PedGames Project Curriculum Document
Game Design Activity 2:
Board Game Design Activity – Modifying an existing board game by making some
changes with respect to objective, rules and procedures and make a new game from
it.
Pick any board game and play the game with its standard rules.
Eg: if you pick the Mastermind game, divide students into groups of four and make
them play the game with the standard rules of Mastermind.
Then ask students what was the objective, procedure, rules and resources of the
original game and let them make their own version of the board game that they
played by changing the rules, objective, procedure and have them come with a
different version altogether.
Then students should play test the modified game and give a brief description of
their experience of how they felt playing the new game.
Sample examples of board games:
1) Dominoes
2) Mastermind
3) Up The River
4) Snakes & Ladders
5) Bingo
6) Chinese Checkers
7) Checkers
PedGames Project Curriculum Document
Title of your game:
Word Mind
Derived from the card game:
Mastermind
Objective of your game:
Guess a 4 letter word in minimum number of guesses.
Formal Elements of the Game:
1) Resources: (cards, dices, tokens, etc)
Letter tiles (A to Z), scoring indicator tokens
2) Rules:
One player sets a 4 letter word and hides it from the other player. The other player
has to guess that word using clues and scores given by the setter.
Eg: If the word set is “CAKE” and player guesses “CLAP”, then he should be given 1
position point for “C” and two letter points for “A” & “C”. Since C is in proper
position and A & C are proper letters. However the setter does not reveal which
points are given for what letters.
3) Procedure: (How to play)
Each player alternates turns once by setting a word and guessing a word.
After every guess, the setter must award the guesser the points by matching the
number of letters and positions of those letters with the set word.
Generally the minimum number of guesses is decided at first and usually is set to 15.
After 15 guesses, the setter must reveal the word if the guesser fails to get it.
PedGames Project Curriculum Document
4) Boundaries: (with respect to grid size, game board size, resources etc)
The number of guesses is the boundary set in this game.
Also the other boundary is the number of letter words. For Eg: 4-letter words, 5letter words or higher. Generally 4 and 5 letter words, the game becomes quite hard.
5) Conflicts (obstacles while achieving your objective)
The main conflict in this game is to determine which are the correct letters for
which points are given and which must be present in the set word.
6) Outcome
The final outcome is determined if the player correctly guesses the word or if the
number of guesses of the player is exhausted.
The player must secure 4 position points in order to win the game.
Dramatic Elements:
1) Premise
Premise of the game is simple, a player is trying to break open a safe by guessing
the 4 letter-word code.
2) Story
The story of master mind is actually to crack a color code. For this game, it is to
crack a word based code.
How would you rate this game in terms of strategy on a scale of 1 to 5 and why?
4, this game requires quite a lot of thinking.
How would you rate this game in terms of luck or chance based on a scale of 1 to 5
and why?
2, this is less luck based, however if you started with a word which is very close to
the set word, then you can be lucky.
PedGames Project Curriculum Document
Compare both the games and describe in your own words the difference in game
play of both the games.
Among both the games, this game is more fun since there are 26 letters of the
alphabet and one can choose their own words in the game.
With the color game, there are standard 8 colors and the range is less.
This makes it ideal for vocabulary building too where players are constantly trying
to outsmart their opponents by setting and guessing challenging words.
PedGames Project Curriculum Document
Title of your game:
Derived from the card game:
Objective of your game:
Formal Elements of the Game:
1) Resources: (cards, dices, tokens, etc)
2) Rules:
3) Procedure: (How to play)
4) Boundaries: (with respect to grid size, game board size, resources etc)
5) Conflicts (obstacles while achieving your objective)
6) Outcome
PedGames Project Curriculum Document
Dramatic Elements:
1) Premise
2) Story
How would you rate this game in terms of strategy on a scale of 1 to 5 and why?
How would you rate this game in terms of luck or chance based on a scale of 1 to 5
and why?
Compare both the games and describe in your own words the difference in game
play of both the games.