Digital Playtesting

This industry has such small margins that I wouldn't worry about Digital Ownership rights... From what I have seen in the Digital world... it is not at all the same experience as playing and HOLDING the cards themselves.

It very mechanical, "F"lip a card to see its backside, "Z"oom to actually be able to read what is written on the card, etc.

To me it's not as "Exciting" or "Exhilarating" as sitting down at a table and playing the game face-to-face.

But that my own experience... And from what I have tried to experiment with in the Digital world (TableTopia)...

I'm a little confused on exactly what you're asking. I keep reading to separate, unrelated questions.

The first question is "How do you feel about digital prototyping" and the related aspects.

My thought is that it's a perfectly fine thing to do but there is a major difference between board game and video games. Board games require very little work to prototype and test, video games require alot of effort to prototype.

Even factoring out the engine work and making a TTS or vassal module building the prototype will take a while unless you are highly experienced with the engine.

Yeah, it's nice to be able to test with loads of people across the internet without PnP costs... but it's not always the wisest option to take. Most of the time, I find it quicker and cheaper to just bring it to random FLGS.

The second question I see was "You don't own the digital rights to your game?"

This depends on the contract. If you are self publishing, sure... you own it. But with a publisher you generally give them ALL rights. Physical, digital, international etc.

I have Table Top Simulator and have tinkered with it on occasion, but shied away from subscription-based "services" like Tabletopia.

Personally, I prefer a physical prototype, even if it's a rough first draft cobbled together. I also have the advantage of a couple meetings a month with local designers, so it's worth it for me to have physical prototypes - and the crowd I work with knows that these are projects and not reflective of the final product.

It takes a little time to become used to the interface of TTS, and the relative ease of constructing a physical prototype outweighs the design time and learning curve required to create a project in TTS. However, if I didn't have local designers to work with so frequently, I'm sure I would be pouring more energy, effort, and time into TTS, promote its use heavily, and be an ace at the interface.

Oh, this I can do.

You know the big terms of agreement that you click "I agree" when installing nearly all digital games? They usually explain that you are not purchasing a product, but a "License to Use" the product.

If they violate the agreement, they reserve the the right to revoke that license. You DON'T own the product, you own the license. Heck, where the digital storefronts are concerned, sometimes they take it away anyways.

Exactly how it works in practice depends. I have a handful of games on steam that were removed from the store either because of contract running out, companies withdrawing, or steam banning them... With steam, they still let me download those games.

One the Google Play on the other hand? I lost access to them completely when the store decided to terminate the relationship. This bothered me and signaled the end of my collecting for their store, but I agreed to it with my initial "I accept" button.

- - -

TTS isn't selling you board games, they are selling you a virtual tabletop with which you play games except for their few individual featured games that you pay for. This is legally important.

The vast majority of the modules on TTS (And Vassal) are copyright violations. Unless it's a module put up by the designers/copyright holder as an alternative way to play the game... they had no rights to transfer or reproduce the game.

You don't own them because they were never Vassal's to give away. It's the same as if you bought a stolen watch... the watch will be returned to the original owner because the thief had no right to transfer ownership in the first place.

Now, it's important to say outside of legal aspects... most publishers and designers don't mind virtual tabletop play. They let it happen because the benefits outweigh the costs and we're glad people can play the games online with friends.

But in cases where they don't feel that way, publishers can and do have the modules removed. There are many modules on Vassal that are missing play tables because the publishers specifically demanded it so that only owners of the real game can play the virtual version.

The copyright owners are the ones who own the rights.

If you create your own game from scratch and put in on vassal... that makes you the copyright owner. If you recreate Fantasy Flight's latest game... they are the copyright owner and they may not be happy.

I think you are not understanding. TTS is LICENSED to you. You DON'T OWN IT. Therefore what that means is that TTS reserves the right to REVOKE YOUR license at ANY GIVEN TIME. They don't OWN the rights to your game... They own the rights to the TTS platform/software. And they don't guarantee that you own anything that belongs to them...

Like McTeddy explained, you're only a licensee. Service can be REVOKED at any given time... Like a buy-out or a bankruptcy.

You own all the rights to your own TTS module (are they separate files???). I'm not familiar with TTS... But my guess is that you own whatever your own module is and whatever content you upload (Images).

For TableTopia, you OWN the IP of all the uploaded content. It's ALL copyright and only the owner can USE it in any game online. But much like TTS, TT offers you a license to use TT. You don't own the platform (how could you, it's all online). Everything you upload, you must certify that you OWN the IP. And by uploading you agree with the terms & conditions of using that IP online.

Maybe that's a bit more clear...

Without stepping into the minefield of "ownership rights" and other legal conundra, I'll simply answer the question as it relates to playtesting.

Given the technology at our fingertips, it's an essential aspect of playtesting. As a developer, I've recommended this approach to designers as it permits a much wider audience to playtest the game. As someone who has shipped games around the country, it's labor-intensive, not particularly timely, and costly.

I've found it much easier to establish dates and times for playtesters to get together into the virtual room, with the game already set-up and playtest for an hour or two, rather than try to get folks over to someone's house or a public space to do so.

Digital playtesting will only grow in the years ahead, due to the ease by which one can create the prototype and the accessibility for the playtesters.

Cheers,
Joe

The "single point of failure" remaining with VASSAL is that all games online are played through a central server. (You can still play off-line for solitaire testing without having to connect to any server.) But the plan for the next version is to remove that remaining obstacle by making possible for anyone to host their own server, so if you use VASSAL you will truly be in full control and not rely on the whims of some IP owner or server operator. Also since it is open source they can not hide any remote kill-switches (like how steam or google play can remote-delete any app you have installed if they find a reason to).

Lacking local playtesters, my game designs reach print-and-play supposedly ready for blind playtest stage. Then I work on digital playtest versions from the PnP version.

I figure that anyone who is willing to playtest a digital version should be able to have (as much as possible) the same "possession of prototype file" capabilities as the print-and-play people would have.

So, Vassal is suited for some (Alchelemental and Mind Game both have Vassal modules) but is more of a pass&play or PBEM type format.

Tabletop Simulator is better at emulating real time activity - I have done a TTS version of both Alchelemental and Mind Game, the (not so suited for Vassal) silliness of Sky Pirates and the Quest for Helium, and now that I have a functional equivalent for game purposes of a souffle sauce cup am doing a TTS version of Fleet Admiral - Singularity.

My TTS modules are done using no outside of steam cloud files (all mesh objects etc in TTS steam cloud) so any playtesters have a working copy dependent only on TTS/Steam maintained cloud content instead of also relying on external links. Making them available this way in the TTS workshop has always struck me as basic courtesy to playtesters.

(Making those modules available to all - publishing them - in the TTS workshop and on the Vassal website - vs posting private links only - is just a way of trying to gather up a few more playtesters while placing the files themselves on "trusted" sites vs my own website. It has no impact on my copyright for the game itself.)

Not publishing the modules (distributing them privately to selected playtesters) vs publishing them makes no difference to any copyright.

Having people use print-and-play files to make their own copy has no more effect on copyright than printing them yourself and mailing out the resulting copies.

BUT - once things enter the digital world they are easily duplicated and distributed beyond your control.