I've been trying to read a lot of stuff about board game design, and one topic which seems to come up a lot is your game's "theme", even if it's as basic as Chess' theme being "soldiers on a medieval battlefield".
But when I learned to play Chess as a kid, I enjoyed it without ever thinking of a theme. And much less with Checker/Draughts. So is theme really necessary? Or does it just help?
I ask because I don't want to tack a shoddy theme onto my board game after it's done. And my current game involves multiple pieces merging into a single mass, larger units splitting up into smaller ones, and dead pieces coming back from the dead. The theme of which would be.... zombie pancakes, maybe?
Obviously I'm kidding (kinda), but still my question remains valid. Do you really need a theme?
I'm glad to hear you guys say that. I don't really think that my game needs a theme; and however awesome a pancake-themed game would be, this isn't it.
And about the "some will only play themed/non-themed", is there a difference between hobby-store-oriented vs. mass market on this? Are people in one camp more likely than the other to play themed or not themed?