Battleships! Enhancing the rules

The game of Battleships landed in many childhoods and it not surprising how well children and adults took to this as, I propose, the target audiences were preschoolers(4-6) and kids(7-9), and I will explain why I propose this.

Trying to summarise this game in a just a few I would have to say guessing, chance, luck and logic. These elements of what I perceive to be the core foundation of interaction solely relates to the types of game play kids and preschoolers often engage in and enjoy.


The Game-play and Rules

Battleships is a turn-based game between two players who, before the start, have to set their ships position in secrecy to the opposing player, who is not supposed to know the locations until a successful declaration of attack by coordinates("B-9", "Hit!"/"Miss") is undergone. This has already explored the creative nature of children as it allows some self-found logic for their strategy of placements and exploration of what patterns they like setting, indulging in personalisation as opposed to direct logic (Kids can be stubborn apparently).

Guessing, chance and luck I believe play a huge part in this game, as who can tell if one person will always hit and the other always miss, there is no real formula for deciding the outcome, unless perhaps you are playing against Derren Brown.

This can lead to a few emergent emotions from playing and the outcomes, often invoking Anticipation - between turns, Impatience - from consecutive misfires,  Frustration - from unbalanced streaks, Jestering - From 'lucky' streaks.


Iterations

In order to mitigate some possible chances of gamer-rage once someone has settled into continuous gaming whilst losing I decided to test some minor additions in order to alter some of the emotional responses from playing the game. In this I looked at changing logic to aid in increasing anticipation and jesting. The logic-enhancing tool I tested was a simple Deflector Shield. The rule addition is simple, "Once you have successfully sunk an opponents ship you gain 1 expendable Deflector Shield, which you may activate in response to the opponents declaration, this replaces the need to declare Miss or Hit."

After playing this game a few times with the new addition I found their was more strategy in using the deflector shield other than I originally thought. Since you can activate the shield on any coordinate, not just on your ship(which would still give your positions away), it was often used to divert attention around that coordinate, often used to deceive as you would think "Their ship must be around there as they just used their only Shield to save it".

I found this was a success in minor attuning emotional responses from the game, it still remains the same core game-play but with something other than turn-based ship finding, it now involved deception!

Bibliography

Full book
Schell, Jesse. The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses. Burlington, MA: Morgan Kaufmann, 2008. Print.

Reader
Costikyan, G (2002). I Have No Words & I Must Design: Toward a Critical Vocabulary for Games. In Mayra (ed.) CGDC Conference Proceedings. Tampere University Press. p. 9-34.

Journal
Aarseth, E (2001). "Computer Game Studies, Year One". Game Studies 1. http://gamestudies.org/0101/editorial.html

Critical Games Studies - A Short Interview

What is the title of the book (fiction) you are currently reading, or what is the title of the last fiction book you read?

 

The last book I read was a series of books called The Saga of Darren Shan by the author Darren O'Shaughnessy, appealing to teens and young adults I was introduced to them by my brother who had started reading them, I was immediately drawn into the stories set inside and I often found myself irritatingly waiting on my sibling to finish a chapter and pass it on.

What is the Title/Topic of the book (non-fiction) you are reading?

 

I am currently reading several books all related to the course I am studying and nothing else I have had time to fit in to my schedule, currently includes a reader called Challenges for Game Designers, The Perfect Pitch based around Dragons Den and Jesse Schell's The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses which is taking up most of my reading time. In the near future I want to be able to find a series of books based around philosophy and all that can be related.

What is the last live performance you attended?

Since I am the proud owner of facial hair, a somewhat novelty topic at this present time, my latest group I have been following in music is a band aptly called The Beards, I own a collection of my favorite songs by them and attended a concert in Birmingham several months nearing the end of my college course in 2013.

Introduced to them by my brother, once again, I admired the humor created out of beard related situations and responses often contained in their songs, which to this day all songs are all titled with 'beard' and obviously all songs are based around the fuzzy things.

What is the title of the last film you saw at the cinema / online or DVD?

Since I am an avid film watcher it's hard to choose which film I have watched lately really speaks for me but the latest film was Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, I am a massive Schwarzenegger fan, prompted by witnessing his earlier work when I was younger like the start of The Terminator series and not forget The Last Action Hero, all of which I found truly epic experiences.

How often do you read a newspaper?

Apart from a casual passing glance at news headline in the shops I don't usually find myself reading newspapers, I often found the bogus or misleading coaching from the articles too much to bear. I'm sure once I settle into the working world with adult related topics I will have to formulate my opinions on the current issues displayed through that source.

Which art gallery / museum / exhibition did you last visit?

 The Last museum I attended was The Tank Museum in Bovington, which I highly recommend attending also, It has great exhibitions on histories of tanks to models and scales of turrets and other projectiles not to mention the live display of a small tank which could also be aided by the training troops in the camp nearby, which put on quite a performance for tank enthusiasts.

How many hours a week do you spend playing video games?

I guess by saying I don't calculate it thought time but rather advancements in levels, currencies or other tasks, really says it all. If I had to put a value on it I would say around 20hrs a week playing digital video games, probably more if the weekends free. Current adventures are taking place through a game called Firefall, all about rebuilding and fighting back an alien race that scorned the earth through the greed of trying to reach a resource rich planet.

How many hours a week do you spend playing non digital games?

It's hard to say how many hours as every week changes, but me and my flat mates do enjoy a banter-filled session of Palace or Go-Fish, apart from that any games that are available through the games society, which I wish to spend more time with.