Expert: Dante - 10/15/2011

Question
dear sir

I m asking about a board game gather between imgaination , joy and intelligence , please let me know some board games name cotain this factor

please let me know your opinion and comments about the following game

1- scrabble

2- curses

3- game of life


thanks and wish to hear from you soon thanks

Answer
You're asking a pretty broad question, but I'll see what I can do with it. Obviously, if you could create with all of those factors, you'd have a best seller for sure. But, obviously, it all depends on your point of view.

Some people view imagination as pure creation... games like Cranium or Pictionary are great games that need imagination. But other folks believe that imagination is how you play strategic games like Risk... where you use creativity to build up a strategy to outwit your opponent.

It's probably a bit easier to look at the games you've listed and give my opinions there.

Scrabble isn't really a game of imagination... more one of vocabulary. While the list of words that are acceptable is large, it is finite, so it doesn't lead to significant use of imagination. It is, however, a good measure of intelligence... a more intelligent person usually has a better vocabulary and can analyze a board and set of tiles for an optimal play. Joy is very subjective. In my life, I have several friends who enjoy Scrabble, and one who finds it sheer agony.

Curses is a game that different people like or dislike. It's also not the most imaginative, since the game's progression applies more and more behavioral rules, which could be considered prohibitive to imagination. But, for a younger crowd, the opportunity to watch a friend attempt to sing a song with a golfball in his mouth is certainly a joyful situation.

Finally, the Game of Life is considered by many board game enthusiasts to not really be a game at all. The player actually only has a few choices, and most of those choices are ones where one option is obviously better or worse than another. One could argue that The Game of Life encourages imagination, as you try to visualize the different situations that your unfortunate pawn is subjected to at the whim of the spinner... but even that's a bit of a stretch.

Instead of trying to tackle the goal at this level... I'd suggest to think a little smaller. The best piece of advice I've ever heard is simple... design the game that you would most want to play with your friends. That tends to lead you to the types of games that you know and understand best... and if it's the type you want to play with your friends (that you think your friends would enjoy), you've got an easy time finding people to help you playtest and refine.

I hope this helps and good luck!

--D