In Meeples Together we write quite a bit about subverting cooperation. For the most part, cooperation is easy, so a designer needs to figure out how to convince players not to work together — through limitations, restrictions, or anti-cooperative limitations. The more a design can convince players to spoil their own game … the better! This year,…
Team Study: Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig
Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig is another co-op related game that released just as we were Kickstarting Meeples Together. It’s a sequel to Between Two Cities with many of the same mechanics, but it’s still worth a little investigation on its own. Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig by Rosset & O’Malley…
The Betrayal Legacy Chronicles, Part One
One of the joys of a Legacy game is seeing how it changes over time. I love that idea, which is why I’ve been so enthusiastic writing about the category’s Legacy Play, Legacy Venn, Legacy Mechanics, and Legacy Emotions in past articles. As I’ve seen my own groups’ games of Pandemic Legacy: Season Two and SeaFall…
Case Study: Betrayal Legacy
Betrayal Legacy was the next major co-op released after we finalized the text on Meeples Together. (It actually came out in early November 2018, toward the end of our Kickstarter.) However, we’re continuing to play and analyze new co-op games, so we’re pleased to offer this case study of one of our genre’s newest games….
eBooks Are Available
The eBook editions of Meeples Together are now available. If you missed the Kickstarter, this is your chance to pick up copies from your favorite web site. The following sites offer bundles of eBook versions: at DriveThruRPG (PDF, ePub, Kindle) at Indie Press Revolution (PDF, ePub, Kindle) at Warehouse 23 (PDF, ePub, Kindle The following…
Lost Study: American Football
Our first iteration of Meeples Together covered a broader spectrum of cooperative play, before we whittled it down to the precise focus of the final manuscript. In that original version, our first case study covered American Football. Though it’s slightly outside of the scope of the final release, it nonetheless remains a great example of…
Case Study: Star Trek — Five-Year Mission
The cooperative universe of the Star Trek Federation is fertile ground for co-op game design. David E. Whitcher’s Star Trek: Five-Year Mission is thus the second Star Trek co-op of the ’10s, and a very different beast from Reiner Knizia’s Star Trek: Expeditions. Star Trek: Five-Year Mission by David E. Whitcher Publisher: Mayfair Games (2015)…
Case Study: Star Trek — Expeditions
Reiner Knizia is best known in the co-op field for Lord of the Rings (2000), the game that kicked off the co-op revolution of the ’00s and ’10s. However, he also produced a second co-op game a decade later, Star Trek: Expeditions. (As with the Lord of the Rings case study, we at one time…
Challenge Study: AuZtralia
This is a second look at challenge systems in competitive games with a survival focus, and also a second look at the designs of Martin Wallace, following The Witches case study. AuZtralia by Martin Wallace Publisher: Stronghold Games (2018) Cooperative Style: Survival-Focused Cooperation Play Style: Combat, Resource Management Overview Following the Restoratonist War, Cthulhu and…
Challenge Study: The Witches
Our model for cooperative games broadly divides their design up into three major parts: cooperative elements, challenge elements and (sometimes) adventure-game elements. These mechanical elements can also be used in other sorts of games. In particular, challenge systems can appear in fully competitive games, making them more unpredictable and also creating the possibility of survival-focused…