I went to New Haven this weekend to help a group of Yale graduate students create a game about dengue fever and climate change. The five of us from Parsons (Lien Tran, Ben Norskov, Mohini Dutta, Eulani Labay and myself) first met the Yale students during a playtest at the Rockefeller Foundation. As part of a class, the Yale group (Sophia Colantonio, Lauren Graham, Kanchan Shrestha, and Vanessa Lamers) is making a game for the United Nations Climate Change Conference in South Africa this November.
This was the first game that the Yale group had ever created and I think it was an illuminating experience for humanitarians that are interested in using games for social good.
Shut Up and Play
With such a limited time to to work on the game it was really important to focus on the goal and get things done. When we first met and started discussing the topic, I was a little worried that we would end up talking about making a game and how awesome the outcome could be instead of actually making the game. Fortunately, we didn't get sidetracked. After figuring out the basics of what was needed, we jumped right in and started prototyping. Every designer has their own way of working, but with a fairly large group of people I think the best way is to just start playing with ideas and see what works.
Target Audience
This was a weird one. The game design brief that Sophia put together stated that the game was for a conference with policy makers, but that the game should be for children. The issue was that we needed to sell the idea of the game to policy makers and the Red Cross, but ultimately it would be played by children. In the end, we settled on making a game that could be played at a table (for those adults that are just too cool to run around outside) to demonstrate how it worked while focusing most of our efforts on designing a physical game that kids would enjoy.
Translating Physical to Paper and Back
Our initial ideas were all over the place. We started by talking about the social mechanics of Mafia and then moved to playing tag and throwing things. I had brought my prototyping kit which is full of pawns, dice, a treehouse set, cards, and many other random things. Kanchan mentioned that whatever game we created would ultimately have to be played with "whatever resources were available." For this game that meant only using stones, so throwing things was off the table.
As we discussed possible physical movement, it got pretty difficult to prototype. We didn't want to create a game based purely on physical abilities (I mean, this is supposed to be an educational game, right?) so we decided to use paper and create a mechanic that required the transfer of an object. We came up with a system of Humans versus Mosquitoes.
- Humans have 2-3 units of blood.
- Mosquitoes have a set of breeding grounds, filled with 2-4 larvae.
- Human can choose to defend themselves against bites or clean up a breeding ground by removing one larva.
- Mosquitoes can bite a human to acquire blood (food). If they have food they can lay an egg in an existing breeding ground.
In this system, players would choose on the count of 3 what they wanted to do. Humans either crossed their arms to defend themselves or pointed at the breeding ground they wanted to clean. Mosquitoes would lay their eggs in the breeding ground or point at the person they wanted to bite. We played this version many times, playing with the numbers and trying to find a balance that felt winnable on both sides.
With a firm grasp of our mechanic, we decided to create a physical version in a nearby field. The major change that took place was instead of a split second decision, the moment was drawn out by having the opposing side staring you down and try to figure out what your move was. This also added variety to the combinations a player could experience. They could get bit but not be able to clean a breeding ground. For this game, that felt like a good thing.
The Message and the Mechanic
I cringe when I think about the time and money that's been spent on creating games that only get played by a handful of people. I think that the main reason serious games don't get played more is that they're utterly boring or have no replay value. So our goal first and foremost was creating something that was fun. With our mechanic in place, it felt like we accomplished that goal. With that out of the way, it was time to integrate the message into the mechanic.
For children, we felt that we shouldn't present a nuanced argument. We decided that our message would be simple: Dengue fever can be constrained by humans if we work collectively on the problem. However, as the climate changes, we're facing an uphill battle.
When our game starts, the game is balanced to give the humans an advantage. Through the use of events (either by action cards or a facilitator) the game will get increasingly difficult for humans and much easier for mosquitoes. These events include floods, humidity, heat waves, and cholera outbreaks. Our hope is that as the humans struggle to win, they'll realize the effects of climate change on a very personal level.
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