I have been in the development stage of my game BOTA (Battle of the Aces) for about three four years now. This game has gone through many transformaions but is finally coming to a place of rest, or at least for awhile. Balancing, testing and artwork of some of the cards is in order for it to be able to be even printed for prototyping.
Anyway, to make it simple (and if I need to alaborate I will) the game is composed of players creating a deck of 40 cards while picking a "Monumental" card; the epicenter of the games main objective (41 cards in total). There is a board that consists of player Territoy and the Battle Grounds. Players start with 18 of the forty cards randomly selected and put on the board in their territory (four, including the Monumental card, are "activated" or face up while the rest faced down, "deactivated").
They then use actions (such as activating deactivated cards) and these cards to gather kills (points) by removing enemy cards from the board into your kill count piles aswell as other means of gathering points (Special occurances, Special Deck Point cards etc.) which will ensure them victory. To end the game the victory conditions (or better stated: Ending game conditions) on your Monumental card must me met. In turn, you must find yourself with the most points and complete the winning condition(s) to come out victorious.
Each card has a number of attributes that make them unique such as Special Abilities, Movement Type, Predator and Prey. It plays like a complicated version of Chess. For most instances, when a card lands on a space where an enemy card (contained in the cards Prey attribute) is, the enemy card is removed from the field and put into your Kill Count Pile.
My dilemma... The theme of the game is non existant. Or close to it anyways. This has been a challenge since the start and finding myself this deep into developemnt without a concrete idea probably was not a smart choice. But the game has reached a climax and the flaw that I see screaming at me is the dull and fragile theme.
By seeing a watered down version of the game, does anyone have some ideas on how a unique theme could be added? and what?
Thanks,
Tbone
One Monumental card (called the Ace) will end the game if you make it to the enemies Home Base (which is a part of your Territory where you put your first four activated cards).
Another could be "Get four friendly cards in enemy Territory"
Or "After killing three enemy cards you must then sacrifice five cards to end the game" (sacrificing a card would cost a turn)
These in turn would create a sort of Faction affect where you may have a different playstyle suited for a certain "Race" or Monumetal. Maybe you're more agressive--you would then find A Monumental card that has a more Agressive End game condition.