Mint Tin Games – Roller Derby Ref Approved
I am a volunteer ref for local roller derby leagues.
This means that when I show up to officiate I don’t find myself in a big locker room where I can hang my stripes up and stretch out. In fact, sometimes we are lucky to fit us all in where they have us.
Being an official at these games can lead to downtime for us between games and at half-time. It can be 10 minutes to over an hour depending on the events.
Well this leads into me saying how much I love mint tin games.
I have a gear box that I carry everything in. Shirt, skates, gear, extra wheels, tools, basically anything and everything I need in an emergency. So that doesn’t leave a lot of room for me to have some big box board game. The fact that these games literally fit in a mint tin means that I can store them without having to carefully reorganize everything to make it all fit.
Now to touch on another wonderful part and that is the time aspect of these games. There is a very little learning curve which is a plus because I don’t want to spend the whole half explaining this great game just to have to pack it all up.
Also with the rules modified to be able to stop at any time and be able to quickly do some quick addition and have a winner is beautiful.
So for example, this past weekend we were stuffed in a small hallway. Just enough rooms for a couple of chairs and standing/sitting room only. So with the 20 minute half, I was able to set up Pirates, explain the rules, go through a demo turn or two, and have 10 minutes of play which was enough to have the other ref I played win.
Rinse and repeat during intermission between the first and second game. Get the call that we have to report back to the track and it’s just pack it up, throw it back in my gear box, and no worries.
Let me say that this game is a blessing to me and refs in the locker rooms.
Thanks subQuark for the great games!
“Scooby” Drew Ziegler
Game Design Inspiration
This week a tweet asked “What is a game that inspired you as a designer?”
I watched MythBusters’ Zombie Special with Michael Rooker with a segment titled Dead Heat exploring how likely you could “escape the horde” in varying densities of zombies.
I got a sense of angst no zombie movie ever evoked and wondered how I could convey that feeling.
Non-player characters can be programmed in OpenSim and Ener Hax built an excellent representation of Kowloon Walled City, complete with labyrinths and mazes, that would make a great zombie role-playing sim. =)
I sketched out the elements that created my angst and realised it was beyond my tech skills to do this online. Plus OpenSim severely limits who could explore it and costs $100 a month to host. =(
Around that time, I received Zombie Dice and loved its simplicity. I bought a copy for my daughter and made brains from Sculpey clay to use as counters.
That got me thinking about making a board game instead of something online. =)
ZOMBALAMBA was born, laboured over, prototyped, and play-tested.
A nifty “AI” for zombie movement, very little in-game text, hex tiles for the board, and multiple play modes gave it some variety. I was pretty impressed with myself. *rolls eyes* =p
The prototype even fits into a mini prepper camo bug-out bag (ripped off, err, inspired by Bananagrams).
I wanted it produced domestically but my prototype cost is $26 per game!
A Kickstarter and offshore production with someone like Panda is an option but I have issues with my game made in a country with no free elections, no freedom of speech, and possibly some deplorable work conditions. There’s a reason it costs so much less to make products offshore – cheap labour and little regulation.
I’m not terribly bothered that 99% of games are made like this – I just couldn’t choose this for mine.
So I started looking at alternatives to shave costs. There aren’t many US or Canadian companies that can do this, so I decided I could do it! o_O
And why not?
I’m not scared of doing menial labour and am no primo uomo (well, I may be snobby but I don’t mind saying I had to look up that phrase). =p
Rather than $4 for a custom bag, those wide-mouthed gripper jars are 69 cents . . .
Digging deeper into box alternatives, I ran across mint tins and while ZOMBALAMBA won’t fit in an Altoids’ sized one – it was too late – I had the game design bug.
It’s like a zombie bite – I had no choice but to create a game. Must make games!
I had no idea what but serendipity saved the day.
I went to lunch with Steve, a long time tabletop gamer, and I had two meeple and a pair of dice in my pocket (I mean, who doesn’t?). While waiting for burritos I tossed them onto the table to pass the time.
That day, we challenged each other to come up with a highly portable quick playing pirate-themed game.
A few weeks later we both had prototypes and attended our first game design meetup.
I was ready for full-on blind playtesting with 3 copies of my game. I had no idea what to expect and wanted to be prepared (I may be a tad OCD and manic). =D
The meetup group graciously played my game and jotted down notes on the instructions. I took all their feedback to heart and Mint Tin Pirates came into existence! One suggestion was to Kickstart a pair of games so I took that to heart too! =)
Maybe it was naive to think I could design and publish a pair of games but I watched a lot of Rhado, devoured anything Jamey Stonemaier wrote, studied other kickstarters, and did it one small step at a time.
I think anyone can do the same – it doesn’t have to be the next Catan – just share what you enjoy and others will like it too.