Design Challenge 1 Reflection

I really enjoyed being able to test my game in class. I realized that some things that were obvious to me were not so clear to the players. Despite that, my players still gave me good feedback and enjoyed the game.

After some explanation, they were able to play the game the way I intended, even though the game was not fully fleshed out. One part that stood out to me was the confusion with the “order” cards. The players weren’t sure how to interact with them and I think the simple act of cutting them out might solve that. A lot of the confusion that was present could have been fixed with a written rule sheet and some more preparation on my part. I took inspiration from popular games like Uno, Yahtzee, and Go-Fish, and assumed that people had played those before and would be able to intuitively play this game. I had written instructions as part of my write-up, so I know now to print that out so it is available for players.

I think the game concept was well-received and worked well in practice. I like my initial designs a lot, even though they are currently just sketches. I think my idea would work well as a children’s game and would be able to teach things like patterns, fruits, and decision-making. I also want to playtest it with my niece in the future as she is the perfect age for something like this.

For my next design challenge, I want to iterate on this game and improve it based on the feedback I received. My goals are to make the rules more clear, develop more “order cards” so the game can go on longer, and design full-color cards that are made of a more sturdy material so they can be shuffled and handled properly. After these changes are put in place I think the game could be really fun and well-received. My goal is to give it to my Mom to put in her classroom so her students can play and enjoy it.