Introduction
In 2014, Daniel Solis released another of his POD card games. I’d been looking forward to this one for a while. It had the aesthetic feel I like, both in game design and actual graphic design. In this game, you are all using cards to create little ink drawings of trees and scoring points based on the flowers, dragonflies, and the like that inhabit the various branches.
It’s called Kigi.
So, when I heard that Action Phase Games was planning on redeveloping Kigi into a new game, I was intrigued. I won’t lie; I was debating what my interest level was. Did I really need a mere variant of Kigi if I already owned Kigi?
But then, as I saw the game art, I realized that my daughter Hope (who turns 7 today!) would love it. And as I heard about the changes that Action Phase made to the gameplay, I became more interested. So I backed the Kickstarter for Kodama.
I’m really glad that I did.
Gameplay
In Kodama, you’re trying to grow the best tree for the little tree spirits to inhabit. You each start with a trunk with one of six features on it: a caterpillar, a star, a cloud, a mushroom, a firefly, or a flower. Then, on your turn, you take a branch card from a display of four cards and adding it to your tree. The end of the branch must touch the bark on a previous card, and you can only touch one other card. However, to be clear, you do not have to play on a grid or anything. So your tree tends to grow in semi-organic ways.
These branches have one or more of the same features that are on the trunks, and those control how you score points. For each feature on the branch you just played, score one point for each matching feature in a contiguous line down the branch until you reach a branch without that feature or you reach the trunk. You’re not allowed to play a branch card that scores more than ten points, which also encourages you to diversify your branches, spreading out in a few directions. This might sound complicated, but it’s actually pretty simple once you see it. Again, Hope has this figured out, so it can’t be that tricky.
Four turns comprises a season, of which there are three in a game. (There’s no winter, because trees don’t grow in winter. Savvy?) At the end of each season, each player plays one of the four Kodama cards that they were dealt at the beginning of the game. These represent the tree spirits judging your work and are essentially special scoring cards, such as “Score two points for each feature on branch cards that touch your trunk card” or “Score four points for each branch card with your trunk’s feature that is within two cards of your trunk card” or “Score two points for each cloud or flower on your tree, whichever is fewer”.
Oh yes, there are also the Decrees. These are special laws dictated by the spirits for the duration of a season. Each season has its own deck of Decrees. In the basic game, each season has five possible Decrees, of which you’ll only use one per game. (That’s 125 possible combinations, for those keeping track.) My deluxe Kickstarter version actually includes nine of each, which is 729 possible combinations. These are little effects like “After placing a branch card that touches your trunk card, gain three points”, “At the end of this season, choose an end branch card on your tree and score it again”, or “Score one point when placing a branch card with a firefly or a star on it”. These provide additional opportunities to be considered while playing the game while keeping gameplay fresh.
After three seasons (aka 12 turns) the game is over. Whoever has the most points wins!
Some Clever Marketing
Here I must discuss briefly the genius of the winner card. I don’t know if the winner card exists in the base game, but it was certainly included in my Kickstarter edition. Here’s how this works: whoever wins gets the winner card. That means they get to decorate their finished tree with the little cardboard Kodama that came with the game. Then, you’re supposed to take a picture of the winner with the winning tree and post it on social media with the hashtag #kodama.
In other words, this game provides a built-in victory ceremony which naturally turns into free advertising for the game.
As I say: genius. Really, I tip my hat to Action Phase Games for coming up with this idea. It feels like such a natural part of the game while improving the marketing of the game at the same time. Everyone wins!
Playing with Hope
Daniel Solis, the designer of Kodama, has commented that he has stumbled into designing a number of games that gamer parents can play with their children. Kodama is no exception. As I mentioned, I primarily backed Kodama to have a game to play especially with Hope, and that seems to have worked out well.
There are a few reasons for this. The graphic design and basic gameplay certainly help. There’s something satisfying about growing a little tree, even if you don’t win. Also, the math that the game requires is essentially just counting, which makes it easier for Hope to engage with. The Decrees are also pretty simple to get, and in our last game Hope was considering the bonuses from Decrees and reminding me to score them.
The only area that could be difficult is the actual Kodama cards. And this is where Action Phase Games had their other stroke of genius in developing the game. They included three sets of special Kodama cards called Sprouts which are specifically intended to be used by children. Each set is comprised of three little Kodama, each labeled for the season they are intended for. Taken together, each set of Sprouts essentially rewards collecting two features. For example, one set has these scoring conditions: “Score five points for each branch card with a firefly or flower on it that touches your trunk” for Spring, “Score 3 points for each branch card on your tree with a firefly or flower on it” for Summer, and “Score 1 point for each firefly or flower on your tree” for Fall. So, when Hope has this set of Sprouts, all she needs to focus on is collecting lots of fireflies and flowers. That’s a much simpler initial heuristic than trying to understand a hand of Kodama cards.
Oh, and last game, she scored about 20 points per Kodama card, which gave her the game in a five-player game.
In essence, the Sprouts represent an elegant handicapping system allowing young children to play Kodama with older children or parents and actually be competitive. I won’t lie; this might be my favorite part of the game.
Differences from Kigi
For those of you curious, here are some of the ways that Kigi is different from Kodama.
First, in Kigi, you can play on anyone’s tree to score points, not just your own. In addition, instead of there being a rule against branch placements that score more than ten points, in Kigi this triggers a pruning that cuts that entire branch back to the trunk, thus resetting that scoring opportunity.
Also, In Kigi, the bonus scoring cards are shuffled into the deck with the branch cards and must be chosen from the display instead of taking a branch card. These bonus cards (called Commissions) represent end game goals that can now be scored by anyone, like “have the fewest flowers on your tree” or “have the most pruned cards” or the like. At the end of the game, each Commission is worth ten points to the player who fulfills it. If you took the action to choose the Commission, you win ties. If the display ever fills up with Commissions, then it clears and refills from the deck. So, it’s not a given that any particular Commission with end up in play. Unless, you know, you make sure that it enters play.
These factors aren’t the only differences, but they are probably the most significant. They make Kigi a potentially more confrontational game, as players can sabotage other players’ trees through triggering pruning or by adjusting feature count to skew Commission scoring.
Conclusion
I was really happy with Kigi when it came out. It slotted into a neat place in my collection, being able to play with a wide range of players, including relatively young players like Hope.
But I can’t lie. I think that Kodama has fired Kigi. Here’s why.
First, removing the competitive card play and, therefore, the pruning, allows the game to be about building up. At the end of a game of Kigi, you’d frequently have several players with only stumps of trees, due to particularly brutal pruning. Kodama fulfills the promise of Kigi by giving each player a beautiful, unique tree at the end of each game. Win or lose, you walk away being able to feel proud of yourself for having accomplished something, which also fits the comtemplative feel that Kigi presented but didn’t necessarily provide.
Also, being dealt a hand of Kodama at the beginning of the game provides strategic direction beyond merely lining up the most features. Ideally, you want to consider your hand of Kodama at the beginning of the game and plan which one will be played in which season–and therefore which one will not be played–and grow your tree accordingly. Kigi was purely tactical, but Kodama actually introduces strategy into the gameplay.
The Decrees are another pleasant addition that further diversify gameplay, which should help keep the game fresh for many plays.
And, I have to admit, the Kodama are all so darned cute!
Kodama should be available from your local gaming store starting April 24. Pick yourself up a copy!
For Further Comment: Loops and Arcs
I would hope that none of you are surprised that I’m a geek about game design and related topics. I mean, you do read the blog, right? Many of the people I follow on Twitter are similar, so I pick up various articles about game design and the like in my feed. All of this preface is really to say that I don’t remember who originally posted the link to the article I’m going to discuss.
So, without further ado, Loops and Arcs.
This article prompted a bunch of ideas, but I’m going to keep it focused to just one. (You’re welcome.) But first, a summary.
In the article, a loop is a repeating sequence of learning in the game. To quote the article:
So, as I proceed through a loop, I start with my understanding of the world, which leads to action, which leads to feedback on my action, which leads to learning on my part. Those of you who know your continuous quality improvement probably recognize PDSA (Plan, Do, Study, Act) here. This is a very common construct. And, as the article notes, the loop is a good model for the building of wisdom. I iterate over a series of experiences, improving my understanding each time. Or, at least, we hope so, right?
The article also defines an arc:
(Emphasis in original.)
I might quibble a bit on this–I do rewatch movies and reread books–but the basic point stands. After all, I don’t immediately reread a book once I’ve finished it. That particular reading has done all the work it’s going to do, and time will need to pass, allowing external factors to operate on my mental model, before I will be able to profitably re-engage.
So, loops and arcs. Who cares, right?
Well, the article goes on to discuss a couple of interesting implications of designing with loops and arcs, including a brief but fascinating excursus into evaluating religion through this lens. But what earned this article a blog post was the article’s discussion of how loops and arcs impact the economics of game design.
Hey, you! I see you edging out the back door! Hang on a sec. If you’re a creator of any kind, this applies to you.
See, from one perspective, economics is how we answer the question “How can I do what I’d like to do and still be able to eat?” For all that we laud the nobility of the starving artist, the fact still remains that the artist is starving.
So, how can you make games (or whatever) and be able to get paid enough to eat?
As the article notes, the classic boardgames are all loops. You don’t “finish” Chess or “beat” Go. Each instance of playing the game becomes part of the larger loop of ongoing mastery of the game. I’ll note that early videogames were also loops. Again, there’s no way to “beat” Asteroids or Space Invaders. Over time, though, computer games became more arc-focused. Consider most of the AAA games that are released. There’s a story line that you play through and, eventually, you beat the game–if you’re any good, at any rate.
Why is this? Why the change? One answer is economic. How did the makers of Asteroids make their money? The player paid 25 cents per game instance. Thus the loop makes sense. The player continues to return to the game to develop mastery and therefore continues to fund the game maker. This is why the leaderboard was such an important part of the design of these games. Those high scores represented milestones of mastery, providing aspirational goals to drive consumption. Your skill would be publicly acknowledged by the community of play that formed around a particular game cabinet.
With the advent of the home computer and game console, the economic model changes from paying per instance to paying for the entire game. Now, instead of having to pump quarters into a game cabinet, you could pay once for a game and play it as much as you wanted! Pretty awesome for the players, but how did the game makers make their money?
Thus, the rise of games that could be beaten. Games move away from being loops of mastery to being consumable arcs of content. This leads quickly into the place of the sequel in game design. If I’ve beaten Dragon Warrior and am now casting about for another game to consume, Dragon Warrior II seems like a safe bet. So now, the game makers have to be thinking about franchises and game series and staying out in front of the players enough so that new content can be released to feed the consumption habits of the audience.
The advent of the Internet provided another possible tool to solve the economic problem: the DLC. Rather than having to make an entirely new game, you just release little expansions of downloadable content (DLC) that provide additional content. Maybe a new character class or a special level or even a new mini-campaign that can work within the context of the current game. Handled correctly, this strategy of expansion could allow you to milk a given game release for a long time.
Now, where I get interested is how these economic forces act on the hobby game market, both in boardgames and roleplaying games. As I’ve been thinking about all of this, I’ve arrived at some interesting preliminary conclusions.
I think that boardgame makers are finding themselves in the place of selling loops while marketing them as arcs. Let me explain. The buying pattern of boardgamers seems to be driven by a lot of novelty. What’s the newest game? I must have it! There doesn’t seem to be a lot of exploration of the game space or the establishing of communities of play around specific games in the same way that there is around games like Poker, Bridge, Chess, or Go.
Yes, I’m aware that the hobby boardgame market isn’t as old as these games. But there are enough games that have a measure of age to them. For example, Tigris & Euphrates is generally considered to be one of Reiner Knizia’s greatest games, it is about 18 years old, and it certainly has a comparable depth to Bridge or Poker. But I do not see advanced level strategy discussions about T&E. Instead, it’s generally passed over as being an “older” game, pushed out by the flood of new games pouring into the market.
I think that this is the result of economics. The market for a game like Tigris & Euphrates is only so large. A company can’t sustain itself on sales of just that game. Eventually, it will need new revenue streams.
Another solution to this problem is the expansion, which is similar to the DLC approach in videogames. This approach has its own problems (e.g. your market is automatically smaller, because having the original game is a requirement), but it can be functional.
This all becomes particularly fascinating when coming to roleplaying games. A genre of game that is based on player creativity has additional complications when it comes to selling new product. How do I make money, if I’m selling you a toolkit for your imagination?
Again, the normal solution has been expansions in the form of new rules, pre-made adventures, and the like. But these approaches can sometimes reduce the approachability of a game, simply because there is too much material to take in. Are there other solutions?
Here’s one weird thought that has emerged in my thinking from reading this article. What if you designed a game that was intended to be a consumable? What if we embraced the arc-like nature of player engagement with these games and actually make some games that are intended for a one-shot use and then be done? System mastery wouldn’t be the point. Rather, it would be the creation of a particular experience in a particular moment. And when it’s done, then you’re done with the game.
I know that this could sound shocking and cynical, but isn’t that how we engage with most media? How many movies do you watch once and never view again? Why should games be different?
If you think about it, I just described those murder mystery dinner kits. If you consider the popularity of these dinners as opposed to the rest of the hobby…let’s just say there’s food for thought there.
Here’s a completely different approach: what if we approached game design as a fine art? What if we could decouple the economics from the game design? This would essentially require patronage, as those with money support not a product but a designer, freeing him or her to make games that are beautiful and well-crafted without also having to be economically viable.
So it’s not surprising that we see the growth of crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and Patreon. In fact, Patreon requires a little more attention, as it has this creator focus versus the product focus of Kickstarter.
I’ll be honest. When I design games, I don’t usually think about the economic impact of my design. I’m approaching it all as an artiste…and it shows in my economic success as a designer. But I’m starting to think about possibilities for the future. And, now, hopefully, so are you.
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