Playtesting with Simon

Simon Schmieder is the designer of Jakarta Traffic, Durian Smuggler and Food Alley. He is from Germany and currently lives in Indonesia. I got to know him through boardgame fairs around South East Asia. We were both in Bangkok for the Bangkok International Game Festival (BIGF) in August, and he, Jon and I met up for a playtest session. 

The Airbnb Simon stayed in was like a mini museum, with so many antiques. There were no other guests, so we had the whole place to ourselves. 

We took turns playtesting one another's games. The one I asked them to playtest for me was Rebels of the Three Kingdoms. I wanted to playtest the 3-player variant more. 

This is Simon's prototype You're CC'ed. It is about that one thing in the workplace everyone loves to hate - emails! Everyone has a secret identity. You know who you are, but at the start of the game no one else knows. Throughout the game emails will be generated, and you manipulate who these emails get sent to. As a general rule, getting many emails is bad because it stresses you out, and getting fewer or no emails is best because you can relax. You reveal cards in the play area. Some will generate emails. Some are paths through which emails will be routed. Some are inboxes of the various characters in the game. This is how they receive emails. In addition to the four possible player characters, there is also a CEO and a spam folder. Emails might go to the CEO or the spam folder. 

Here you keep track of how many emails are received by each employee, the CEO and the junk folder. This list must stay sorted. Depending on which card is on top (most emails received), the winning condition changes. If a regular employee is on top, then it is the employee with the third most emails who wins. The first two are burnt out from overwork, and the last is fired for being useless. If the CEO's card is on top, the employee with the fewest emails wins. The CEO is stressed out and fires everyone. You are fired but at least you are happy for having had the least work. If the spam folder is on top, it is the employee with the most emails who wins. This is because the CEO rewards you for being the most hardworking. Manipulating this ranking is crucial because you want to position yourself to win. 

Several things in this game are very relatable. Emails are bad, but if you receive funny GIFs, they balance out the emails you receive. Sometimes attachments are added to either emails or GIFs, doubling their effects. Sometimes emails bounce back to the sender. I find this game hilarious. I am amazed with the themes Simon pick for his games. They make the games highly enjoyable. 

This is Jon's Foundations of Rome, and it is now called Pillars of Power. He has been trying to find a non Roman theme for it, and he wanted a more serious theme. The theme now is political ideologies. I think this works better. 

This game is like a friend's child I've seen grow up over the years. I have played many versions and seen how it improved over many iterations. I still enjoy playing it. I hope it finds a publisher soon. This is a light strategy game and it is better suited for the international market, as opposed to the Malaysian market. I keep telling Jon I like this better than Castle Combo. 

This is Simon's prototype about introverts at a party. Although you are an introvert, you know you should be going out there to meet people. Throughout the game you will meet other guests and collect them. These guests you claim will score points in various ways at game end. 

The house is customisable. You can meet people only in certain rooms. You're not going to meet new friends in the toilet. At least not in this game. 

Some of these standee characters are the players, and some are their best friends. When you move about the house, whenever you meet your best friend they energise you. However if you meet other people, you lose energy. That's how introverts work. Energy is one of the resources in the game. In one of the rooms, you can smoke to regain energy. 

To collect a guest card, you need to spend resources. If you have something in common, the cost is reduced. For example you both like music. 

The art is done by Simon's wife, and I find it adorable. It's unique and it really gives the game character. 

You start the game with three tokens for each of the four resource types. Whenever you use a resource, you flip it to the red side to indicate it is exhausted. This means for every resource type you can have at most three unit, unless you are able to gain more tokens. 

Game design is fun!