Prototypes - Visual Enjoyment vs Mechanical Enjoyment

JD,

First, let me echo Jon's comment and agree that commissioning "some" artwork goes a long way in helping to establish the feel for a game. To that end, I'll share a story with two different paths.

I'm currently serving as the Developer for another BGDF contributor, Kris, on his game Tradewars: Homeworld. While I'm not an avid card gamer, I was struck by the interesting game mechanic AND moreover, the exceptional artwork associated with the game. I would defy anyone to show me better artwork by a newcomer.

This leads me to the second half of the story...producing a prototype. I've been play-testing hex-and-counter war games for five years and developing games and expansions for the last few years and a well made prototype is worth the money. Kris had his produced at The Game Crafter, and they do a great job on the components, especially cards.

Finally, a word on play-testing. Definitely have it play-tested...a lot! A recent video by The Game Crafter actually quantifies the advice, stating a game should be play-tested 100 times by 100 people. While that may sound daunting, you will absolutely accomplish it in one extended stay at a gaming convention.

I wish you luck in your endeavors!

Cheers,
Joe

I've always felt that if you got nothing visual to show during play testing, you've got nothing. But that's just me, I've got much more experience in artsy stuff than design.

Also by having something that's kind of final on the table, you can "trick" people to play a board game instead of just play test something random. I know I would act differently to to a game that's just pushing a pile of handwritten paper around.

I've had just a handful of play test games for my zombie themed thing (shameless self promote: http://jarecsblog.blogspot.fi), but the first thing after I gathered the main concepts for the game, was to powerpaint like a 100 zombies.

Having something complete also gives more inspiration to carry on since that's one mark crossed over from the things-to-do list.

The way I see it is my initial prototypes are usually B&W. I playtest those myself and I get the opportunity to work on the game's mechanics. I should know whether the game's mechanics are working together well enough to let's say create a prototype for consumption by let's say a playtesting group.

My way of thinking is this: if you can show some artwork of what you would like your game to look like - and people like it - that kind of art adds value to the game.

But I believe it's a false impression that the game would be any less good if we used B&W cards. Sometime I think it's the opposite: a game looks really GOOD because it has impressive artwork - but the game isn't very interesting to gamers.

This is something akin to saying "All good Graphic Designers are good Game Designers." That's a completely false statement. In most instances it's more like "All good Game Designers are poor Graphic Designers. And good Graphic Designers would hope to be good Game Designers..." Or more the distinction that artwork and game design are two separate trades and they require a different set of skills.

Finding someone who is good at BOTH is hard/rare.

If you are finding that your plain B&W prototypes aren't quite what they are actually supposed to be - maybe you need to revise your game. Having fancy artwork doesn't make the game any better. Note I also have an artist for my current production - and I agree having great artwork improves in the overall professionalism and it does makes a difference. Here's a sample:

BUT my game's mechanics which are about HOW the game plays - is what playtesters are trying to figure out. Do they mesh well with the other mechanics in the game. Are there some things that need revision? Or because this aspect of the game is sort of weaker than other areas of the game, etc.

I am always aware of what aspects of my games are the "weaker" elements to my games. That's why I want to have the game playtested by more people to get even more feedback. The other thing is, if you playtest a B&W copy of the game, it's virtually the same like art you download from the Internet. The plus with REAL artwork is having people who playtested the B&W copies of the games - see what the final product will look like.

And that's what gets people excited about the game.

But that's not true about every publisher... Quite the contrary: they don't care about the final artwork. It's not a selling point. Most publishers that I have approached say the artwork is nice - but it's not a reason to give me a publishing deal. Or maybe I should say, it's not ENOUGH to give me a publishing deal.

Differentiation in the market is what some publishers are looking for: "So your game is about Zombies, what makes it different?" And fundamentally every game is different from the other games - I guess I'm not certain what people are looking for (in terms of designs).

People currently playtesting the game - actually like it. I have been given a median score of 7.0. That's pretty good grade from an independent blind playtesting group (12 members).

So I think the key is - people are always looking for the NEXT Dominion. But then again, most deck-builder are just "another deck-builder"?!

Snakes & Ladders, Candyland, Monopoly, Clue, Sorry! are ALL roll & move games. They fundamentally are the same style of game - and yet they are some of the MOST popular games ever sold... So you have got to stay positive and keep trying to find someone who will be interested in YOUR game... Being in the prototype stage is still early on in a game's cycle. Don't worry if the artwork is not complete... Maybe have 10 out of 100 cards to show off what the game will eventually look like.

BUT remember a publisher will most likely produce the game with their OWN artists... Not your artwork. And also most designers are happy with that because they don't have fancy artwork to sell along with their game...

I was going to say that the prototype cards on the left is pretty much like any other prototype out there. Okay so maybe the Frog is a little bit better - but I'm sure you could find other clipart of frogs that would look similar.

And to be real honest, I think if the game was FUN I could easily play it as it is (in B&W). But I'm not 100% convinced about how fun the game really is... It seems like a simpler version of Magic: The Gathering... All the same concepts, nothing really *new* or innovating (from my perspective).

That's just my opinion. Also I am designing a "duel" game and we have really innovative ideas - but we are having a hard time matching the innovative aspect of the game to the "core" of how the duel will actually resolve. So our innovation is pretty unique (unique game concept) but the gameplay (game design) is still in progress...

I am trying out HearthStone because A> it's a Blizzard game and I loved StarCraft and Warcraft, B> because it's a card game, C> I have a similar video game I would like to design.

From my first game, I'm not too impressed. Sure the graphics are way over the top, something I cannot achieve using a board and cards - but the question about "Is this a good game?" still remains unresolved in my mind.

I will give the game some chance and play a few more games before deciding... But from a first view, I'm not seeing anything really new.

Blizzard is known for not really bringing in anything new; they excel in polishing existing genres, which is why their games are so well liked. I agree that Hearthstone is a simpler version of Magic; however I would argue that the game is more (for lack of a better term) the World of Warcraft Trading Card game cut in half...BUT the WoW TCG is a polished version of Magic.

Is that wrong? Well you decide. It may be wrong and disappointing for you, but it's raking in tons of cash, nominated (and won) a lot of awards. It targets a certain crowd and just because you don't belong in that crowd doesn't mean the game went "wrong".

Personally I like to put together the game design in a simple bullet point format and then slap together some simple mockups to do the initial solo testing.

The first few multi-player tests I do with a design partner or my wife are usually with something slapped together with generic clipart.

After that I like to make a look-and-feel mockup with art representative of the theme I am going for before showing the game to close friends.

And finally before exposing anyone outside of my circle of friends to the game I like to have a prototype that is good enough for print-and-play or possibly even for sale via a site like The Gamecrafter.

I may be a bit crazy though as I am looking at using tinkercad to make a few 3d pieces and have them printed via a online 3d printer service just to have a decent prototype to shop around to publishers..

I love that you put together some art. I really do feel that all aspects of the game from mechanics to art to narrative all work together to create a single experience.

=M=

I'm firmly in the camp that having some basic artwork to capture the feel of the game is crucial to understanding how much fun people will have playing the game. Of course the mechanics are king, but without some kind of visual theme to guide the play, the human brain just doesn't get as engaged. The game has to tell a story, and some kind of art to guide that helps immensely (and the science of how we learn and have fun bears this out - images help stimulate emotional response much better than words ever will).

I also find that having some kind of art for the prototype helps me personally - I actually enjoy designing the game more (and getting through some of the rough spots more). The difference I felt from throwing a Hubble photo of a galaxy as onto the background of my space game board instead of just having a white hex board was significant. I enjoy staring at it alot more when I have to, and it just makes it feel more real and motivating, regardless of the mechanics.

I'm not an artist (not a good one anyway), so I usually troll the Internet for public domain pictures I can use that are "good enough" to capture the feel of the component. Not only does this help bring out the theme for playtesting, but it also helps creates some basic guidelines for my ideas for an artist if I later hire one.

YMMV, but I think if you really want to get the best response from your play testers, spending a few hours downloading some passable artwork may be worth the time.

I am new to bgdf.com and I couldn't resist registering so I could comment on this thread. I am mid way on my very first game design and hope to discuss it here eventually.

In terms of the question about artwork I wanted to chime in. I come from the world of interface design and usability, often called User Experience Design. It is well researched that aesthetics impact how people perceive a system. in the world of gaming I am certain that the way it looks impacts the way people think about it.

It is shown that when people perceive something as attractive or beautiful they tend to find the good qualities in it. In contrast, if they perceive it as unattractive or as having poor aesthetics, they will seek out the flaws in it.

I think that for we must strike a balance between putting in "real" artwork and the need to move quickly. And obviously, if your testing a games mechanics the artwork is not important.

I believe that we can and should play test the artwork as thoroughly as we would any other component of the game.

These comments are all gold. And as mcneipl stated, it's not just an opinion - there's research to back this up (in both the UX field and neuroscience).

Absolutely true. Though we might not test out the art during playtesting, at some point we need to test it out, and playtesting may be the best chance we have to at least test out the art concepts.

The point here isn't that great mechanics won't win over playtesters - they will. The point is that a lack of passable art may dampen the enthusiasm of playtesters, and it would be a shame to miss the chance to test out the art concepts during playtesting (because you're not going to do a whole nother round of playtesting just to get feedback on the artwork).

This may be askew of the topic a bit.

I'd say games that make good use of theme probably depend more on good art as part of the 'beta' prototype testing phase. I'm down the middle here -- I think you need a solid, fun, playable game without art -- if it needs art to succeed in that basic round, that's probably a bad sign.

But a game that's been conceived without theme and then had the theme stuck on will show it. This is the feeling I get about many Knizia games. Lost cities, for example, is an interesting game, but its theme feels entirely tacked on. I'd think the playtesting angle for a game that has strong theme must include playtesting the art.