The board has 2 different designs from different time periods. Both designs contained a total of 20 cells but both games had the cells placed differently. Both designs feature a bank of 4 cells at either side of the board and both boards feature a centre column but of different sizes. The centre column in the earlier board was 8 tiles long while the later board had a column that was 12 cells long. In place of the 4 cells the original design has 2 extra banks that are 2 tiles in length (bell)
According to Kendall(1982) The game is played with the board lengthwise between them the players then use dice throws to move their pieces into the their respected safe zones which are the banks of 4 cells and towards the corner. From the corner the players would move their pieces in the opposite direction down the middle row with the objective of moving all their pieces off the end first. Both players then use their respective dice throws to fight for control of the centre column by blocking cells and taking their opponents pieces by landing on the same cell as them.
In the original variation of the board the players would move their pieces onto the secondary bank of 2 cells on their respective sides of the boards this acts as another safe zone for the players as the player cannot move their pieces into their opponent’s banks to capture their pieces. This change was probably made to increase the excitement of the game because the players are able to be taken until the end of the board.
The game traditionally used 4, 4 sided dice that can each either give a result of 0 or 1. In the variation of the game we played the rosette tiles gave a player that landed a piece on it an extra roll. Because the rosette tiles were spaced 4 tiles apart a roll of 4 (the maximum roll) is significant because it allows a piece to go from one safe rosette tile to another and gain another roll.
I was given the task of iterating the Royal Game of Ur to try and improve the game and try to make it more entertaining. I find that games with elements of skill are more entertaining to a lot of gamers and I therefore am aiming to improve the skill aspect of the game in my iterations.
From my original play-throughs of the game I found that the major flaw was the lack of meaningful choices. The game offered the player a choice of which piece to move with each throw but the choice has no perceivable consequence because the randomness of the game means that the other player is unpredictable.
In order to try and counter this I introduced a change of giving the players the ability to split their throws. By this I mean that if a player were to roll a 3 they could choose to move 1 piece 3 times move 1 piece 1 cell and another 2 cells or move 3 pieces 1 cell each. I anticipated that this change would make the game more engaging by making the player feel that he is having more of an impact on the outcome on the game because they can make all these choices.
When trying out the interaction I found that the game was more enjoyable but for a different reason than I had anticipated. The ability to split the rolls allowed the player to repeatedly hit the rosette tile by making certain pieces hit by giving them the exact required number of moves. Because the rosette tile gave the player an extra roll this meant the player would often get more than 2 rolls a turn. This made the player feel like his is really making a difference in each turn and gave him satisfaction because of this. However the core problem was not entirely fixed since the choices the player makes are obvious and once the player realises this he soon loses interest putting his wins and losses down to chance. Ultimately a player must feel that he is winning because of his/her skill for to really enjoy a game.
To try and fix the problem of choice being obvious I made a second iteration of not allowing more than 1 piece on the same square. I intended this change to reduce the amount of throws a person can achieve in 1 turn by forcing a player to remove a piece from a rosette tile in order to then get another extra roll. The rationale behind wanting this to happen was that if a player has a piece near a rosette square they would try to conserve their extra roll till they are either safe to move or their opponent is in a position to be taken. It was my hope that this would make it easier to overcome the chance aspect of the game.
While i tried this iteration i found that the game had gotten worse. The game as I had predicted had a lot less instances of multiple rolls in a turn however the players quickly realised that by placing a piece on the first rosette tile in the middle column and leaving it there. they could gain a very significant advantage. The piece being on a rosette tile was unable to be taken and a also blocked. this created a area between the safe area and the first rosette which was extremely hazardous for the other player. The players pieces would have it’s movement stunted by the fact that it cannot land on that rosette square and if they moved past the rosette square they would easily be taken. by the piece on the rosette tile. This advantage while not unbeatable is strong enough to reduce the entertainment value of the game significantly because the player has a valid excuse for their losses which reduces how connected they feel to the outcome of the game..
To fix this I tried a final iteration of not allowing players to have a piece remain on a rosette tile for for more than 2 turns. With this i change i was confident that such a situation could not occur again. I intended this change to make the game more in line with how i expected the game to end up after the previous iteration. I hoped that the chance aspect of the game would be reasonably reduced.
The outcome of the iteration was not entirely successful. The game did have a increase in tactical gameplay but not enough so to really improve the game significantly. Chance could still make the more skillful player lose the game. The game itself did now have some meaningful choices but all they add to the game is a improved chance of winning.
Through my iterations I tried to remove meaningless choices from the game. I wished to make the game to entertaining by making the player feel like they themselves are causing their wins rather than believing that they were just lucky. I felt that the game as it was did not the player with a feeling of control. When i tried to do the iterations they were largely unsuccessful
My iterations taught me that when a game has chance built into it’s core mechanics it is very difficult to change the nature of the game through making iterations to it’s extraneous mechanics.The core mechanics of the game a really the deciding factor on what aesthetics a game will give to the consumer of that game. So if a game’s core mechanics rely heavily on a element of chance the resultant aesthetics of the game will be those of a high tension but also those of a disconnection to the outcome of the game and also often that of boredom.However if a game is fundamentally based on checks of a player's physical or mental ability then the resultant aesthetics will be those of satisfaction achievement or frustration.. Because of this I have therefore learned that if a game is fundamentally chance based it is a better idea to start a new game than to try to turn the game into a game of skill.
In future attempts at iterating games I will use what I have learned and will try to take into account how difficult it is to change a nature of a game and try to make the game more entertaining as the type of game it is.
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