IVP2 Hilary Huskey

Game name: The Game of We; A Private Emotion
Inspiration: Since coming to Duke, I have been exposed to a myriad of experiences. One of the most significant experiences thus far has been the relationship I have entered into with my boyfriend. It is my first serious relationship and has been a lens which has colored the different trials and tribulations I have faced since coming to college. I wanted to make a game that was eloquent and personal for me, which led me to craft a game that conveyed my perception and gauge on my relationship. I decided I wanted to play off of the cliche "game of love". I have heard it a multitude of times throughout my life, yet I have never developed a meaning for this phrase. I thought about what the "game of love" meant in confines of my own relationship and how I could craft that into a game, however, I struggled to give the phrase life or meaning. I came to the conclusion that I do not view our relationship as a win or lose situation. There is no start and finish with a straight or twisted trail in between. There is not one point of convergence or divergence. The starting line of our relationship is not clearly defined for me because the process of forming my own identity and finding 'me' is an important aspect of our relationship. A relationship cannot form without solidifying the 'me' position. The finish line is equally ambiguous as the start. Some would say that the finish line is defined as a break up or death of a loved one, however I disagree because a meaningful relationship never dies. Given this I knew constructing a functional game was going to be impossible for what I was trying to achieve.

I decided that my boyfriend and I would be the 'game board'. The first striking aspect of the game board is that we are both scantly clad. This is traditionally a very vulnerable situation, however, I believe we have reached a state of complete comfort with each other. The stripped figures are representative of both the physical and mental position of our relationship. He has accepted me, flaws and all, and visa versa. The figures are unaware and unashamed at their current state, and it is reflected in the positions which they are posing. They are not attempting to hide or cover anything they perceive as imperfect.

I decided to apply the game board to their skin. However, I had a difficult time envisioning how the paths on the figures correlated with each other. I eventually decided that the path that our relationship has taken is not so defined and therefore this trail was not intended for us. I believe the people who do not know how love works are on a constricted path. Love is multifaceted and cannot be defined by one moment, or one space on the game board.The pawns on the bodies represent all the people who tried to date or fall in love with us. Those individuals who are enamored with the physical, dwell on the minute details or love with a tunneled vision. These pawns are traveling down a path with no beginning or end. Ultimately their trip serves no purpose because they have no great meaning on he nor I.

However, their is a game being played. It is the process of crafting 'we' which is a game. This is represented by the two colors that each figure possess. My blue and his purple represent our definition of 'me'. In the image, my blue is beginning to infiltrate his purple and visa versa. This represents that we have started the process of creating a 'we' from two distinctive personalities, yet at the same time still maintaining our base color because in our game of forming a 'we' neither he nor I have lost our individuality.

IVP2 Chrissy DiNicola

UNIVERSE

The Directions:

The Idea:

I wanted to create a space themed game, because I have always loved astronomy. At first, I thought I would make a game where aliens tried to conquer earth. However, I wanted to give my game some characteristics of sky maps. In order to do this and keep the arrangement of the planets relatively accurate, I decided the aliens would try to reach the sun.

Instead of overlapping circles, I used overlapping ellipses, because then the game board could be square. Each corner of the board features a picture of a different galaxy and its code (like M83). Players can start from any corner of the board.

The game has a primarily navy blue, black and purple background with a yellow game path, because I wanted to use the color scheme generally found in space photographs. The background of the game is a collage of space photographs, and there photographs planets, the sun, and a black hole strategically placed on the board. I wanted to use a collage of photographs because space images are generally interesting and visually appealing, and because they would create a nice, textured contrast with the yellow game path.

At first, I wanted to use a collage of many different space images. After testing this idea, I found that with lots of pictures, the collage background seemed gaudy and distracting, so I settled for a few.

To play, each person chooses an alien. I wanted all of the aliens to be unique, which I thought would be a fun aspect of the game. People can fight over the cutest one...etc. Players roll dice to figure out how far to move forward, and follow the instructions on their square. These are all space themed. Many of them go specifically with the plant to which they are closest. Squares range from "Find a jet pack. Move forward 3 spaces." to "Retreat to home galaxy to escape death by supernova." Players' aliens can get stuck in orbits of some planets, ride comets, and get mauled by hostile life forms on earth.

The goal of the game is to land on the square that lets you take the shooting star to the inner ellipse. Once there, players must roll a 2 to reach the sun and win the milky way (the game). If they roll a 10, they get sucked into a black hole and have to start over. This allows for exciting upsets, and can be funny for players.

The Process:

I thought it would be really neat if the box for the game was like the box from Jimanji (the movie). Also, I thought having a large, sturdy case would suit the nature of game, because it is called Universe, which is a strong, rather majestic title. Luckily, my friend's boyfriend has a wook working shop in his basement and helped me use it to build this box. After almost choking my hallmates out of their rooms with spray paint fumes while the box dried (a learning experience), and adding hinges and a latch, I finished it.


I made the path for the game first, on Illustrator. I chose Illustrator because I was working primarily with lines and shapes. Then, I cut out photos for the board's background collage and scanned them. I added those to the Illustrator document as well. Also with illustrator, I made directions to go in one side of the box when it opens and a space for all the alien characters to sit for the other side of the box. Each alien has one square with its name on it. I printed the board and the directions at Kinkos and glued them to the box with spray-on photo-paper adhesive. I chose yellow dice to go with my color scheme.

The End:




The completed game looks like this.

My friends like to wear costumes, so I let them dress up like aliens (or just like strange people) to play my game. I will incorporate this into my creative representation of the project.

IVP2-Catherine Cordeiro

Litterpad!!

INSPIRATION:

My goal was to take a children's game and manipulate it slightly to communicate a social message. I chose the traditional outdoor game, hopscotch, but instead of squares, the numbers appear on collages in the shape of lilypads (called "litterpads). The collages are a montage of pictures of water and earth pollution. Thus, the game takes on a darker tone because it is a children's game which, like the environment has become corrupt and dirty. The composition of each litterpad is the same, and the focal point is a large drainpipe that leaks lime green polluted water. The game is meant to provoke conversation, debate and education, focusing on environmental issues. An alternate way to display the installation is to float the litterpads in a body of clean water, emphasizing the pollution message. This way, however, is not playable.

RULES: The game is played like traditional hopscotch.

NUMBER OF PLAYERS: 2 or more

HOW TO WIN: Be the first to hop all the way through the grid.

HOW TO PLAY: 

   1. Arrange the litterpads on the ground in a grid pattern. Each player has a natural found object to use as a marker (small stone, etc.)

   2. Stand at the beginning and toss your marker in the first litterpad. Hop over litterpad 1 (you must skip any litterpad that has a marker in it) to litterpad 2.

   3. Hop through the grid on one foot unless there are two litterpads side-by-side, then you jump landing with one foot in each square.

   4. Hop to the end, jump and turn around 180 degrees without leaving the grid, and hop back.

   5. Pause in litterpad 2 to pick up the marker, and out.

   6. Toss the marker in litterpad 2, hop through the same way, then square 3 and so on.

WATCH OUT! YOU'RE OUT IF:

   1. Your marker fails to land in the right litterpad.

   2. You hop on a space that has a marker on it.

   3. You step on a line.

   4. You lose your balance when bending over to pick up the marker and put a second hand or foot down or hop outside the grid.

   5. You hop into a single space with both feet. You then place your marker in the litterpad where you will resume playing and the next player begins.

 

IVP2 Adeeb Yunus

Spookcheesi!

Spookcheesi is an adaptation of the board game Parcheesi "The Royal Game of India." In addition to the basic rules, I used the traditional roots of Parcheesi as an inspiration while creating this board game. First and foremost are the instructions to Spookcheesi. Since this game is indeed ingrained in the culture of India, I chose not to include the basic instructions with the game. However, I will explain them here. Two to four players can play. Each player chooses a color and takes the four pawns of the appropriate color. The pawns are kept in the nest area until a "5" is rolled by that player. At that point, the player can move one pawn out of the nest and onto the track. The pawn follows the track around the game board until it reaches the appropriately colored path towards the center of the board (the home). The first player with all four pawns in the home wins. However, there are two types of interactions that can take place on the board. Firstly, say a red pawn lands on the same square as a green pawn. The green pawn is "eaten" by the red pawn and must be returned to the nest. Secondly if, for example, two orange pawns are on the same square, no other pawns can cross that square. The orange player has created a "blockade."

Now, for my spin on the game. When I played this game over and over again, I loved using the interactions between pawns, but I craved more strategy within these actions. Thus, I created a system in which the "eating" rules have been modified with "battling" rules. Each player now owns a unique team of four pawns. These pawns can aid an ally pawn to contest its being "eaten" but only if it is within seven spaces of the battle (ie. if the player rolled a seven, the pawn could reach the battle space). Since each pawn varies in strength and invincibility, the battle aspect draws in more strategy. For instance, say the zombie lands on the ghost's space. If the grim reaper is within seven spaces, he brings 3 points to the battle field. However, if the zombie has the wolf and vampire within seven spaces, they add 6 points to the battle field, overcoming the ghost who then returns to the nest. Each team interaction is written on a team card for that player. Additionally, each team has a leader pawn. The three other pawns have immunities to a certain other pawn. For example, the werewolf is immune to the black cat. So if the two were involved in a battle, the black cat's points could not be contributed. The leaders do not have immunities and their points always count. They are also the strongest member of the team. Otherwise, they act like a normal pawn. Thus, I have added strategy into deciding which team to pick and when to move each pawn. Below are pictures of the testers of the game.





Here are all the pawns and die, which I created. The process started with me brainstorming teams. I chose mythological creatures because they are ancient, like the game Parcheesi, and have similarities. I grouped the creatures together based off similarities and came up with immunities and points based off of their myths. For example, vampire tales are closely related to those of werewolves and zombies, making their allied point total very high. Also, zombies like to eat brains and mummies have their brains removed during mummification. Thus, the mummy is immune to the zombie's points. Then I sculpted each pawn out of sculpey. After baking them, I coated them with a spray epoxy, which made them very plasticlike and much less brittle. After that step, I painted pieces the appropriate colors and tada!

The teams are as follows:

Team Aqua, nested in the Infested Waters:
Leader: Mermaid
Other pawns: Swamp Thing, Ghost Pirate, Kitsune (a Japanese myth of a fox spirit who looks like a man until he touches water, upon which he turns into a fox)

Team Eternity, nested in the Afterlife:
Leader: The Grim Reaper
Other pawns: Demon, Ghost, Mummy

Team Magic, nested in the Enchanted Forest:
Leader: Witch
Other pawns: Elf, Black Cat (but is painted green), Fairy

Team Hungry, nested in Dracula's Castle:
Leader: Vampiress
Other pawns: Werewolf, Zombie, Chupacabra

Here is the game board. The older parcheesi boards that I saw online were made out of cloth. I followed suit and took a pillow case, charred the edges (to make it look old) and painted the board game. The track is the the yellow spaces (sometimes gold, red, orange, green and blue).


These are my journal pages. I wanted them to look like the sides of a box cover--cheesy and family fun oriented. I took the first picture from flickr and photoshopped it with downloaded brushes.



And that's my board game-Spookcheesi!

IVP2 Lucas Best

Emerge

This game originally developed from my curiosity of physics in Flash. I eventually got the physics and collision detection to be good enough to work. I then decided to make it scroll vertically and I added in the visual aspects of the game such as the background, trees and suns. 

The player uses the left and right arrow keys to roll left and right and the down arrow key to build up jump power. Release the down key to jump.

You can play it yourself if you click here.

It does have audio so make sure to mute your computer if you're in a quiet place.

Jungle Jacks

Jungle Jacks is a game combining the concepts of Pass the Pigs and Jacks and can be played by an unlimited number of people. It includes a board, 7 animal pieces, and a rubber ball. The objective of the game is to be the first player to gain 100 points. One player keeps score.

Rules and Gameplay:

1. One player rolls the animals onto the board. The player to the left of the roller begins.

2. The player chooses an animal to pick up and proceeds to pick it up Jacks style (throwing the ball into the air, picking up the animal, and catching the ball before it bounces.) If the player is not successful, the turn is lost and the ball is passed to the next player for their attempt to pick up an animal. If the player is successful, points are gained depending on the number in the square and the position of the animal, and the turn moves to the next player.

Animal Positions and Points:
~Side - single points
~Back - double points
~Tipped onto the snout - triple points
~Standing/sitting up - 5 x points

If two animals land in the same square, both can be picked up for double points. Animal poisition point system applies to each piece. If an animal lies between two squares, the point value gained is the smaller point value subtracted from the larger point value.

The first player to accumulate 100 points wins the game.

Inspiration: My inspiration for this game came from manipulating the basic concept of Jacks. In the original rules of Jacks, the game is won by picking up as many jacks at once. What if it wasn't how many jacks could be picked up, but which one was picked up? From there I developed the idea for the board with point values. I was unsuccessful in finding a Jacks set to use and came upon the small animals. They reminded me of the pigs in Pass the Pigs and the rest of my game developed from the those rules.

Design Elements: For this game I wanted to create an interesting playing surface and immediatley thought of painting it. Acrylic paints allowed mixures of colors, textures and patterns for the board where I could include elements of a jungle, including leaves. I felt that the acrylic paper alone wasn't sturdy enough, so I cut a piece of foam board to adhere the paper to. I think of a jungle as a place of many textures, shapes and sizes, which is why I chose to paint the squares and numbers the way I did. Also, I chose to paint the lines separating the squares a little wavy to emulate vines off of which I could place the leaves.

IVP2 Rosie Gellman

Woodstock
How to Play:
Player, or "groupies" as they are called in the game, first place their hippie van pieces on the "start" block of the game board, or "peace trail." They next set up the stage next to the game board, with the autograph cards inside. Players take turns rolling the dice and moving their piece the number of spaces shown on the dice. If a player lands on a space with a flower, this player gains "flower power" and gets to go to the stage and collect an autograph from the stack. Players continue to go around the board until all autographs have been taken. The player with the most autograph at the end of the game becomes the "most devoted groupie" and wins!

Design components:
I wanted to create a game centrally themed around Woodstock. The game board background is very psychedelic, created with dripped paint, and overlayed with daisies, the flower of the hippie era. The actual game board, or "peace trail," is in the shape of a peace sign, a typical hippie symbol. The game pieces are hippie vans, covered in hippie symbols as well. The point of the game is to become the "most devoted groupie" by collecting the most autographs, all of which are replicas of actual autographs of the artists of Woodstock. To get an autograph, the player has to go to the stage, which depicts a scene from a Grateful Dead concert, just as a real groupie would have done at Woodstock. Every piece of the game is somehow tied to Woodstock, either hippie-themed or themed around the music of Woodstock. The pieces are all also very colorful, as was the hippie generation. The game is meant to be happy, light-hearted, and full of peace, love, and good vibes.
The packaging box is pretty plain because all of the internal components of the game are very complex, so I didn't want to detract from that. The box includes the name of the game and some colorful hippie symbols, so as to relate it to the game, but other than that, it is pretty simple. Also, as I came over to Smith Warehouse, it happened to be raining just as it was at Woodstock. The rain caused the paint of my box to run, adding to the hippie, Woodstock vibe, somewhat corresponding to my game board. Additionally, everything at Woodstock was drippy and wet, soaked in rain, so the box ties furthers the genuine wet feel of Woodstock in this way as well.


A view of the stage with the autograph cards inside.


An example of an autograph card.


The hippie vans pieces on the board.


The game set up.


An overview of the game board.

VisualPractice54- Sarah Hamerman

Freshly Cut!
A Game Featuring... Game!

The Concept:

For this project, I decided to create a puzzle, as I wanted to keep the rules of the game simple and focus on the aesthetics of the piece. Struggling to come up with some novel way to incorporate the idea of the game into my project, I repeated the word over and over in my head. "I've got it!" I thought, finally. "Game! Meat! Hunting! That's IT!" The imagery in the piece is a montage of various stages in the life cycle of hunted animals: a jumping deer, the antlers of a recently-killed animal, and a cut of meat prepared for human consumption. Though hunting is certainly the central theme of the piece, the work makes no comment on the practice, leaving interpretation up to the viewer-player. I'd like to say that I compounded three "games" into one-- a puzzle, big-game hunting, and a game with words.cut of meat prepared for human consumption. Though hunting is certainly the central theme of the piece, the work makes no comment on the practice, leaving interpretation up to the viewer-player. I'd like to say that I compounded three "games" into one-- a puzzle, big-game hunting, and a game with words.





Method of Construction:
I hand-drew the image on the puzzle in chalk pastel and pastel pencil on a 16 by 22 inch sheet of sanded paper. With regards to the composition, I paid particular attention to the relation between positive and negative space on the page-- because I layered many bold representational elements , I wanted the shapes between those objects to hold as much aesthetic weight as the shapes themselves. I then scanned the drawing, printing and backing the images on heavy poster board. I cut the puzzle into twenty-four pieces, all very similar in shape for added difficulty.




Packaging:
I decided to package the puzzle in a styrofoam meat container, as if the puzzle pieces were cuts of venison for sale in a grocery store. I wrapped the package in plastic wrap and affixed a large label, complete with a bar code and "expiration date." I photographed the finished product in the deli section at Whole Foods.

IVP2Rosie Gellman

The stage with autograph cards inside

The hippie van pieces moving around the peace trail.

An example of an autograph card

The game in play.


An overall view of the board.

ivp2rachelpea

The game Révolution! is a fun and educational way to learn about the French Revolution. To begin the game, each of the four players will pick a game piece—King Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, Robespierre and Napoleon Bonaparte (players will begin the game in this order from the first space marked, “Start!”). To begin playing, the first player will draw a golden card from the stack on the left. There are four options on a golden face card—blue, white, red or Revolution! (Eugène Delacroix’s painting, “Liberty Guides the People.”) The card you draw will direct your piece to move forward to the corresponding space (much like the functioning of the game Candy Land…where drawing a red card would move your piece to the nearest red space.) If you draw a Revolution! card—as opposed to a color—you must draw a second card from the stack on the right with the face of “Liberty Guides the People.” These cards will either move your piece forward or backward according to victories or impediments in the fight toward revolution (forward or backward from the Delacroix space you have just moved to.) For instance, one card reads: “You have been sentenced to death by the guillotine! Go back to start.” The game proceeds as such, sometimes moving forward at an average pace, other times being thrust forward or backward as so often happens due to the forces at work in a revolution. One second you feel victory is within your grasp, the next you feel that it is simply beyond your reach. The goal, of course, is to be the first player to reach the last space marked, “Finish!” and achieve final victory in the Revolution!

IVP2. emily lin.

Rekenen is Dutch for "arithmetic." It is a racing-type game (like Candy Land), but it is numerically- rather than color-based. Players start on the 9 space and finish on the 8.

Game parts:

• the board (shown above)
• 16 operation cards
• 4 player pieces ("doughnuts")
• coins: quarter, dime, nickel, penny
  

Instead of rolling a die, players flip coins to determine how many steps they can take. When all the coins are flipped, the sum of the heads-facing coins is taken, and the digits of that sum are added together.

For example: quarter, nickel, and penny ~> 25 + 5 + 1 ~> 31 ~> 3 + 1 ~> 4

This allows common objects to be used and creates an opportunity for more arithmetic during game play. It also reinforces the circular motif created by the doughnut-shaped player pieces and the circular steps.

In order to advance that number of steps, the player must move his doughnut to the next number, draw an operation card (which happens to be x^2 in the above picture), and correctly perform that operation on the number in 7 seconds. He can keep his spot if he succeeds, but he must move back to his old position if he fails.

Players take turns, and the first player to finish wins.

Design and Construction

While looking for a suitable name for my board game, I was inspired by the name "rekenen," which comes from the Dutch word for "arithmetic." I started looking at Dutch design (especially in experimental jetset's Dutch graphic design flickr set), which was quite compatible with my personal taste for minimalist, clean, simple design (as well as compatible with most of the mathematics textbooks I have had). Accordingly, I chose to work with a limited palette, flat colors, white, overlap, and sans serif characters. I chose to keep a circular motif, because the circle is a simple geometric shape, and also because both circles and math make me think of a kind of intellectual purity and balance. The pathway is an organic curve - although many think of rigid, straight lines when they think of math, being a science major, I have observed that graphed data often follows a mildly organic curve. Also, organic curves are balanced.

The game has a handmade aesthetic, which I have come to love after reading typography (which is now largely done on a computer) books with extensive sections on calligraphy and hand-lettering. The board is a textured rather than sterile white, all characters were hand-drawn and painted, and I left the paint on the doughnuts thin enough to keep the brush strokes visible. Operation cards were hand-written. Dutch (and Swiss) design has this reputation for being clean and sterile, but I've noticed that if you examine it closely, there are always personal touches and little quirks throughout the work. Mathematics theorems and their histories are like that, too.

IVP2 Sarah Wallingford

EVIDENCE

Evidence is a spin-off of the traditional game, "Clue." The story is modified, however; instead of Mr. Boddy's death under investigation, a love affair has occurred in the mansion! The game is a race to find out which two characters had an affair, what evidence they left behind, and in what room.

The game is a commentary on the way private love affairs are publicized by the media. Often times, false accusations are made (just as in the game) and reputations are ruined. In any case, love affairs are the business of the participants and should not be made public for criticism or judgment.

The Game Board (above)
The Characters (below)

The Evidence (below)


Visually, the game is very eye-catching because of its bright colors. On the other hand, it uses only very basic shapes to represent the rooms and evidence and uses only profiles for the suspects. I did this intentionally. The bright colors represent the attention the public gives to love affairs, and the representational simplicity of the shapes reflects the way that in most news stories, details are unknown. This lack of detail often causes people to misinterpret the truth.

Playing the Game



The game is played in the same way traditional "Clue" is played, however two suspects must be discovered instead of one. Players use the detective cards (below) to eliminate which cards are not in the CONFIDENTIAL envelope in the center.


Finally, the rules of the game (above) are in a newspaper format to communicate that this game is a commentary on a news story.