Project: Death Race Update – Making Games Is Hard
Admit it, sometimes on the drive home from work, you wish you had a .50 cal mounted on the roof.
We’ve been hard at work here at Robot Viking HQ deveoping the first Robot Viking original game. We were hoping to have the alpha rules for Project: Death Race posted this week. So why is it taking so long? ‘Cause this game design stuff is harder than it looks.
Project: Death Race (a working title we’ll almost certainly have to discard) is a game of automotive combat using 1/64 scale die-cast cars. There are more details here, and an example of one of the cars here. First, the good news: in preliminary play-testing, the game is fun, even in a fairly stripped down form. If it wasn’t fun, the whole thing would be pretty pointless – it’s not like we’re going to win awards for historical accuracy here.
There’s something else I’m even more excited about. RPG and comic book illustrator (among many other talents) Juan Navarro has jumped on board the Death Race Express, and has already contributed some seriously cool sketches. You can see part of one above. We’ve had a bunch of people offer support, playtesting help and design ideas, including Brian and Andy of the Game On! podcast. Of course, we invite all Robot Viking readers to participate in playtesting when we post the open alpha rules, but it’s awesome to have some hardcore gamers willing to contribute.
The bad news is, we’re at least another two weeks from alpha. The rules are mostly done, though some sections need to be modified and added. We’ve had some incredibly productive playtest sessions, including one in which we basically wrote the rulebook as we played through the game. A more recent session revealed a lack of rules for driving in reverse and a gross miscalculation of ramming damage. An SUV doing 40 mph does a lot of damage, but it isn’t a tactical nuke.
The other big hold-up is the formula for calculating the point cost of special equipment. We took a big step in the right direction this week when we nailed down the formula for weapons, but for other special equipment, there really is no formula. It’s going to take some time to figure out. After that, it’s just details. Cleaning up the rules, laying out the rulebook and creating the template for the maneuver tool.
I’ll leave you future Death Racers with a design question that we can discuss in the comments. Currently, the to-hit number for a weapon attack is based on the speed and the difficulty of the most recently completed maneuver for both the attacker and the target. In other words, if you’ve got the pedal to the floorboard and are making insane hairpin turns, you’re going to be hard to hit, but it’s also hard to get off a clean shot at anyone else. This makes sense – your attention is spread a little to thin to take careful aim. But if the to-hit number were based only on the target’s speed and maneuver, then there would be more incentive to drive fast and insane. You’d be harder to hit, but you wouldn’t penalize yourself. One design choice offers an interesting tactical decision, the other encourages crazy, chaotic gameplay. Thoughts?
Related posts:
February 13th, 2009 8:38 AM
I think you and I use a different definition of “alpha”. In my mind, “alpha” means you’ve implemented all of the core features, made sure they don’t fail spectacularly, but haven’t really tested anything beyond that.
Neither here nor there.
As to your last question, I think the obvious answer is “a little of both”. A game named “Death Race” really deserves crazy, chaotic gameplay, but any good game should force the player to make interesting tradeoffs.
Your current maneuvering should be taken into account, but weighted less than your opponents maneuvers. Without knowing how your maneuver system works, I imagine it like this:
Maneuver difficulty: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
To hit modifier: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 (added to the target’s defense)
To shoot modifier: 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 (subtracted from the attacker’s offense)
Basically, maneuvers break down into easy(1-3), medium (4-6) and hard (7,8). If you wanted to, you could even weight the defense in the same way, all easy maneuvers grant a +3, all medium maneuvers grant a +6, and all hard maneuvers grant a +9.
That would be nicer because you wouldn’t need to track the actual difficulty number of the last maneuver, just its category.
February 13th, 2009 9:20 AM
Also: one of the few things the old WEG version of the Star Wars:RPG got right was vehicle piloting rules. It’s been awhile since I’ve looked, but they had a system for handling maneuver difficulties and the like. Might be worth digging up an old copy of that (surely, you must know someone who has a copy of that? I might have a PDF someplace) just to see how they solved the problem.
Lord knows, I reviewed the rules for MageKnight and Last Night on Earth before formulating the combat system for the game I’m working on.
February 13th, 2009 10:03 AM
Well, my personal opinion – a game called Death Race should, by default be very much about hitting the pedal and driving as fast as you can. Maybe with a very small penalty only if you’re going the maximum speed and doing the most insane stunts. It’s called Death Race, not Death Driving Carefully And Taking Aim.
The ideas on the posts sound groovy and can’t wait for the alpha test rules.
February 13th, 2009 11:15 AM
@Alvan: good way of putting it.
That raises an idea- lots of RPG systems have “style points”, where you can gain bonuses on rolls for roleplaying out or doing stuff that’s just really cool.
Something like that would actually be good for this game- there should be a way to improve your attacks by being utterly ridiculous.
February 13th, 2009 11:31 AM
I like the to hit number factoring in the maneuver of both the attacker and defender. It gives you the flexibility to design “classes” of cars. The insane driving, light on armor sports car versus the slow moving, heavily armed tank of an SUV. I’m assuming that the rest of the rules would have mechanics that would create reasons for one to choose between the different classes.
February 13th, 2009 5:44 PM
I’m with T3kno on this, don’t penalize the shooter’s manuver too much. If it’s too hard to shoot at speed it’ll quickly become Death Turrets and speed would lose all advantage. Your moving doesn’t hurt too bad, and maybe a weapon that partly compensates for the mobility. Battletech’s Streak missiles come to mind. Mild homing, perhaps?
February 13th, 2009 5:44 PM
A little bit of both, I think previous incarnations of this type of game have suffered from too much math and over thinking the situation. tactics and strategy always play a part, but should not hamper game play to the point of needing a scientific calculator to make you next shot
Another idea would be to have a gunner / co-pilot to aid in the shooting. adding a bonus to your “to hit” number, this could be offset by the points you pay for how good your gunner is.
Andy
February 14th, 2009 8:35 AM
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February 17th, 2009 12:24 PM
I stumbled across this and found it pretty interesting. I have a number of Matchbox cars around my cube for decoration so this is right up my alley. It reminds me of a Steve Jackson game I played a little as a kid, Car Wars. Anyway the game sounds like a ton of fun, I especially like the idea of modifying Matchbox cars. Anyway on to the rules:
I believe if you don’t make it too difficult to hit with a weapon while driving fast or making a hard maneuver than you’ll end up with games that end too quickly, and you will be taking away the motivation of setting up a well timed and thought out attack. Driving fast would still be encouraged from a strategic perspective because it will aid in defense and still be important for inflicting damage during any ramming maneuvers.
Style points are another interesting dilemma. I don’t think they should be considered when you are adding up damage or chance to hit, but it would be a cool way to bring in the effect of morale of the drivers. If someone keeps hitting your car and they are taunting you while they are doing it then it may affect your ability to make sound decisions. Perhaps the best way to deal with it is to have any style points earned go against the opponent’s accuracy roll in future attacks.
Anyway I think I am going to create some cars for this next weekend. Cool game idea!
March 14th, 2009 2:02 PM
If there is some risk of crashing & burning, and this risk escalates the more complex a driving action is taken, then I think a parallel decrease in successfully targeting or being a target seems sensible. Your going to want to level out at some point and concentrate on aquiring and hitting your target and you will also make a better one while you are busy aiming which also seems sensible to me.
I’m eagerly awaiting this game,
Sigwald
Nitrous injected suicide machine
March 21st, 2009 11:49 AM
Just a note of encouragement. Somehow or other I managed to find a couple matchbox cars in a junk drawer and I’m keen to try out the game.