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Deceptive Games · Pick Up and Deliver

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to pick up and deliver it the podcast where
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: I pick up my audio recorder as I step off
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: the train at deliver an episode to you while I
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: walk home. I'm Brendan Riley. Well, good afternoon, listeners. It's
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: a lovely day here in suburban Chicago. It's September sixteenth already.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: I am really working hard to get back into the
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: rhythm of recording every day. But I'm not doing a
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: good job or recording three times a week. But I'm
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: not doing a good job. So we'll see what happens
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: as the semester goes along.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: But I'm excited to be talking to you today.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: So I think I have mentioned a number of times
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: that I'm the faculty advisor for our college board Game Club,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: and I have really enjoyed the board Game Club meetings.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: So far, We've had great turnout. There were forty three
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: students the first week. We had twenty one the second week,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: which is probably much more in line with how many
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: we're going to have. If we can maintain twenty that's
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: a really good turnout, and I'm hoping we'll be able
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: to do that. So I have been making an effort.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: I did that at the first meeting. I did the
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: second one too, grab a euro game that I feel
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: like playing and invite sort of three people to join me,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: three or four. I mean, I have to start bringing
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: five person games so that I can accommodate more people,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: or like we played seven Wonders, which accommodates seven.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: But the idea is picking.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: A game, so we all kind of play party games
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: and stuff at the beginning, but then around seven seven thirty,
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: picking a game that I can play in like an
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: hour and a half or two hours, and playing that
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: that way, I get to enjoy one of the sort
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: of more elaborate games, and it's fun to get an
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: opportunity to show that to other students.
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: So that's kind of what we've been doing. And this
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: last time.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: We played Karpe Dim, which took me a little longer
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: than it should have to explain, but then we also
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: just played really slow, oh, and so it ended up
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: taking longer. We like I started setting up at seven thirty,
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: we should have been able to finish by nine thirty,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: but we in fact did not. By the time we
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: had nine thirty, we had only played three of the
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: four rounds, and so I had to call it and
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: said we got to just sweep the game because we
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: don't have time to go another half hour, which is
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: what it would have taken to complete the game, which
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: teaches me I got to under I got to really
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: be aggressive in how much time I think I have
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: in terms of picking games that are shorter. But it
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: also got me thinking a little bit about the fact that,
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: in my head, Carbadium is a game that should play
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: pretty fast, and frankly, if you played with people who
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: are a little more decisive, it would play faster. But
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: that's neither here nor there. So I thought I would
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: talk a little bit about deceptive games, and by deceptive
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: I mean games that feel like they should be one
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: thing when in fact they are another. I was looking
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: at the podcast history. I don't think I've done this before,
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: but I feel like maybe I have, so apologies if.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: This feels repetitive.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: So I was thinking, first of all, games that are
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: deceptively short. So deceptively short means they are in fact
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: not short. They appear to be short, but they're not.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: And there aren't very many games that actually appear to
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: be short and are not. Although actually Munchkin occurs to
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: me as a game that's deceptively short when you look
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: at what Munchkin is and you learn about how it works,
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: especially as you play the first couple of rounds where
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: every round somebody is getting a level and you know
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: that ten levels and the game's over. You start to think, oh, man,
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: this game is just going to take a little while.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: It's going to be short. And then you're playing it
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: and it's not short, like it gets longer and longer
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: because players get in each other's way and people start
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: piling on and it becomes pretty long, so it's deceptively short.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: I would put Carpa ADM in that category because to me,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: it is a game that should take forty five minutes
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: to an hour, and we played an hour and a
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: half and didn't finish, and I think that's happened.
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: To me before.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: I think it's going to go quicker than it does.
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: And the third game.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: Actually, pair of games that I want to put on
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: there are Leons and Altiplano. Orleons and Aultiplano are both
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: games that feel to me like they should be short
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: but end up being pretty long. Altiplano especially runs pretty
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: long compared to how long it feels like it should go,
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: Orleons does the same a little bit, but it has
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: this nice countdown clock that you can see that makes
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: it feel a little bit shorter. So I'm not sure
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: exactly what it is about.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: Like I know what it is.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: About, Munchkin, I just explained it with regard to Carpe DM.
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: I think it's because your turns are so simple. You're
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: just taking tiles and filling up this board, and you
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: don't get that many, so it feels like it should
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: go quick.
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: But there's a lot of thinking.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: You have to do to figure out which tiles the best,
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: and that makes it slow down.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: And then finally the Altiplano and.
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: Orleons, those ones should go fast, like they feel like
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: they should go quick because so much is done in parallel, right,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: You all draw tiles from your bag in parallel, You
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: plan your around in parallel, and then you take turns
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: actually doing your actions. And since you've been planning, it
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: feels like doing your actions should be pretty obvious. You've
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: decided what you're gonna do. But those games tend to
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: have tons of rounds, and as the game goes on,
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: you get more and more stuff you're drawing out of
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: your bag, which makes the rounds take longer.
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: And longer.
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: So I think those games are deceptive because they appear
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: like they're going to be short, and then in fact
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: they take a long time. So those are deceptively short games.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: On the other game, on the other end, I want
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: to point to some games that are deceptively long. I
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: think one of the things that makes the game deceptively
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: long is if it's complicated, because the game that's complicated
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: feels like it should be long, and then if it's not.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: It ends up being deceptive.
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: So the two games that I feel most embody this
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: are Mataynai and Cerebria. So Matyinnai is a genuinely short game. Generally,
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: if you're playing with Tyinnaie with somebody, it takes like
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: twenty minutes to play. Maybe it could take a half
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: an hour, but it's never gonna to go longer than
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: half an hour. Now, this is deceptive that way, particularly
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: because if you're familiar with the other works by that designer,
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: either Glory to Rome or Innovation, both of those games
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: can be short, but they can also run pretty long,
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: and so they are not kind of uniform. Matynai, just
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: because of the rhythm of the game, tends to be
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: very short, but it's actually pretty complicated to explain. So
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: teaching somebody to play Matinnai is a bit dramatic. It
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: takes a lot of effort to teach, and so in
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: that effort, the game gets what feels very complicated and
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: thus feels like it should probably be a long game.
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: And then when you got to play it, it's only
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: twenty minutes.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: So, particularly on my first teach, but tayna I can
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: take forty five minutes to teach, and then it's only
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: fifteen or twenty minutes to play, which is an amusing
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: place to be. So Matyni is a particularly funny example.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: Cerebria is interesting because it's the same pattern. It's a
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: complicated game that feels like it take longer than it does.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: But that one is especially deceptive because it sneaks up
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: on you. It's deceptively long because first off of you're
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: going in cold and showing somebody Cerebria. If you can
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: do a half hour teach, you're doing a good job,
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: doing a very good job. It's probably a forty five
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: minute teach. It's a very complicated game. Then once you
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: play it, it's actually not that complicated. It's relatively easy
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: to understand it's a tug of war area control game.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: It's just complicated because there's a lot of different moving
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: parts and so a big part of the game is
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: trying to solve the puzzle of how to slot the
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: moving parts together so that you can come out ahead
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: on the different goals, and of course your opponent is
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: doing the same thing.
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: What makes the game.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: Deceptive is it usually in my experience, has a ramp
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: up and then like a burst of activity, and sometimes
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: that burst of activity will lead to the end of
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: the game. Sometimes it will kind of mark a halfway
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: point and you go again. But as you're playing it,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: you do have this complexity that you have to tangle with.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: And then when you go to play it, so you
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: do a forty five minute teach and then the game
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: takes like ninety minutes, which ninety minutes is hard to say, well,
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: that's not a short game branded, no, it's not. But
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: in terms of complexity, particularly because mind Clash is the
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: company that makes it. If you've played tri carry On,
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: you're like, oh, we're in for a four hour game, yes,
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: a similar level of complexity to carry On, But then
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: you're in for a ninety minute game. It's deceptive, which
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: is why I say Thribria is another game that's deceptively low. Finally, oh,
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: the third example would be the two different PAS games
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: that I've been playing a lot this summer, Packs Premiere
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: second Edition and Packs Renaissance second Edition. Both of these
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: games are very complicated. There's a lot going on, there's
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: a lot to keep track of, but the games themselves can.
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: Be over very quickly.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: Actually, just finished the game of Pax Premiere that I
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: won six to nothing because I won the first two
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: cards that came out, and they happen to come out
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: when I had a lot of money so I could
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: buy them, even though by all rights we shouldn't have
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: had them out yet. So just sort of being ahead
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: like that, you can just squeak out a win, even
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: though the game is really complicated, and it makes for
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: a fun challenge because you have to be on your
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: toes from the very beginning because somebody might at any
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: moment squeeze out a victory that way. So those games
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: are deceptively long, by which I mean they are shorter
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: than you think they're going to be. Next up, a
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: game that's deceptively hard. Now, again, this would be in
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: a game that appears like it's going to be hard,
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: but is in fact not that hard. The game I
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: would point too here is Seven Wonders. I've had time
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: and time again. The teach of Seven Wonders is actually
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: a lot. If you're somebody who has not played a
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: lot of hobby games, seven Wonders is really intimidating. Now
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: most of you, anybody listening to this podcast probably is
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: a hobby gamer. And it said, and you're saying to yourself, wait, no,
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: seven Wonders, that's a gateway game.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: It is not a gateway game.
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: If you think it's a gateway game, you have played
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: enough games with people who don't play games.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: Seven Wonders is definitely a mid tier game.
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: And it's got a very high learning curve. There's a
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: lot to learn before you start playing, because in a
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: drafting game, you have to understand what all the cards
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: do when you draft them, so you have to learn
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: everything up front, which makes it very.
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: Difficult to play.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: That said, even by the time you get to the
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: second round you probably understand everything, and by the time
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: you get to the third round it is easy. And
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: if you play two games in the same sitting, the
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: second game is like butter and once everybody knows how
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: to play, Seven Wonders is like a forty five minute game.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: That's why people who are experienced think of it as
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: a gateway game or a level one gateway plus game,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: because once you understand how to play it, it is
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: pretty smooth, it's pretty easy, it's pretty fun, it's reliable.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: So people think of it as easy, but it's actually
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: or people think of it that way, but it is
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: deceptively hard, by which I mean when you first look
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: at it, especially if you're not a gamer, it seems
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: like it's going to be very hard, and it is
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: for a minute, but then it gets easier much quick,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: very quick. On the other side of things, a game
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: that's deceptively easy is Wingspan. This is another one where people,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: I think who haven't played games with other people underestimate
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: how difficult a game is. And whereas Seven Wonders is
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: difficult because you have to understand all the cards to
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: begin with, Wingspan is difficult because you have to constantly
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: be reading new cards and everyone has to wait while
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: you're deciding. So one of the challenges of Wingspan is
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: as people try to figure out what to do, they
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: have to constantly be reading the cards that are in
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: the market to decide whether they're going to take those
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: or not. And they have to constantly be referring back
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: to what do their cards do. Then as they add
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: more cards to their board, now those cards do different things,
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: Whereas in my experience seven Wonders, there's a lot of
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: learning upfront to do, and then that learning curve tails
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: trails off because everything works the same way, the cards
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: and wings or the opposite. On Wingspan, it gets more
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: complicated as the game goes along. There's more stuff to
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: keep track of, there's more economy to keep track of,
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: there's more scoring conditions, there's constantly new things. And so
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: this mix of these different experiences means that you're constantly
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: trying to do better. You're constantly wrestling with new information
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: as you try to understand how the game works. So
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: that cons that constant is what makes Wingspan deceptively easy.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: People think it's going to be easy, and then it's not.
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: I want to talk about three other things that create
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: the kind of deception we're.
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: Talking about here.
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: Three other ways the games are deceptive. First is box size. Americans,
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: for some reason, we associate box size with difficulty, and
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: especially I mean, we all kind of acknowledge once a
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: game reaches your standard eleven x eleven box, your ticket
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: to Ride box, that it could be medium weight, it
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: could be very heavy. But we sort of acknowledge that
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: that size box can be any of those things. But
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: then we also have boxes that are smaller, and we
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: generally think boxes that are smaller should be lighter, less complicated.
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: I will point to the height.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: Here is a game I already mentioned, Innovation.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: Innovation is a game.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: That comes in a very small box and is in
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: fact pretty complicated. I would say it is not very complicated.
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: It's not Matinnai.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: Matinnai could be another one, but Innovation is deceptively simple.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: It looks like it's going to be simple because it's
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: in a small box, and we think small box means
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: not that complicated.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: In fact, it is pretty complicated.
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: There's a lot to think about, a lot to pay
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: attention to. Matayinnai and Innovation are both like Wingspan in
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: that there's constantly new stuff coming out and you have
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: to constantly be reassessing what you're seeing and.
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: How you tackle it.
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: A deceptive theme I'm going to point to Founders of
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: Gloomhaven and Lords of water Deep as having the similar problem.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: Now Loads of water Deep I think solves this by
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: being very accessible, but Founders of Gloomy and it's a
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: good example of this.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: It is a deceptive theme in.
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: That people want dungeons and dragons, Lords of water Deep
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: or gloom Haven Founders of gloom Haven to be games
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: like those initial games, and Lords of water Deep is
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: not an adventure game, and Founders of gloom Haven is
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: not an adventure game. Those are both city building games.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: Founders of Bloomhaven in fact a very heavy euro game,
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: which is great unless you are somebody who just wants
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: gloom Haven, in which case Founders of gloom Haven is
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: a kick in the teeth, very deceptive. And finally, art
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: art is the place where the deception can really become
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: a problem, as people try to buy a game and
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: then it doesn't fit what they're looking for.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: The height of example of this is Root.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: Root is of course a game in which you are
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: it's a mean area control wargame, but people play it
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: like it is or people look at it like it
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: is a fun children's game because the art is fun
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: and cutesy. Thus it is deceptively mean or deceptively kind.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: So what deceptive games came to your mind? As I
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: was talking about the deceptive games that come to mind?
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: Head over to board game gek Kill three two sixty
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: nine and share your thoughts there.
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: I'd love to hear them.
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: Send me a message Wombat nine two nine on board
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: game Geek or Brendan at rattlebox games dot com.
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: Uh, but you know, thanks for joining me on walk today.
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: I hope your next walk pleasing is mind one O bye.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: Brought to you by rattle Box