CAGD Section 2 Group 4 - Eriatilos

I have been working with my partner Usume in group 4, and our game is called
Eriatilos (Air-ee-ah-tee-lohs). The game is very similar to solitaire, however there
are a few key differences. 

Game Summary

In Solitaire, the player’s goal is to create four “victory” decks which begin with an ace
and end with a king, with the entire deck in ascending order of value, while being
composed entirely of the same suit. 

In Eriatilos, this is reversed, in two ways; first, the victory decks begin with a king and
end with an ace, this time in descending value. Second, the decks are made with an
alternating color scheme. The other key difference in Eriatilos is that when a move is
made, instead of an alternating color scheme on the 7 starting piles, the player is
required to use not only the same color, but the same suit.

Audience

When we were creating Eriatilos, our target audience consisted of three types of
players: the competitor, the explorer, and the achiever. My partner and I tried to make
the game simple enough for anybody to pick up, but intricate enough for the explorer
to gain an interest in the game’s mechanics and the tricks to winning. We also wanted
to keep it similar enough to solitaire that those who compete for the best time, or want
to achieve victory, will find interest in Eriatilos.

Issues

The biggest problem encountered during the playtesting was that our rule sheet was
inadequate, and confused our players greatly. The instructions were not nearly clear
enough for the player to grasp the differences from regular solitaire. This was due to
a lack of review of said rule sheet on my part I feel, because my partner was very
industrious and even asked for me to review it.

The main gameplay issue observed was the difficulty presented by the same-suit
building rule. Whereas regular solitaire offered many options for strategic placement
of cards from the reserve deck and/or other playing piles, the same suit rule
essentially forced the player to rely on pure luck to allow them to play the game.
After watching a player run out of moves within 5 minutes, due entirely to this rule,
I realized that we may need to either modify that rule or scrap the idea altogether. 

Although there is the chance that said player just had very bad luck, after doing a
bit of testing on my own, I realized that this occurs much, much more often than
previously expected. I’ve found that the alternating color scheme is a necessary
rule for the playing piles because it allows the player to play the game, regardless
of the luck of their shuffle.

Solutions

The solution to the rule sheet issue is quite simple, I just need to review, revise,
and rewrite it to be more accessible to players. I will admit, there was some
complacency on my part when reviewing the rule sheet, and now I see what needs
to be fixed to move forward.

The solution to the same suit problem is a bit more tricky, however. We have a few
options:

1) We can modify the rule to be a bit more lax, not requiring it all the time, or possibly
making the same suit rule apply to certain cards.

2) We can modify the rule to make it optional, giving the player an advantage in the game,
but still allowing them to play an alternating color scheme on the play piles.

3) We can remove the rule altogether, making the play piles use alternating color scheme
rules all the time

The Plan Going Forward

In the future, I don’t have many changes I believe are necessary, but the changes I do
see, I believe are crucial. I need to stop being complacent and communicate with my partner
more effectively, as well as review the documents more thoroughly both before submission,
and before playtesting. I also believe we need to test the features of our game more often,
as previously minimal testing was done, which backfired during the playtest day.