Ludology

In the past few years, Ludology has recorded a live episode at Gen Con. We weren't going to let a global pandemic stop us this year!  Recorded as part of Gen Con Online 2020, Emma, Gil, and Scott streamed this recording live on Twitch. We had an excellent turnout in the chat, and everyone seemed to really enjoy this new twist on Ludology Live! You can watch unedited video of this chat here. It's possible we may return to this format in the future! Stay tuned… SHOW NOTES 1m54s: We mention Gil's Twitch channel several times in this episode. 2m13s: Of course, this note to turn it tickets doesn't apply to people listening to the podcast. Don't let that note trigger any vague feelings of guilt! Also, for reference, we began recording at 5 pm EDT. 3m29s: "This much on the timeline" - at this point, Gil is holding up his finger and thumb with a few centimeters of space in between. 4m46s: Scott is holding up a Gamemaster DVD at this point. 5m40s: You can watch the Gen Con Gamemaster panel here. 6m01s: The shot in que

This is the 50th Biography of a Board Game episode! To celebrate, Scott takes us through the history of his first board game, Rayguns and Rocketships. BIBLIOGRAPHY OF A BOARD GAME 0m36s: Video game publisher THQ 0m51s: God of War, Pac Man World, Soul Blade 1m37s: The Star Wars Album 1m43s: The legendary filmmaker Akira Kurosawa, and Republic Pictures, responsible for many well-remembered serials 5m17s: More info on Hodgkin's lymphoma 8m22s: More info on the new Gamemaster film

Emma and Gil welcome game designer, educator, and birder Chidi Paige to discuss how games and play benefit education, how she designed her bird-themed game Birdwiser, and how competitive birdwatching has affected her as a person. SHOW NOTES 0m22s: From educationcloset.com: "STEAM Education is an approach to learning that uses Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts, and Mathematics as access points for guiding student inquiry, dialogue, and critical thinking." It is an evolution of the older STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) approach in that it adds the arts. 1m29s: The Newark Museum in Newark, NJ. Fun fact: back when Chidi was working at the museum, Gil was a block away working at audible.com. Small world! 1m36s: Columbia University in New York, NY. 2m45s: Wonderstar Foundation has no web presence yet. Hopefully soon! 7m11s: ClassCraft 7m36s: Labster 8m01s: Chidi is referring to polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for DNA replication, and to CRISPR for genome editing. 13m43s: Explorer's Pr

Geoff muses on the difference between explicitly calling out the way a game system works, versus letting players implicitly discover how the players discover how the system works. Is one clearly better than the other? Tell us how you feel in the Ludology forums! Here's more information about Geoff's game Versailles 1919.

Emma and Gil invite award-winning game designer, teacher, and not-scholar Sharang Biswas to the show to discuss verbs in games. What actions do we actually perform when we play a game, what actions do they represent, and how does that impact the game experience? You can find Sharang on Twitter or on the web. Here is his itch.io store. CONTENT WARNING: This episode contains references to sex and sexuality. Show Notes 2h31m: Sharang teaches at The International Center of Photography (Bard College), and at Fordham University. 3m05s: We had Dr. Mary Flanagan on the show for Ludology 226 - Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo 3m26s: Playcrafting is an organization that holds game design events, mainly for digital games, in New York City, San Francisco, and Boston. 5m04s: Anna Anthropy is an influential game designer, and current designer-in-residence at DePaul College in Chicago. 5m15s: Ian Bogost's Persuasive Games. 10m08s: Android: Netrunner 11m33s: We discussed ludonarrative dissonan

Scott takes us through the rise, fall, and rise again of the game Vinci, which designer Philippe Keyaerts and publisher Days of Wonder re-implemented as Small World. Bibliography of a board game Text: Meepletown interviews designer Keyaerts. Text: Boardtime interviews designer Keyaerts (the site is Polish, but the interview is in English).   Text: Related Small World products from publisher Days of Wonder. Text: Tabletop Gaming magazine September 2019 - How We Made Small World (paywall)   Text: Tabletop Gaming magazine #10 Jun/Jul 2017 - First Turn: Phillipe Keyaerts 

Emma, Gil, and Scott go back to a topic that Ryan and Geoff discussed earlier in the show's history: Deckbuilding! With all that's changed (including Emma having designed a deckbuilder), what has changed, and what have we learned? 0m41s: The episode that Ryan and Geoff did was Ludology 119 - Deck the Halls. 0m46s: Dominion (which did come out in 2008) 2m39s: StarCraft: The Board Game, which is generally believed to be the first game with an in-game deckbuilding component (if we assume that Magic: The Gathering's deckbuilding component is technically not "in-game," but is part of the metagame). 5m12s: Trains, and A Few Acres of Snow 6m26s: Smash Up 14m45s: Concordia, Aquatica 17m13s: Ascension, Thunderstone, Nightfall 22m26s: Eschaton, Copycat 30m08s: Aeon's End, Thunderstone Quest, Big Book of Madness, Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle 31m39s: Puzzle Strike 32m36s: The Quacks of Quedlinburg 33m19s: I think we have the name to Scott's next game... :) 34m03s: Black Friday 34m47s: Quarriors (and its themed re-i

Geoff uses an interesting bag-building example to discuss how a mechanism that is designed to be fair and equitable to all colors in the bag winds up favoring a single color over time. This example has incredible significance to our hobby, and our world. You can reach out to Geoff via Twitter or email (geoff@ludology.net).

Emma and Gil welcome Banana Chan: game writer, larp/RPG designer, board game publisher, horror movie buff, and pop-up museum aficionado. We talk about writing for all kinds of games, how game mechanisms support intense experiences in larp and RPG, the effects of emancipatory bleed, and the effect of moving roleplay online. Content warning: we discuss games with intense themes, like human sacrifice. 4m29s: The Spire RPG  5m59s: The Circle is a reality show in which contestants are isolated in their homes and can only communicate with others via a text-based app. They're free to adopt any persona they wish. You can watch the first episode of the American reboot here. 6m27s: Pork roll vs. Taylor ham (two names for the same kind of processed meat) is a long-running debate in the Garden State.  7m01s: Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit, a legendary play with a classic twist. 9m03s: The RPGs This Discord Has Ghosts In It and Long Time Listener, Last Time Caller  10m06s: For those of you just joining Ludology, welcome, an

Scott takes us through the twisted history of the classic game Twister. How did it overcome its risqué premise to become a perennial favorite? Bibliography of a Board Game: Video - Twister was created 55 years ago Video - Ren Guyer: The Man Who Invented Twister & Nerf Video - Original Twister Commercial  Video - Twister Mania for Xbox 360 review Text - Ren Guyer's story of Twister from his official website Text - Twister on Board Games Galore Fandom Wikia Text - Patent information on Twister Book - Timeless Toys: Classic Toys and the Playmakers Who Created Them, by Tim Walsh 7m46: One interesting note is that Shuffle Twister's gameplay is similar to Bez Shahriari's independently-released In a Bind, but Shahriari released her game in 2015, one year earlier. In a Bind went on to be re-implemented by French publisher Gigamic as Yogi. 9m19s: To clarify, Monkey Auto Races wasn't #1 on the BGG Hot Games; as an April Fool's joke in 2007, a bunch of BGG users gave the game a high rating, and it was actually t

Emma and Gil moderate a roundtable on safety tools in games, with guests Kienna Shaw and Lauren Bryant-Monk (creators of the TTRPG Safety Toolkit) and John Stavropoulos (creator of the X-Card).  We discuss consent and safety in games, starting with tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs), but expanding to all sorts of games. How can safety tools help in games, and in what ways do they help? Content Warning: this episode mentions occurences of consent violations, domestic abuse, and sexual assault. SHOW NOTES 23m25s - The D&D Adventurers League is an official ongoing play, organized by D&D's publisher Wizards of the Coast. 32m29s - Kids on Bikes, by Jon Gilmour and Doug Levandowski. 33m17s - Avonelle Wing is a longtime RPG/LARP player, convention organizer, and advocate for equality and justice for games. She's one of Gil's idols. 34m11s - Kate Bullock is a TTRPG designer, advocate, writer, and president of the Indie Game Developer Network. 39m58s - Nordic LARP is a form of LARP with minimal rules and GMin

Geoff discusses the phenomenon of counterfeiting in game production. How prevalent it it, and how badly does it affect game publishers? Here's the ICV2 interview he mentions.

Emma and Gil welcome Dr. Mary Flanagan, designer of Monarch, Visitor in Blackwood Grove, Buffalo, Awkward Moment, and plethora of other games in a myriad of styles and platforms, from party to strategy on digital in tabletop. Dr. Flanagan is also an artist, having exhibited works (many game-related) all around the world, and teaches game design at Dartmouth, who also hosts her game design and research lab, Tiltfactor. We discuss designing games from the perspectives of fun and meaningful change. How does one make a transformative game that players actually enjoy, but that is still effective at building empathy and fighting prejudice? CONTENT WARNING: There is a brief mention of racial prejudice, and sexual assault in literary works towards the end of the episode. SHOW NOTES 0m21s: "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo" is a grammatically correct sentence. This video explains it, and other lexically ambiguous sentences. 1m21s: Tiltfactor, Dr. Flanagan's game design and research lab

Join Scott as he recounts the history of the game that blurred the line between a game and a toy: Mousetrap.  Bibliography of a Board Game for Mouse Trap It’s All a Game by Tristan Donovan A World Without Reality: Inside Marvin Glass’s Toy Vault by Bill Paxton Mental Floss – Mouse Trap Game Facts Chicago Tribune – Toying with Success Best Play – History of Mouse Trap: Murder, Playboys and Plagiarism Google Patents Rube Goldberg.com Smithsonian Mag – Teaching physics with a massive game of mouse trap

Today, we put Emma in the spotlight to find out what went into designing her newest game, Abandon All Artichokes, how many cards she actually designed for it, and how the game was almost derailed by an Infinite Potato Problem. SHOW NOTES 5m44s: Magic: The Gathering and the marvelous deckbuilding video game Slay the Spire. Also check out Ludology 198 - Inspired, featuring Slay the Spire's co-designer Anthony Giovannetti. 6m00s: Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing, two video games where the player starts in a remote area with very little in the way of equipment, and ends up building a small town. 7m22s: If you want to check out more deck-wreckers, try Xenon Profiteer (one of Gil's personal favorite games), or Fine Sand. 8m39s: Don't let the bean theme throw you off. Bohnanza is one of the best trading games you'll find. 9m15s: Bonnie Pang did the wonderful art for Artichokes. 9m43s: Sushi Go, by Phil Walker-Harding and also published by Gamewright, is an excellent light drafting game. It was good enough to spaw

Geoff ruminates on the limitations of using AI to balance games. Why can't we use machine learning to fully balance a game experience, and finally make a game that everyone on BGG will find perfectly fair on the first play? SHOW NOTES 1m17s: For more on this subject, check out our two GameTek episodes on AlphaGo : GameTek Classic 218.5 Alpha Zero, and GameTek Classic 222.5 Alpha Zero, Part 2. 2m00s: Geoff's game The Expanse. 5m29s: The fantastic trading game Sidereal Confluence (which will soon have a new edition!) 6m18s: League of Legends has grappled for a long time with how to balance their champions for players of all skill levels. Here's their latest approach on how they're trying to do it.

Emma and Gil sit down with Chris Rowlands of Funko Games to discuss the design of IP-based games, and what it's like to design as part of a group collective. SHOW NOTES 0m00s: Playtest safely online with Gil and Emma! 4m11s: Mox Boarding House is one of the premier board game stores in Seattle. (Here's hoping they can stick around until everything is able to reopen!) 12m21s: The Frosthaven Kickstarter project. 16m45s: Personal plug: Abandon All Artichokes is Emma's newest game. 19m47s: Power Grid is the #36th ranked game on BGG. (Rankings are not absolute, objective measures of quality, of course, but still. It's a big game.) 24m01s: Beth Hawley was responsible for the amazing art in Chris' game Under My Bed. 27m18s: Disney Villainous, in which each player is a Disney villain with unique special powers, is one of their more well-known titles. 29m05s: The party game Yeah Nope. 30m52s: Funkoverse, the tactical minis game using modified Funko figurines. 32m33s: All of "Prospero Hall's" credited games on BGG.

Scott goes into the checkered history of The Game of Life, which has had many inspirations and incarnations, and is still going strong.  (Content warning: this episode contains quick, passing references to sex and suicide.) 0m00s: Join Gil's and Emma's remote playtesting groups! 1m44s: A Little Pretty Pocket Book. Fun fact: this book contains the first appearance of the term "base-ball," although that term at the time was an alternative regional name for the sport now known as Rounders. 2m37s: The New Game of Human Life. Here's the original French game that inspired it, which BGG has under the name La Vie Humaine un Nouveau Jeu. 3m19s: More information about the teetotum, which was often used to avoid the impression of gambling.  5m48s: The Reward of Merit, The Mirror of Truth: Exhibiting a variety of Biographical Anecdotes and Moral Essays calculated to Inspire a Love of Virtue and Abhorrence of Vice, and The Mansion of Happiness. 7m45s: The Checkered Game of Life. 9m17s: The Game of the Telegraph Boy, G

Emma and Gil welcome Anya Combs and Luke Crane from Kickstarter to discuss how crowdfunding is changing, especially in light of recent events. Anya: anya@kickstarter.com, games@kickstarter.com, @anyayna Luke: @burning_luke, burningwheel.com Note that this episode was recorded on March 25, 2020, so if we talk about things happening "a few weeks ago," we're referring to late February/early March. This wouldn't normally be an important detail, but things are changing a lot quickly these days. SHOW NOTES 0m00s: Playtest safely online with Gil and Emma! 1m28s: For those who have never heard it, the MC5's "Kick Out the Jams" set a template for punk rock's sound well before its time. (Explicit language warning)  3m52s: More info about the Burning Wheel roleplaying system.  8m32s: The original Alien Frontiers and Cards Against Humanity  projects. Both were modest successes. Double Fine Adventure, Wasteland 2, Shadowrun Returns, and Shenmue were much larger successes. 9m48s: The original Kingdom Death: Monster was

Geoff continues the discussion about Alpha Zero, this time pointing out the impact a self-learning AI can have on an established tournament meta, like Magic or Hearthstone. Show Notes: 0m47s: More info about Agent57, the DeepMind AI that can beat humans at 57 different Atari 2600 games.  1m52s: The Ares Project, Geoff's first published board game (designed with his son Brian) 2m15s: More info about the Halifax Hammer strategy from A Few Acres of Snow.  2m29s: The current list of banned cards in Magic: The Gathering.  And, the current list of changed Hearthstone cards.