Paper Information
| Title | A Transmedia Comparison of Digital and Tabletop Board Games |
| Presenter(s) | Brian Magerko |
| Session | From the Keyboard to the Game Board - Part 1 |
| Time | Saturday, October 11, 10:15a-11:15a |
| Location | Green Room |
| Format | Paper Presentation |
| Description | This paper will present the research goals of the Digital Tabletop research group, which are to: a) identify the key game mechanics in board games that make them engaging or entertaining and then b) identify how those mechanics relate to current or hypothetical digital games. Rather than simply explore how board games can be adopted to digital counterparts, we are interested in how understanding the underlying mechanics can be used to influence design innovation in the digital realm. A secondary interest is in exploring the opposite relationship by studying digital games that have been adapted as board games (e.g. Doom or Starcraft). This paper will go through several case studies of analyzing modern board games, present our findings, and point to a generalized approach to conducting this type of transmedia analysis. We will review: Munchkin, a card-based game that is a humorous take on traditional RPG games; Ra, an auction-based board game that presents incredibly complex odds calculations for players; Starcraft, a board game adaptation of the famous digital game; Settlers of Catan, a famous tile-based board game; and Lost Cities, a card game based on chance and exploration.
We anticipate that this work will lead towards a contribution to the larger question of building a taxonomy of game mechanics, such as the one currently under development by Zagal and Mateas. Having a common language and set of references across games, digital and analog, is key in being able to constructively discuss, compare, and analyze the mechanics of games. This paper will look towards this future work and describe a methodology of surveying games with a specific mechanic in mind (e.g. cooperative play) to contribute to such a taxonomy. |
| More | View PDF of extended abstract |