Week 12 (final)

The board game I selected from the youtube channel Watch it Played is Wonder Woman: Challenge Of The Amazons. In this game, you and your partner play as one of the amazons, each with their own ability. The goal of the game is to defeat the selected villain card by bringing its health down to zero before the villain brings your defense to zero. 

This game includes a game board, hero mats and corresponding figures, different types of cards such as relic cards along with their matching tokens, many colored cubes and more. This game mainly works by having cards that explain what the corresponding pieces on the board are supposed to do. This makes it both a board and a card game. Because the image on the card looks similar to the piece that moves around on the board, it is easy to tell which pieces a card is referring to. This is a visual component of the game that makes understanding the game easier for players. According to Soren Johnson in the video How Board Games Matter. “Transparent, visible mechanics increase player comfort,” This is important so that players are not confused about what they are supposed to be doing and instead they focus on strategy and the core gameplay. 

This game involves an element of pre-luck. The first thing you do in the game is play for the villain according to the instructions listed on their mat and the card(s) that you play for them, which are random. It is only after the villain has played that the amazons (players) are allowed to make their move. The players then have a set of different actions they can take based on the cards they have been dealt. They can discuss amongst themselves which cards would be best to play that round to bring the villain's defense down while also keeping their defense as high as possible. This balances the element of luck with strategy. As Johnson said, “Pre-luck is a transparent way to present interesting decisions.” This way, you don’t have to worry about making a decision that means nothing because of bad luck. Decision-making comes after luck, not before, so it is the deciding factor of what happens in the game.

Rules, such as when to play and how much you are able to play, remain consistent throughout the game. As Johnson said in his talk “Transparent, consistent rules run in the player's head, creating engagement.” Throughout the game, players can come up with clever ways to utilize the rules to their advantage in order to win the game. For example, in Wonder Woman: Challenge Of The Amazons, you can use your cards to make your teammate's cards more effective, or even work together for an effect. This way, you can use the rules written on the cards to your advantage.