Better as a Video Game? Part II

My first post in this series detailed an amazon.com review of Tide of Iron that seemed to suggest board games in general are dated because the mechanics are more easily implemented in a video game setting. This review seems extreme, but I hear more qualified versions of this sentiment fairly often. To a reasonable person who actually enjoys playing board games, when might certain games be more suited to a video format?

Case Study: Cities & Knights of Catan

I'll cover three answers to this question and how each pertains to this one particular title. A board game may be better as a video game when:

• setup is extensive when compared to the actual value of game play, or
  
• particular mechanics or housekeeping functions are tedious or repetitious, or
• the game isn't heavily played or well known by the players and thus much easier to play when led by a computer program.
  

Setup Time

Jennie has mentioned that she has friends that enjoy playing Cities & Knights of Catan online, but refuse to play the physical version of the game. Part of this is due to the basic setup time of any Settlers of Catan game: the board has to be randomly constructed, several decks of cards shuffled, game pieces removed from their storage bags, and finally opening placement of settlements (and cities as the case may be) and distribution of initial resources. Any game that requires several steps of setup will certainly play faster in video format, so if fitting in a quick game is one's primary goal the computer version has the upper hand.


Bits & Pieces

Cities & Knights also has many more cards, pieces, rules, and special situations than vanilla Settlers. As in the base game, resource cards must be dealt to players at the opening of each turn, but in Cities & Knights commodities and three different categories of progress cards are also distributed. In C&K players need to track which types of knights they have on the board, whether those knights are activated or not, which player has the most knights, progress of their city developments, a host of incoming progress cards, the robber and the merchant pieces (the latter of which tends to move very frequently), differing hand sizes due to city walls, when to place Metropolis pieces, 'Defender of Catan' cards, and other assorted mechanics and bits of information. I will not concede that all of this bookkeeping, card drawing, and piece tracking is reason to only play the video version of the game, but it does contribute to that argument.


Complexity as a Barrier to Play

A third angle at which to look at this game is its difficultly to get to the table. I own the board game and have yet to play a full game of it in tabletop form, both because I've yet to fully grasp the rules and since the game's complexity is such that I will only introduce it to players already quite familiar with Settlers of Catan.

I've played the online version probably 10-15 times, and because of the structure of the computer program I have yet to master the intricacies of some of the mechanics, especially the special abilities and movement of knights. The computer notifies players when knight abilities are available, and then only allows legal moves. It's impossible to use a knight improperly in the video game, whereas in the board game I'm not only unsure about exact legality of a move, but I might not even realize everything a knight can do, and thus won't even notice I'm missing important options.

Another reason C&K never hits the table is that it can really only be played by those that already fully understand the base game. Very few of the people I game with locally have played Settlers enough times that I feel prepared to add on the extra complexity of Cities & Knights. I am much more likely to introduce a new mid-weight game such as El Grande or Fury of Dracula, as I feel teaching those games from scratch is easier than adding lots of new complexity to a game players are just beginning to understand. Perhaps Cities & Knights online will allow me to teach the game more easily and thus ultimately result in more tabletop plays. We will see.


Wrapping Up

Cities & Knights of Catan is one instance where it's been suggested the online video game port may be a better implementation of the game than the original tabletop version. Though there is no conclusive evidence, and how one views each of the three major points discussed in this post is certainly still subject to personal preference, I'm willing to concede the legitimacy of the argument in this case. There is no reason why someone who plays fairly deep board games (El Grande, Agricola, Caylus, etc.) wouldn't feel right at home with the complexity of the tabletop Cities & Knights. However, when you take into account the strategy and game play one gets for the level of complexity (quite a bit from the aforementioned titles, perhaps not as much from C&K), perhaps the organization and acceleration achieved by the video game is appropriate in this case.

Also see: Better as a Video Game? Part I

Better as a Video Game?

Recently I've heard a sentiment mentioned several times: 'This board game would be better as a video game." What features in a board game would lead someone to feel this way? I recall several particular points here, and I'll cover them over a short series of posts.

Breaking News: Video Gamer Reviews Board Game!

I read a review of Tide of Iron (a tactical war simulation game) on Amazon.com that stated:

"If this game was published in the 70s or 80s it would have been groundbreaking and would have been amazing. As it is, computer games already do what this game tries to do."

According to this reviewer video and board games don't take up separate gaming territory: if a type of game has been well executed in video format, he would see no reason why a similar game would have any reason to exist in tabletop form. He continues:

"Fundamentally, as a board game you need to read and learn the rules to implement the mechanics of the game, whereas a computer game does all the mechanics automatically and allows intuitive player learning."

To me this exposes the poster as a gamer that has a strong bias toward video games in general. From his perspective probably 99% of board games would have absolutely no reason to exist, since what mechanic in a board game wouldn't be more easily implemented in a computer version? Candyland, for example, could be entirely played without any players at all! The computer could shuffle the cards, draw one each turn for each player, and move the pieces. Certainly this is much easier than dealing with the hassle of actually using the mechanics of the game. 'Candyland is a terrible example!' you might say, and I thought so too at first, since who wants to play Candyland? But maybe it is a good example because this is a game in one of the simplest forms possible and thus emphasizes some of the essential differences between video and board games.

What reason would anyone have to play Candyland except to 1. teach some basic game mechanics to a young child, or 2. interact face-to-face with your kids? Both of these reasons are entirely negated by the computer version. Video games skip the mechanics and remove the personal interaction.

Who Runs the Program?

We can think of a game's execution as a program. With video games the program is run almost entirely by the computer. The computer knows the rules and mechanics and runs the majority of the program in a quick and efficient manner. The only input required of the player(s) is the essential participant contribution to any game: the player decisions. Sure, a video game may require a player to click on a picture of dice to effectively "roll them" in the game, but really this is just the computer awaiting that player to tell it to continue. The player has no impact on the game at such a point, he merely gives the computer permission to generate a random number ("roll the dice").

On the other hand, during a board game session the program is run entirely by the players. The rules and mechanics are all laid out in the rules and the components of the game, but it is up to the players to learn and execute them. A video game lets players mentally skip over much of the nuts and bolts of game execution, whereas a board game requires players to be much more active participants. A video gamer may insist that this crucial difference allows him to more fully concentrate on the important part of the game: the actual decisions that lead to winning or losing. A board gamer might say that being completely involved with the game's execution leads to an experience with more weight and depth.

Who Builds the House: the Man with the Plans, or the Man with the Hammer?

From my perspective any cerebral activity would become a more full experience by adding a physical element. Imagine instructing someone on how to build a house. You give the orders about what materials to acquire, what tools to use, and how to proceed with construction. Such a job successfully completed would certainly give you satisfaction since your decisions were responsible for that success. Now imagine making those same decisions but also performing much of the physical labor. In this case the job may have been more of a hassle because you had to physically build the house rather than only supervise, but it also would have led to an additional level of satisfaction with the completed project. To me this describes some of richness of experience gained from playing a board game rather than a video game. Yes, the decisions are the essential part of the game, but the execution of the mechanics provides that extra bit of satisfaction.

Is this mostly a case of preference? Absolutely. The video gamer would emphasize the hassle side of the mechanics, the board gamer the richness of experience.

More examples and analysis to come...