Boardgame: Jotnar
Our game, Jotnar, is about two explorers that get lost in the woods with a Norse giant called the Jotnar. Both players race to the finish and try to escape it's grips while taking turns to control it. Our target audience is teenagers and up, targeting both men and woman interested in a competitive, 15-20 minute experience.
Some common problems we ran into during development was overcoming some difficult mechanics. We had to implement lots of testing into mechanics and rules to make sure the game ran smoothly while also keeping the rule sheet short for an easy to learn game. We didn't want a game that took long due to players not understanding and having to reread the rule sheet. We had to reinterpret lots of ideas to be made simpler so players can spend less time worrying about how things worked and what was allowed. With every change came a whole new set of other issues, which is something that comes with game development, but this is the most I've experienced it yet.
We combated this with many play tests and lots of redefining of rules. What was most important was the ability for players to pick up the game quickly to enjoy some of the best aspects of the game.
Some small things I would change about my game development process in the future is speaking up when I am unsure about something. Some of the mechanics that didn't work too well I predicted wouldn't function, if I had spoken up earlier maybe these wouldn't have been as big of problems. Although I value my time having spent on trying to fix these mechanics, and if it weren't for trying them, we might not have found other paths that we took this game down that ended up being beneficial to the game.
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