I really want to play that mode. If I get to be the phantom, nobody will know who the phantom is because I suck so much. The regular shmo players will probably have more units than I do, even though I will be trying to not suck.
Was just re-listening to the GN episode on Mafia-likes. Has any progress been made on Beantown, Rym? Is that project still in the hopper? I'm definitely interested in getting a copy someday.
Beantown is nearly done. I expect to playtest it in the coming months.
Designing a game, eh? Are you really looking to push it, make it a financial success, or are you just making something fun for you & friends to see what comes of it?
You might want to check out Metatopia. It's NJ hotel con in early November that is playtest speed-dating. Only unpublished games are allowed, and the con is geared for the benefit of the designers, not the players. Players get shuffled around from prototype to prototype and are expected to give honest feedback. It's a great way to get opinions outside your immediate social bubble. You'll have to parse out the bad feedback of course, but it's good to know all your playtesters aren't just kissing your ass.
It's also is a good place to generate buzz and potentially get scouted by publishers if the game is in a really good state.
I'm giving it away for free. It's just an exercise for me really. Beantown is designed to fit inside of a Bohnanza box to make it "also" effectively Mafia. I'm just taking the Mafia-like that we played at RIT, cleaning up the rules, codifying game balance, and making a free PDF of the rules.
Granted, our particular flavor of this type of game had some superior features compared to what I've seen people playing out in the wild, and coupled with some specific balance instructions and other rules, should be a superior play experience for most people.
Now, I might kickstart a printing of cards for the game if enough people are interested. But it's designed to just be rules that can be used with any deck of playing cards or an existing Bohnanza box.
BTW, there's a Mafia-like Half-Life 2/Counter-Strike Source mod out there called "Trouble in Terrorist Town". Anybody playing that here?
My friends have been trying to get a game together for a while, but we can never co-ordinate well enough. It'd be awesome if we could get a Forum game going.
Beantown is nearly done. I expect to playtest it in the coming months.
Nice. I would contribute to a Kickstarter for cards, but I am also happy to buy Bohnanza, too. Scott highly underestimated people's interest in bean-themed games, I think. Yay beans.
I ran real-time Mafia at camp over the summer. It was really well received. Not sure how well it would work outside of an overnight camp context, but it worked well for us.
@Rym I am in the situation where I can run a blind playtest of Beantown this month if you throw me the rules. I'm having a game night that's probably going to include Werewolves of Millers Hollow and Shadow Hunters as well.
I started playing Trouble in Terrorist Town. That mod is awesome and hilarious, and I think it brings something to Mafia like games that bothered me about them for a bit: Real Time.
This game isn't round based with "sleeping" and "wake" phases and voting and stuff like that. If you are a traitor you have to be actually opportunistic and play your cards right, set traps, work together, and pick your targets well.
I haven't found any mention of this game any where else, so I thought I let you guys know about. Full disclosure I haven't actually played it but it looks awesome.
Two Rooms and a Boom. This is a social deduction, hidden role game. There are two teams, the Red Team and the Blue Team. The Blue Team has a President. The Red Team has a Bomber. Players are equally distributed between two rooms (separate playing areas). The game consists of 5 timed rounds. At the end of each round, some players will be traded into opposing rooms. If the Red Team’s Bomber is in the same room as the President at the end of the game, then the Red Team wins. Otherwise the Blue Team wins.
Its a Print and play game, most of the components are cards, and it's available for free. I would love to hear what Rym and Scott think of this game, and from anyone who's played it, for that matter.
Comments
You might want to check out Metatopia. It's NJ hotel con in early November that is playtest speed-dating. Only unpublished games are allowed, and the con is geared for the benefit of the designers, not the players. Players get shuffled around from prototype to prototype and are expected to give honest feedback. It's a great way to get opinions outside your immediate social bubble. You'll have to parse out the bad feedback of course, but it's good to know all your playtesters aren't just kissing your ass.
It's also is a good place to generate buzz and potentially get scouted by publishers if the game is in a really good state.
Granted, our particular flavor of this type of game had some superior features compared to what I've seen people playing out in the wild, and coupled with some specific balance instructions and other rules, should be a superior play experience for most people.
You should send me your playtest doc.
This game isn't round based with "sleeping" and "wake" phases and voting and stuff like that. If you are a traitor you have to be actually opportunistic and play your cards right, set traps, work together, and pick your targets well.
Full disclosure I haven't actually played it but it looks awesome.
Two Rooms and a Boom.
This is a social deduction, hidden role game. There are two teams, the Red Team and the Blue Team. The Blue Team has a President. The Red Team has a Bomber.
Players are equally distributed between two rooms (separate playing areas). The game consists of 5 timed rounds. At the end of each round, some players will be traded into opposing rooms. If the Red Team’s Bomber is in the same room as the President at the end of the game, then the Red Team wins. Otherwise the Blue Team wins.
Its a Print and play game, most of the components are cards, and it's available for free.
I would love to hear what Rym and Scott think of this game, and from anyone who's played it, for that matter.