Fourth Week

I think our game is very nearly finished, but we've run into yet another problem with the board. Terry's board isn't the right type. We wanted a board that you could take a part and put back together into different shapes like a jigsaw, but the one we have been given is a square board that folds. It seems that David will be taking matters into his own hands and will be making the board himself. As for the player cards Georgia and I are making, we have scraped the template and started again. We want to keep things very simple and have decided on a basic rectangular shape. There will be a white design on black card and the two sections for the money and storage will be separated by a white boarder made from card. The boarder will be slightly raised up so that the money and stuff doesn't slip off the card.

We finally had another group play test our game. According to them there were very little kinks in the game, this is a very good result. We also had somebody win through another method other than accumulating money which, while was a nice change, showed that reaching another goal is possible.

Third Week

We finally came up with a working prototype and David, Jack, Martin and me managed to finally play test it. Despite being a prototype, we found that there were surprisingly little kinks in the game play, but since we haven't got any other people to play it other than ourselves we can't be sure of it completely yet. The equipment cards are the tiles are very nicely done and you can clearly see what they are supposed to be. One problem though is the board that Terry made. It does it's job but unfortunately the squares where you place the tiles don't meet the edges of the jigsaw like pieces so we have these annoying rectangular shaped gaps.

Another problem being is that when collecting money and equipment frequently it is difficult to tell what is yours, Dan would always end up stealing some of my money by accident when he went to take out some money each turn so Georgia and I have been given the job of making these player cards where people can put their money and equipment and keep everything tidy. We've come up with a few designs already and have a template to use when cutting the card.

Second Week

We assigned jobs to everyone in the group, Dan and Martin drew the art work for the equipment cards and tiles, Terry made the board itself, David worked on game play mechanics while Georgia, Amy and me worked with others when they needed help.

We wanted to have a working prototype by the end of the week, we didn't manage it exactly and for the presentation we thought we didn't have an awful lot to present, I wish I had said more than just one thing. We also got to play some of the games the other groups had made. The game I played involved singing out a well known song that was written on a coloured card. I found the game very enjoyable.

A history of Board games

Here is a quick history on two of the oldest known board games:

The oldest board game discovered to far is (Not Sennet) 'The Royal Game of Ur'. Which was discovered in 1926 by Sir Leonard Woolley. The game was found in Royal tombs in Iraq and dates back to later than 2500 B.C.E. Among the wonders found within the tombs were four boards of the same basic design representing one game that was played by many classes of people in that society -- ranging from simple to richly worked pieces. It's not known whether UR was the first board game ever played but it's ancient enough that everything before it is pretty much guess-work.

Sennet dates back to 3100 B.C.E and as many people already now, is a game played by the ancient Egyptians. Sennet boards were discovered in the tombs of workers and Pharoahs alike. In this game of 30 squares set in three rows of 10, both player's pieces enter the board at one end of a row, proceed to the end, turn and go back down the middle at the end of which they turn again, drop to the final row and go back -- the object being to bear off all your pieces before your opponent does. Special spots on the board represent death and being turned away from the afterlife -- and rebirth to try again. The heiroglyph representing a Senet game is found honoring a king.

First week

Our group first played a couple of board games to get a few ideas of what worked well. Our group split itself into to two groups, consisting of David, Dan, Amy and Jack in one group and Terry, Georgia, Martin and myself in another. My group played Carcassonne While the other played Scotland Yard. Using this and further research that we did, which involved researching the history and marketing of popular board games we came up with two separate ideas. One was a tile based game, like zombies and Carcassonne, set either in space or underwater. The other was a game which was mostly Terry's idea, involved reaching a  goal (an oil rig) before the other players to save your country.