for decades. As long as a unit has a clear supply path back to a friendly supply source it is in supply, otherwise it is not and get some penalty to simulate lack of ammo/fuel. Very simple, and makes more sense anyway than units running away to refuel every now and then.

Good point, there are people that think you need a lot of detail for a simulation to be "realistic". But I think designers are mostly to blame for that, not players. Well, there is probably some players requesting any given piece of added detail, but I doubt many (any?) want ALL the details included in most games.

The silly thing about the tracking of ammo/fuel for units is how little realism it adds. It seems more like a simple thing to implement and explain to players (and easier for the AI player, not having to worry about being cut off from supply?) and that might SEEM realistic to players that have not read a lot about military history. Also when a game shows aircraft as being able to stay in the air for extremely long times before having to land to refuel, it should be obvious that simulation is not the main focus of those games anyway.

Then even if some detail is realistic to simulate something, like tracking ammo in a tactical game, how realistic is it that the commander can have accurate knowledge of the exact state of all his units at all times? Randomly deciding when a unit runs out of ammo is probably the most realistic thing to do, unless you can make a very detailed low-level simulation of ammo for each unit (but then probably don't tell the player anyway).

That is what I meant by "boardgames never hides information below annoying popup dialog windows either." Panzer General and Advance Wars and any other game I can think of shows no or very little information about a unit unless you select it and often you need to then bring up a special information window to get all information. Boardgames often show all information on all units immediately (although sometimes you need to look up some information in a table).

The problem is that supply doesn't really work like that. Again using Panzer General as an example, to resupply all you need to do is to stop for a turn not adjacent to enemy units. You can do this no matter how cut off or surrounded you are. This makes the game a lot less interesting since trying to cut off supply for enemy units is a big part of the strategy in most wargames (and in most real wars) and without that it mostly becomes a matter of attrition and paper-rock-scissors-attacks (ie remembering what unit type to use to attack what other unit type).

I agree with Pelle that most of the restrictions in the original post are straw men. Your list of 5 is more reasonable, but you've made two important omissions. First, you have not explicitly stated that "video game" means PC game in your discussion. Second you've failed to list the restrictions imposed by the computer medium.

If we acknowledge that "video game" can include devices like the iPhone, then the "infinite board" isn't practical.

As for restrictions of the computer medium, we have:

1) learning curve -- few people program well enough to prototype complex board games. Skill with Photoshop is more common, but far from universal.

2) 3D - if your game has a meaningful 3d component, the programming and art learning curve increases dramatically.

3) Physics - if your game has a meaningful physical component, the programming learning curve increases dramatically.

4) Gesture conversion - those who develop digital games spend a lot of time converting everyday gestures like shuffling cards and trading dice to movements with the mouse or swipes on the tablet. In the iPhone era, "hovering over with the mouse" isn't always an option. In the real world, there are professionals dedicated to this aspect of development.

5) Space -- Pelle already called his out, but you paved over his comment in your list of 5 above. While it's true that you can theoretically support a larger space on a computer, it's not practical. You allude to this, but you're not considering the changes in the digital world. Tablets and mobile phones have dramatically less space and an increasing market share.

6) Multiplayer - if you want a good multiplayer experience in your digital game, you will either need to know network programming or you'll have to work hard on you UI.

In my experience as a digital game developer, I have found most of your five restrictions to be largely irrelevant. Even time, which seems like an obvious truth, is not straightforward. Generally, the time-consuming algorithms in video games involve physics and 3d rendering -- items that analog designers get for free. It is a universal truth of game design - digital or analog - that making complex rules results in less player enjoyment.

Even an extreme case like Unreal Tournament has an analog version that predates its digital counterpart. Give any group of boys some toy laser guns and they will make rules for real time multiplayer science fiction combat. True, it won't be a board game, but it will be rendered in an appropriate analog medium.

You may not have realized that you did. You made reference to "hovering the mouse over" a unit to get extended info. That implies a PC with a mouse.

Indeed, you did. My apologies.

The other point I tried to make in that section was that, depending on the computer hardware, you have even less space than a normal board in which to work. That's why I brought up the iPhone. Not only is an "infinite board" impractical, a "board as big as a regular board game board" is also impractical. I was reiterating Pelle's point that, generally, video games are more restricted in space than board games.

Fair enough, but your post seemed to make broad generalizations about "board games" in general. There are board games with 3D components (Chopper Strike, for example). If you don't intend to include this element in your games, that's great, but you should point out the assumptions under which your list was developed.

Not exactly true. Most games with a dexterity component require physical modeling. Examples include Jenga (which you may not consider a board game), Tiddly Winks (which I hope you *do* consider a board game), and Taktika and Ascending Empires.

As with 3D, it's fine if you don't want to make this kind of game, but others do, so you should consider these things when making your generalized list, or point out your assumptions when publishing the list.

I admit that my previous post was unfair in many ways. I agree with you that some designs work better in one medium than another. It would be cursed hard to render Star Craft as a real-time board game, for instance. But my point is this: broad generalizations almost never hold, especially when they concern a medium as varied as digital computing. If you define "video game" as "a game designed to run on a computer," you've already lost the battle, because the "computer" could be a PS3 with a wide-screen HDTV or someone's programmable digital watch. The design constraints in these cases vary considerably.

Personally, I dislike the terms "video game" and "board game" because they mean different things to different people. I prefer to think of the game design as an abstract entity that exists independent of the medium, and the media in which designs are rendered as "digital" or "analog." The rendering of a game design into a digital medium will differ from the rendering of the design into an analog medium, just like a 3D model will differ from a sculpture. For that matter, renderings in different analog media will differ just as paintings differ from sculpture (or the sport of golf differs from a board game about golf).

In the end, I doubt our generalizations are of much use. By the time a designer has picked a project and embarked on development in his chosen medium, he'll find the devil is in the details. Yes, he'd be a fool to try to port Star Craft into board format exactly as it plays on a computer, but he could probably make a fun turn-based strategy game with many of the same units. Is he a fool to try? I don't know -- was Picasso a fool to try rendering 3D objects on a 2D canvas? Most people don't think so, even though it violated every "rule" people "understood" about the medium.

Food for thought.

Hey Lew,

I read your blog posts, and based on what I've seen, I think we have similar professional backgrounds. I enjoy your posts, and in the rare cases in which my opinion differs, I respect the points you make and the way you make them.

Given your preview paragraph, it sounds like this topic is one of those on which we disagree. I'll toss out some of my reasoning, and when I get a chance (probably in a week or two), I'll hit you up for the 5000 words you've written.

In general, I don't find the discussion of video games vs board games to be of much use because the terms are too broad, and, once you try to refine them, the whole thing falls apart. Here's what I mean:

-- What is a board game?
This should be easy, but it's not. Is an RPG a board game, even if it doesn't use a board? What about dexterity games like Jenga and Taktika? If RPGs that have no boards are board games, why isn't a game like Taktika a board game?

-- What is a video game?
This one is murkier. Is it a video game if it requires a computer? If so, then is Chess a board game when I play it with a friend, but a video game when I play it against an AI? If that's the case, how is the game design -- identical in both cases -- relevant to the discussion?

-- How does platform affect the discussion?
It's easy to say something like, "Starcraft is *clearly* a video game, because you can only play it on a computer." But I can't play it on just any computer -- it won't work on my Vic 20 or an iPhone. Sure, we could adjust the design to make it work on those machines, but if we allow design changes to accommodate different hardware, why do we disallow design changes to accommodate other media like chipboard?

-- What constitutes "play experience?"
You assert that the gameplay of the digital version of Settlers of Catan could easily be identical to the analog version, but I'm not so sure. A large part of the Settler's experience revolves around the social interaction of trade. The experience with 4 people sitting around a shared board differs significantly from that with virtual avatars distributed over the 'Net. Assuming one has the hardware to play an "electronic tabletop" version of the game, you can get back to all players around the table, but then you lose the hidden information aspect -- unless you introduce more hardware, like individual mobile phones, on which each player can see his personal information in private.

By the time you have a custom tabletop digital game with individual handheld devices, I'm not certain you can say you've reproduced the identical gameplay "easily."

Hopefully, you address these questions in more detail in your writing. As for me, I've concluded that game designs exist independent of the medium, and rendering the design into the differing media yields different results. This seems to be consistent with other art forms, where, for example, a sculptor and a painter could both render the same subject, and the audience could recognize the subject in both cases despite differences in the rendering.

Mark

Agreed. Maybe "game design" is the wrong word for what I'm driving at. "Game concept" is probably better.

It gets back to the art analogy: you and I look at the same person. You paint him in oils and I sculpt him. The results differ, as do the skills required, but we painted the same subject. Assuming we're reasonably skilled and rendering somewhat realistically, our audience will realize we've rendered the same subject.

Now consider chess: the work I do to make an analog version differs greatly from the work I do to make the digital version, but we recognize it as the same game. Why? There must exist a collection of abstract qualities we recognize as "chess" independent of the media in which it is rendered.

That, to me, is the "game design." The other parts are the "interface design" (and probably other areas of design I'm too thick to recognize).

Absolutely -- and that's one of the points I'm trying to make about the "video game vs board game" discussion. It's a straw man to talk about "video game" vs "board game" when what we're really talking about is "game rendered in medium A" vs "game rendered in medium B." Of course elements will change to accommodate the medium, but skilled artists should be able to produce recognizable renditions most of the time.

In some cases, it may be impossible to reproduce the results from one medium in another. For example, it's not possible to render all faces of a 3D object on a 2D canvas without distortion. That didn't stop Picasso from inventing Cubism, which is why I think discussions along the lines of, "Here are 'n' things you can do in computer games but not board games" are of limited use.

Please don't pervert the meaning of "analog" and "digital". *Dice* are digital. Use "non-electronic" and "electronic" if you must - I tend to say tabletop and video games.

See http://pulsiphergamedesign.blogspot.com/2011/10/analog-versus-digital-in...

Thanks for the link, Lew. When I get this game out the door, I'll dive in.

Good point about analog and digital, though I fear the inertia of popular culture is against you. Unfortunately, electronic vs non-electronic is loaded, too. is "Operation" an electronic game? Does that make it a video game? :P

Your point about "play experience" is also well taken. We need higher-precision vocabulary, because what you're saying is true, but it doesn't address my point: the social experience of sitting together with players differs substantially from that of interacting with unseen strangers via the 'Net. Both of those differ from sitting around an electronic board and managing your private information on a cell-phone-like device. If we include the design of the "social experience" with the game design, then the computerized and non-computerized versions are very different. On the other hand, if we say the game is only the mechanics, then we're back to "chess is chess whether or not it's rendered on a computer or in wood" -- which is to say the "game" as independent of the "medium."

I'm interested to see what you've written on this.

And Larienna, up to now, I haven't realized your stance on this. I think you and I have also been hung up on vocabulary issues. It just underscores how much -- and how differently -- we all invest in these broad terms.

Mark