Game Design
Confessions of a Component Fanatic
The right components can make all the difference
Board game components have evolved drastically over the years. I remember playing Monopoly as a child and being so impressed by the little metal player tokens. My mom and I would fight over the dog. And I was always a little sad when I had to pick the thimble because friends picked the “cool tokens”.
These days components for board games are amazing, and this can make the theme come alive. I will often buy games because of their component quality. This can sometimes lead to buyers remorse. A lot of games, especially on Kickstarter, have amazing components but the design itself is sophomoric at best.
Adding deluxe components to a game can help the theme and can be so attractive that new players will immediately want to try the game after seeing it. Mexica, designed by Michael Kiesling and Wolfgang Kramer, was released in the early 2000’s and it came with rather blah components to match what seemed to be a dry strategy game. I never gave it much of a look even though I enjoy other games by those designers. In 2016 the publishing companies Super Meeple and Iello released a new version of the game with updated deluxe components. I remember seeing a photo of the buildings included in the game and I immediately watched a video review of the game. I realized that the game was actually an elegant action selection system with some opportunities for cutthroat interaction. The new components did not improve the gameplay of Mexica but it did make the game more attractive and convinced me to read more about the design and eventually purchase the game.
Winner’s Circle is another older design (Reiner Knizia) that recently received a much needed face-lift. The South Korean company Dice Tree Games produced a beautiful edition of the game in 2016. Some of the upgrades are only for show and do not impact the gameplay (i.e. metal coins instead of cardboard money). However, one decision has drastically improved the gameplay and convinced me to purchase the game. Knizia is one of my favorite designers and I have played older versions of Winner’s Circle several times in the past. The game involves betting on a horse race with each horse having unique movement attributes. What made the game unnecessarily challenging was that the plastic miniatures for the horses were difficult to distinguish from one another. Many of the horses were given a single coat of paint in a natural shade of brown. This made it hard to tell which horse was which when playing the game. In the Dice Tree edition the miniatures are painted with the jockeys having different outfits and each horse having a number on it. The miniatures not only look significantly better, but it is much easier to distinguish the horses making for better gameplay.
Good components will never be more important than good design choices. It is a good design that makes people want to replay a game and discuss ways to do better on future turns. Reiner Knizia is a great designer because of all the interesting little twists he puts in his games that challenge players to improve their strategies with each successive play. In Tigris and Euphrates (considered one of Knizia’s greatest games), players battle to earn points from a variety of factions (colors) during the game. At the end of the game players tally the number of points earned in each faction/color but the only one that counts are the points earned in the player’s worst color. So if a player focused on the red and blue factions gaining over 10 points in each but only gained 2 points in green…that player’s final score would be 2 points. That one scoring mechanic totally changes the way players interact and plan their strategy in the game. So a good design is like a quality house (very important), but it is the location of the house that will attract buyers to the property. In board games quality components help market games and get people interested in making the purchase.
So when I see a review or explore my local gaming store (whenever that is allowed again), I am always intrigued by a beautiful presentation. At times this has led me astray (especially on Kickstarter) and at other times it has made me interested in buying super deluxe editions of games that are sold for a pretty penny. I have made some mistakes with confusing quality components for quality games, but I have also found that the current board gaming renaissance owes a great deal to publishers willing to spend money on good components and talented artists.
Please respond below with your favorite board game component? What is your most beautiful game?
