Once again, we were divided into groups. This time we were a group of six people. After spending an eternity breaking down different board games with the help of Raph Koster’s Atoms, it was time to design a board game ourselves. We came up with the idea of DomesDay.
A snippet from our design document:
Domesday is a game where the players take on the roles as various alien races living within the bounds of a dome. The dome is breaking down, and you must keep the dome up and running for eight days until rescue arrives… All you have to do is make sure to stay alive until they get there!Each player has one dome section with two stations each which they need to maintain. The players are encouraged to help each other in order to keep the dome’s core in good shape. They do this by collecting supplies that are spent to fix malfunctions which are spreading throughout the dome.
As it is possible to secure the necessary supplies to make an emergency reactor that works for ONE section only, one or more of the players could be plotting to make it out on their own, but only one can survive by making a reactor! Will the players help each other out to ensure a happy ending for all or neglect the maintenance of the core in order to secure their own safety?
Even though I am not a big fan of board games, I must admit that this was a useful assignment. It taught me how it’s better to focus on a few really good refined mechanics rather than trying to include every “cool idea” to the game.
Art-wise I was only responsible for the ground background and the skeletons.
