Fourth | Portfolio

Diving deeper on specifics

Why symbols?

In a previous post, I mentioned that our symbol system transformed our game from being just okay to being genuinely enjoyable. Now, I'd like to delve deeper into why we experienced this shift and how the system is functioning.

We have a total of 54 cards, categorized into 5 different types. These card types offer various strategies that players can adopt. Before implementing the symbol system, decision-making was quite one-sided. Players would select a card type and attempt to make it work, hoping that others would opt for different types. While we did have the Board members to provide more options beyond the card types, these still felt quite limited in terms of how players approached their selections.

By introducing symbols on the cards and rewarding players for collecting them, every card gained an additional incentive for being drafted, leading to more strategic options and possibilities opening up.

symbols importance

The symbols serve two main purposes. Firstly, they offer players an additional strategy by granting points when they match four or more of the same symbol. However, the most significant aspect is their utility as resources to power other cards.

We reimagined how our hidden actions functioned, concealing them until players could play them, which gave players a goal to work towards. Additionally, these hidden actions served as a thematic collection element for our board members, rewarding extra points for having various combinations.

This system also allowed us to assign different symbols to specific strategies, guiding players in various directions. This concept is akin to Magic: The Gathering's color pie. For instance, if a player commits to pursuing hidden action cards, certain cards that were previously less relevant in that strategy suddenly become valuable as they provide resources, enabling players to remain more open before fully committing to a particular approach.

What should they be?

During our playtesting phase, our symbols were initially basic: a skull, an apple, a fang, a flower, and a water droplet. However, our game had a thematic context – an evil theme park.

We wanted our symbols to match our theme and spent some time investigating different options.

Ultimately, we settled on the following divisions: Fairytales, Horror, Renaissance Faire, Pulp Fiction, and Legends. This thematic segmentation allowed our symbols to better resonate with the context of our game.