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Kids Game Needs Input/Opinions

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jeffrhind
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Joined: 09/21/2013

I am new to the forum and I figured this would be a great way to bounce ideas off a group of other gamers and designers.

I've been working on a dice-based game for my 5 year old daughter. I'd like to think there would be other parents who could play it with their kids and I would make it available as a PnP. The game is geared toward 5 or 6 and up.

Tentatively called Vexil, the theme is rolling dice to gain the colors necessary to complete the colors of flags from around the world. For young kids, the goal can be to complete an X amount of cards. For older kids it could be a certain amount of points. (more on that later)

Each player draws a card at random from a deck. Each card has the name of the country, an image of its flag, as well as dice squares of the colors necessary to complete the card. Additional information could also be on the card like its capitol city and a map of the country or its location plus a value to the card for victory points. The harder the card is to complete, the more points its worth, naturally.

Each player would get a set of six dice. Each side of each die is colored red, white, blue, green, black and gold. The player draws a card. For example, if a player gets the card for Germany (a 3 value card), the player rolls three dice and tries to roll a red, black and gold. If they do, they keep the card for the points and the dice pass to the next player. If they do not, they can choose to pass the dice and try next time or discard the card they have, draw a new one, and then pass the dice to the next person. They might get an easier flag or a harder one. Play continues around the table until the goal is reached, as stated before, either point value is reached or a number of cards are completed.

I was trying to think of a way to design this game with plain d-6 dice. This would negate the need for the creation of custom colored dice. Using the German flag example again, the card may show a red, black and gold die square with 4 pips in each. The player would then have to roll 3 dice (one for each color) and try to get three, fours or higher. Whatever squares they do complete, they could keep the die and cover the square on the card (this would require 6 dice per player) or there could be tokens that cover each square on the card as each player completes them which means only 6 dice in total for the game.

My dilemma is I like the idea of custom dice but for PnP that's a real turn off for many. While, plain dice could be used that people already have makes it great for PnP but if I ever wanted to actually create and sell the game, I don't see the value in that. Yes, I know it reeks of a Yahtzee mechanic but kids like rolling dice and I think this concept would be easy to understand for kids.

Any thoughts or ideas on any of the above? Do you think this is a viable game for children?

Thanks for your time.

questccg
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Dice for small children???

I don't know... but when I saw that "Game Salute" forces games to put a "Choking Hazard - Small Parts" warning on all their game boxes, it makes me wonder if dice are appropriate for small children...

Perhaps you could explore other types of dice - sort of like Fuzzy Dice you have in the car windshield - but SMALLER... Of course they would be made of material not dangerous plastic.

If you explore something along that avenue that may be more appropriate for a 5 year old child.

If you made a prototype using "Fuzzy Dice" that would definitely have an EDGE over the competition - because you would have an original concept using dice in your game - but also that the dice are made AGE APPROPRIATE. I, personally, think that those kind of dice would really add something unique to your game!

BTW someone told me (another designer) that only 6% of the gamer population would actually go through the motions for a PnP (Print-aNd-Play) game. Personally I think it's more like 3%!

If your pool of gamer's is 10,000 gamers and you can reach 3%, that is 300 gamers. Now if of those 300 gamers, 6% are willing to use PnP then you are left with 18 gamers who would be willing to play PnP! Nothing to write home about...

jeffrhind
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Joined: 09/21/2013
Small Parts

Hmmm, I guess I give my daughter too much credit as she doesn't put stuff in her mouth. We play Carcassonne together and she would never even think of putting a meeple in her mouth. And I was playing dice games when I was 5. I suppose I could also replace the dice with a card mechanic, but then you run into the issue of dexterity as it can be difficult for tiny fingers and hands to hold cards.

Thanks or the idea. Keep 'em coming folks.

questccg
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You mentionned Yahtzee

According to Hasbro's website, Yahtzee is a game for players ages 8 and up! But yet Boggle Junior (another game with dice) is rated ages 3 and up...

I think the idea behind the "choking hazard" has to do if a child is exposed to the parts of the game themselves (without adult supervision), they might be tempted into putting those part in their mouths.

I bought a set of 10 Polyhedral dice manufactured by Koplow Games and they had a warning on the label: Not for children under 3 years. So maybe 3 years is the minimum... I just figured I'd take a look at what a dice manufacturer would consider appropriate. So it looks like it's okay for kids aged 3 and up... (according to the manufacturer)

Personally I would say 5 years - not for children under 5 years... But I wanted feedback from a female - and I got as answer 7 years or older... So I guess it depends who you ask.

Note that *memory* games use thicker cardstock and smaller cards (almost square if not for the rounded corners). If you want to go with cards, maybe you could explore the smaller square cards used by games such a memory...

Or there are also "micro cards" which are much smaller than poker cards. Their size is 1.25" x 1.75". There are also "mini cards" which are a little bit bigger than micro: 1.75" x 2.5". Those can be found at The Game Crafter (TGC: http://www.thegamecrafter.com/) Visit the section entitled "Products" under "Make Games". You can Scroll down to decks for the different types of cards I mentioned above...

jeffrhind
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Agreed.

As I ran to the laundromat I thought about your comments and I think 7 and up is the way to go. And yes, micro cards is definitely the way I would go if I go down that road and eliminate dice. Lots to think about. Thanks again.

Corsaire
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Sounds like a fun idea with

Sounds like a fun idea with the colored dice. The federal labelling laws that I've seen only require labelling for choking hazards for three and under. Age suggestions for games tend to be focused on the play mchanic, strategy and math type requirements. Yahtze takes a bit of quick addition and has some challenges with the push your luck mechanic.

If I am picturing your dice right. Then each side is only one color. Rolling three dice to get three specific results isn't very easy (think it is a 1 in 36 chance.) I know my kid likes to be more successful than unsuccessful. The big challenge is then to make sure the rules give them a fair chance to enjoy.

You could have just the flag on the showing side and if they roll it and can name the country, they get a bonus or such.

jeffrhind
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Wasn't clear

Sorry I wasn't very clear. People would roll six dice. Yes, each side is a different color. Difficulty could be amped up by only rolling the number of dice necessary instead if all six. Right now I have about 50 cards prototyped. So those would be standard card size. I also thought of lowering that number and putting them on larger Dixit size cards. But that's another discussion.

Corsaire
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Harder probabilities without

Harder probabilities without interesting choices aren't much fun. If you can come up with some rule that gives them an interesting choice, like paying to reroll some dice or choosing one die to lock into a color for their next turn, that might be even more engaging.

questccg
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Variations for better odds

Hmm... I think there could be a LOT of variations. For example, if cards were 2-sided, one side could have the flag with it's colour and as Corsaire suggested the other side could have the NAME of the country. For example, a correct guess of the country earns you +2 Dice to roll for the colours of the flag.

Other options if a player rolls the SAME colour on 2 dice, he can choose ONE (1) of those to be any colour he likes... So doubles are special and give better odds of getting the right colours. Same goes with 3 dice with the same colour, the player could choose any two (2) colours of his choice... etc.

Give the option to player to swap out a country for another one. This is in case you feel as particular Flag is just too hard to roll for. Instead of having one (1) flag, display TWO (2) flags and let the player choose which one he wants to roll for...

If you have points (scoring), you should be able to re-roll all the dice (or those you want to re-roll) at the price of some accumulated points. Rolling a second time is a huge bonus.

Another suggestion by Corsaire was "locking the dice". This is a good mechanic if players are playing AGAINST each other (sort of a dual). Both players may be competing to win the SAME flag. Locking dice allows players to roll the remaining dice on their NEXT turn... with better odds of getting the colour they were missing!

anonymousmagic
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Is there a particular reason

Is there a particular reason you included gold instead of yellow?

JewellGames
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Do you have rules and or the

Do you have rules and or the cards yet? someone can make a vassal (or i know zuntzu) mod to get around the pnp need for custom dice.

let-off studios
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Build Sets of Dice

I have no comments regarding Choking Hazards and what-not, but here are some thoughts on mechanics and components.

CLAIMING A CARD
If you want to PnP the game, then devising rules for a regular set of dice is essential, I believe. Fortunately, there are plenty of creative ways to go about designating numbers to indicate colours. Some options:
- Each colour on a flag requires a certain number to be rolled.
- Each colour on a flag requires a certain set of numbers to be rolled.
- The flag itself requires a certain set of numbers to be rolled. This eliminates the need for different numbers for different colours.
- The SUM of pips the player rolls must be lower, higher, or equal to a given number per card.

Additionally, using numbers instead of colours broadens the range of colours available for the flag options (although I think all flag colours are represented by the Olympic rings or something, right?).

I do think that some of the magic may be lost when converting to numbers, but again if it's PnP and you want people to have a go at it with their kids, then I say the conversion is essential. It's actually a selling point for PnP games, in my opinion.

INSTEAD OF DICE
Oh, there are so many ways to go about doing this! The one that comes to mind as totally accessible to kids is "Candyland" style cards, with one or two coloured blocks on them. Players are given a hand of cards, and they use them to build sets indicated by the different colours used on the flags. If a card has two different colours on it, it's potentially more valuable than a single-colour card, but must match a flag exactly.

The only disadvantage to requiring colours for a PnP game is that the game itself must be printed in colour, or else the mechanic cannot translate. Having numbers instead of colours would make the game confusing, so I don't recommend doing a colour-by-number kind of mechanic. But one of the setup/assembly steps you can have for your game is to have the players do a "colouring session" to prepare the deck of cards with the required coloured cards... Maybe this is a potential work-around for those with only black-and-white printing possibilities.

Hope you find a workable solution to your issues, jeffrhind! :)

drunknmunky
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the "choking hazard" warning

the "choking hazard" warning is a federal mandate. Any board game with small parts has to put that warning on their box by law. It has no reflection of the complexity of the game, merely that there is the possibility of choking. Even HABAs Dancing eggs has this warning (I believe) and it is designed with kids in mind. HABA is probably the biggest maker of kids games and every one of them I've seen has smaller pieces.

It all comes down to supervision and the responsibility of the parent. Having a small part won't affect your ability to sell a game. But too much complexity will.

EDIT:
On a side note, I love the idea of your game and I would directly market it to teachers. Teachers are always looking for interactive ways to get kids to learn and I haven't before seen a strong way to learn country flags. This is a great one!

You could even make a US only one since each state has a state flag as well.

If doing it as a learning tool, I would add information that doesn't pertain to the game as much as education. An example would be putting the continent on each flag card. (like Russian flag has "Asia" or a small picture of Asia on it). Another would be adding a small "UN" to each card if it is in the UN.

By doing this, you aren't affecting the complexity of the game, but you are giving teachers more to teach! I've met many a teacher who create their own rules to games like this to teach slightly different subjects. Maybe a teacher wants to teach which country is on which continent and changes the rules a bit to make people have to get so many from a certain continent. Same goes for United Nations.

Other possible additives that won't affect gameplay:
Population
Climate
local country name (Germany and Deutschland)
Some way to show exact geography (harder to do, but would be great for geography class. Continent might be better and the teachers can add a rule that when they make the flag they have to find the country on a map)

I would talk to teachers to get input. Depending on where you live, I know that there are teaching groups that get together to trade ideas on how to teach kids. Try to get into one of those and ask questions.

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