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Game Design Document
1. Title & Basic Info
Title:
Marine Ecosystem
Players:
Currently 3 players (If we add more players, we will need to playtest and balance for different numbers of players)
Length:
30 minutes to 1 hour
Age:
Teenagers (Age 12~18)
2. Razor
Cooperative strategy game that gives players a better understanding of the marine ecosystem.
3. Slogan
Cooperating for balance. Maintain the ecosystem.
4. Vision Statement & Top level summary of your game idea
Marine Ecosystem is a survival management game based on balancing and maintaining the marine ecosystem. Each player represents one of three types of species, Predators, Prey, and Mutualists.
The main objective for players is to maintain the ecological balance in the ocean. Players need to obtain food resources across different habitats to maintain the population. Players will be required to evaluate their actions based on the characteristics of the habitats and the relationship between other types of species.
8. Why Your Project is Innovative?
(a) Innovation
Our game is innovative because it incorporates the fun of resource management to model that of an actual marine ecosystem. It lets players play different roles that will work together to accomplish balance in the ecosystem. It has a unique objective whereas instead of every player accomplishing their own goal, every player focused on the balance between players.
(b) Relevance
This game informs players about the way marine ecosystems work and how the concept of balancing is important. The concept of balance may be related to many other real-life situations as it is a huge factor in most situations. Since Marine Ecosystem is also a cooperative game, that means that players will have to learn to work together even if they may have different goals at the start.
(c) Selling points
Unique gameplay mechanics such as different beginnings for each individual player, different mechanics between players, and there is automatically a sense of balance when players play.
Instead of competing like most board games, this game is a cooperative game with the same game objective. It also creates a sense of role fulfilment as each player has a significant role to play.
9. Introduction
Marine Ecosystem takes place in an actual marine ecosystem in the Pacific Ocean modeled by a tile-based game. In this ecosystem, each player has a different role and different missions that they have to accomplish. The objective of all players is to finish all their missions before a fixed time limit. All players must finish their missions or else everyone loses. The game has many different routes and pathways for players to work their way around the board. As players accomplish their missions, they will need to cooperate with each other to balance their completion with the other players before the time limit runs out.
10. Narrative/Story
There is no strong narrative/story element
11. Game mechanics
The game audience is targeted at teenagers at the age of 13+ to any gender and location. Everything else from game setup, procedures, to rules are explained in the rule sheet. The rules are more of restrictions and explanations on what the types of species can do rather than set rules.
12. Play matrix
Our game has minimal chance in what cards you draw and what missions to receive, whereas the amount of skill and mental calculation needed to figure out a balance between players is what players need to win the game. There is no physical dexterity involved as players can take their time to think of their move during their turn.
13. Rule Sheet
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