_{Never shall i be milfgard 'om
My lines are not so clear
But I also make games
And it's pretty nice.
K.V.Davydenko 2016}

Imagine that you were locked in a room, as in the picture below, with a handful of children. And you are made of candy. Yes, you are made of candy. In general, you are doomed if you don’t figure out how to occupy children in order to distract them from your candy essence. What are you going to do?

As some of the workers know, according to the previous article I work in children's camps in my free time. I do a lot of things in them, but I specialize (if I may say so) in creating games in the real world. This is not an easy task. Before the creator of the game gets a lot of difficulties. In this article I want to talk about them on the example of a great city simulator game called Big City Jail Detective RPGame . But before moving on to something so global, consider the situation above.

What to do if you are a candy man locked with children?

For a start, I advise you not to panic. You are not the first, you are not the last candy man to be in this situation. You need something to take these children. Can you try to think of a game for them?

Let's tell children what they can do in the room. Maybe they will start to rush around the room for some time, but soon they will get tired of it, and they will again remember that there is a candy man with them here, and they haven’t eaten any sweets for a long time. Twenty minutes did not eat ... You are in trouble. Then try to tell them that you cannot step on the white tiles . And now the children begin to walk around the room in a strange way, and seem to be busy with something.

Here we have the first law. Any game is a limit .

Restrictions

But no one likes restrictions. Let the players get rid of the restrictions. Let the player have the opportunity to step on the white tile, if on the straight lines there are no other players on the cells of any color (not inclined lines - only vertical and horizontal).
The players are already busy tracking other players - they have been allowed to break the ban, which means they will want to use it.

What we have at the moment can already be called a game. But Chris Crawford ^ENG can disagree with us ^ENG . According to his scheme, I think, we have so far reached only a "conflict" (but this is debatable)

^{The Chris Crawford scheme, which classifies "what a game is."}

We already have the interaction of players with each other, and a specific set of rules. So let's introduce penalties for violating these rules (slippery topic, see below).

Punishments

At this point, you already have players rushing around the room. Small children try not to break the rules, but they still break them, because they monitor their actions more than the actions of other players. Because of this, they often end up on white squares when there are other players vertically or horizontally. Older children periodically notice the player who has violated the rules, and begin to resent. They resent and appeal to you: "Look! He breaks the rules! He stands on a white cage, although I am on the same line with him."

You need to do something, otherwise because of the injustice of this world, and the games in particular, the players will rebel and stop playing. And you, as a lollipop man, have nothing to do with it. You need to enter the rules punishing violations of other rules. Let a person "die" by violating our main rule that can be broken - being on a white cage, when there is another player on a straight line from you.

Departure game

Here the game is already quite ready, and you can play it. Players slowly fly out of the game, and leave the field (no matter where). Players develop strategies to be on the same line with the player standing on the white cage, until he came down from it ... But I do not like the game to take off, because those who flew out quickly become bored. And why should the players stand on white cells, if this is the only way to die? The reason may be some kind of goal , but more on that below. In the meantime, let us return to a more interesting version of the game, in which all players always play, without taking off for a long time.

The game is not on the flight

Let the "dead" players not die at all, and immediately go to the corner of the room (respawn), from where they can continue to move. So the game will be more dynamic, and you will not have bored players. Especially those who flew first, and all end.

purpose

It would be nice to add a goal to the game. Since for the sake of this goal, players must want and be able to "kill" each other, we will place it on a white cage. And, since the respawn is in the corners of the room, let the target be in the center of the room . Children with fantasy are fine, so that in the center of the room lies the Magic Globe. And since we do not have a magic globe, then let it be the Invisible and Intangible Magic Globe.

Goal achievement

Now you have to decide exactly how a player can get an Invisible and Intangible Magic Globe. This will depend on the dynamics with which the children play the original version of the game (yes, it’s worthwhile not to play all the rules first, see the “Total: Rules” section). If the game is very active, and the players kill each other left and right, without going a couple of steps, then you can get the coveted Globe just by standing on the cell with it .

If the players play carefully, and almost no one dies, then this alignment will lead to very fast victories. You need to encourage the guys to think about the killing schemes of their friends. Suppose that to get a globe, you need to "take" the target cell . After the cage is occupied, the player must be in total for 30 (20, 14, 10, 5) seconds. He may leave the cage, but then the timer stops (the timer is you, as the most adult and respected person _(candy) in the room). If the other player becomes on the target cell, then the timer is reset. This is a difficult rule, and it’s worth playing with older children.

Total: Rules

It is important not to overload players with all the rules at once. You need to add them gradually, otherwise all the rules of the game will not be learned at once. The game will have to stop all the time to remind you of any of the rules.

1. You can only walk in black cells
2. You can attack white cells if there are no other players in the vertical and horizontal lines from you
3. For violation of rule number 2, the player goes to the corner of the room.
4. The player who is hitting / occupying the central white square wins

Options for changing the rules

Of course the rules can be changed. As a bit, so much. Changes can be merged, or entered separately. Here are a few changes that occurred to me while I wrote the rules above:

• Playing by teams will allow winning a large number of people at once, it will also allow players to break into specialization in teams (someone will be a “killer”, someone will be a “catcher”, etc)
• Turn-based game - the game becomes less active, but more strategic; perfectly suited with the previous rule

And now the game is ready.

How nice that we were locked up with these wonderful children in such an unusual room!
(c) Candy Man!

Big City Jail Detective RPGame

Yes ... I wanted to devote an article to this game, with a little introduction on how games are generally made. But the introduction was delayed, so I will talk about it briefly (this time), especially since you still know how these games are made, so you can not drink in detail.

So! Last time we had a small group of children of the same age. But what if there are about 200 children and their age varies from 6 to 12 years? Or from 12 to 17? Tell me it is impossible? And no! Meet my invention - Big City Jail Detective RPGame!

A place

Of course, two hundred children need more space than one room. So we will use the entire territory of the camp. At least that part of it that is easy to see ... clearly visible from one point. We do not need the children to run in unknown directions. So, we use the space of the camp, practically without premises - the street.

Mechanics

Since children are different in age, it is necessary that it was interesting to everyone. So we create many locations where children can do different things, and together these locations will simulate the work of the City

Basic game mechanics

Each location is some kind of institution. At each location there is a leader who is responsible for it, and he, as it were, is the director of this organization. Children coming to each location can either use its services, for example, in the "Cafe" location - buy nasty salty cookies, or get a job there (for example, by the seller), and receive a salary in the form of sliced ​​paper money.

Every N minutes, the beginning of a new day is announced and children, if they work somewhere, receive a salary.

^{Minouldon - a mixture of "minutes" and " guilder ". Associated with the setting of the game in which they were used}

Of course, if children do not work anywhere, then they will quickly run out of money, issued initially, and they will have nothing to spend. Also, if not everyone works, it means there may be a shortage of workers at some station, and the economy of our City will be bent. But about this, see the section "Punishments"

Additional locations

It is necessary that all children be interested. And so it turns out that not all children (and adults) are always in the mood for making money, and spin like a squirrel in a wheel. Therefore, we add dead-end locations that do not interact with the outside world in any way, but in which it may be more interesting for small children, or for adult lazy stumps. Examples of such locations:

• Art Workshop - children sit and draw
• Beauty Salon - girls paint on their faces
• Salon Massage - do not ask ...

But dead-end locations may start to be important in the City. See the “Game Mechanic Changes” section.

Conflict

Of course, anyone who plays board role-playing games knows that there must be a conflict in any invented universe. So in our game the evil Game Master outlaws all sweet things. For any signs of use, or for possession of sweet, the player immediately goes to prison _(location) by the police _(location). At the "Cafe" location you can buy only nasty dry biscuits and water ... But is there any sweet elsewhere? ..

The city leader goes, dressed as Mafiosi . He recruits to his children, so that they sell candy from under the floor! (in fact, it is such a mobile location). Children willingly take such a risk, although they know that now the police will be chasing them. But lollipops are always expensive, and civilians (other children) are willing to buy them, which is a very profitable business ... But at the same time other children start hunting for them.

In some cases, you can use not one Mafiosi, but two. Two criminal groups ... The dumping of the forbidden goods begins, and in general what just did not happen. Watching players live their roles is a pleasure.

A very important point that counselors very often miss when playing this game: No one should know about the mafia at the beginning of the game. You don’t need to announce children to it when declaring rules, otherwise it sounds just stupid - Game Master has just banned sweets, and now says that you can buy them from the mafia.

Game mechanic changes

There is an interesting location, but it does not always roll - Parliament. There should get very intelligent children. They can write bills that, if approved by the Game Master, can change the whole course of the game. This is something like the "Change of the World" maps from the Nefarius game.

For example, my parliament somehow introduced the rule that during the day all organizations that do not have at least one work of art should be fined by the police. Thus, the dead-end location "Art Workshop" became important for the gameplay, and the players rushed to buy doodles of kids.

Punishments

I will never forget how one girl (about 15 years old) hit me because I, as her leader, allowed her not to go to one game. And it was a cool horror story that everyone discussed later. And she only had to listen to these stories, because she was able to persuade me to allow her to stay in her room to lie. And then I listened to claims from her: "Yes, I did not want to go. But why didn't you make me?"

So children (or girls?) Sometimes need to be forced to have fun. Here we enter into the game another location - the Army. The call in our city is obligatory, but very selective. We call only on those who are clearly not in the mood to play. The mood of such a person will quickly appear, since at this station there will be the most shabushnoi leader who will catch players who are not working anywhere and not spending money. For parasitism, such players will have to run about one game day and generally practice all sorts of active affairs to protect our City from an invisible threat. Only from the invisible - the visible threat we deal with the police.

Setting

In fact, the game already has a setting. But you can add some locations or rules that give the atmosphere or color. For example, I somehow conducted the magical Big City Jail Detective RPGame. There were additional locations like Koldun and the Witch. The Witch, for example, hired "Witch Messengers." Normal players came to her location, and for a nominal fee they sent damage to other players. It was implemented quite simply. For example: a curse could send an undesirable subject into the army. For this, the Witch wrote to whom and where on a special form, and her messenger attributed this curse to the leader in another location. In that game, it became very popular for the mafia to send policemen to the army.

Results

Here is a brief description of the game for a large number of people of different age. I spent it several times, and the children always had only one disappointment - the game ended after some time, but they still did not have time to try all the jobs and visit all the locations.

In general, I have a certain number of invented games. For example, as an IT person, I made a couple of games in which part of the game is a simple program on the screen, and partly elements in the real world. With a layer connecting them - an intelligent counselor. If you liked this article, then I will write in the following articles about the development of these games.

PS The first game with cells was invented on the go, along with the writing of this article, so it’s likely to be very flawed.