Board Game Redesign
Theme, Branding, & Piece Construction all from the brain of yours truly
The Rulebook
The Process
Learn & Play the Game
Make aggressively orange cards with the theme and extra pieces stripped from the board game. Discover what additional pieces would be helpful and the basic game mechanics.
2. Brainstorm Themes
Think about all the aspects of gameplay and how to add a memorable visual and thematic twist to any action. I settled on a theme of secret agents with animal identities and ran from there. The visuals would reflect desk and office supplies that a secret agent might use.
3. Iterate
Make mock-up cards. Try different character board setups. Sketch. Erase. Sketch some more, but in pen so you don’t erase. Write flavor text. Figure out how to draw a paper clip. ITERATE!
4. Digitize & Start to Make it All “Real”
Digitize and print iterations to physically interact with the pieces. Build weird boxes and discover quirks about printing. Realize you’re bad at estimating how thick a stack of 32 cards is. Contemplate how much longer you should look at typography iterations that your engineering roommate says “look all the same.” Play game with said engineer out of quarantine desperation. Realize you have two different font colors in the same paragraph. Fix it all.
5. Make It All Final & Then Make It All Physical
Click “Save” neurotically one last time. Thank the Lord for the kind man at Copy Corner who put up with your odd requests. Spends hours cutting and glueing. Push all the furniture in your den aside and stage a photo shoot for your newborn game. Fall asleep after a game night of you showing off your game to your roommates who are probably sick of your talking about it by now. Dream happy thoughts of your game on the shelves next to Mouse Trap and Monopoly. (You’d have to place it there yourself like some sort of board-game Banksy but a girl can dream!)
Post Script
Special Thanks to Gavin Braman, TAMU Lecturer and Co-Founder of Drifting Creatives for the project idea and design process feedback.
Also, the game I re-designed is Lovecraft Letter. However, I’ve never played the OG version; I’m partial to my own remake.