What on earth possessed us to try to make a board game? And why one about such a serious topic?
Once upon a time…we are were not ‘board game geeks’. We were enjoying games like Acquire, Risk, War on Terror and Pandemic (analyses of those all in due course) around the time the world went a little crazy, and scary. Remember that? That year when all the celebrities died - Bowie, Prince, Princess Leia and Muhammad Ali to name a few. It was like they actually were aliens from in Men in Black and said, ‘This shit is getting too weird - I’m going back home!”
When Brexit and then Trump hit we started asking ourselves, “Where’s the board game for this era?” The Era of Crazy. Back then of course nobody could know how ahead of it’s time Pandemic was. But it’s worth noting that, while the topic couldn’t be more contemporary, the cooperative gameplay doesn’t really reflect the lived reality of the pandemic, nor what it was like to be a professional battling Covid-19 at the time. That’s not the designers’ fault - they made it before Covid happened!
One key thing for us was to not be preachy or simplistic. There are virtuous games out there in which you rescue endangered species or build renewable power networks. But they’re unidirectional. The way to win is by being virtuous. And that’s not how the world is. That’s not how we’re going to get ourselves out of this mess.
Unless there is big money to be made in saving the planet, all of our best intentions will only pave the road to a hellish, dystopian future.
So, our game can end in one of two ways: the world burns, drowns and generally self-destructs into climate chaos, causing economic meltdown that puts you as a fossil fuel CEO out of a job. Or there’s ‘the Happy Ending’, in which fossil fuels are banned thanks to public demand driving government policy - again, putting you out of business and ending the game. But in both endings, it’s the player with the biggest stock price who wins the game.
In future instalments we’ll dive into more detail about how these two possible endings drive gameplay.
What do you think about these dynamics we’ve put into the game?
Tell the world we’re crazy. Tell them we’re geniuses. Tell them anything you like, but let’s discuss it with civility and mutual respect.
Leave a comment, restack this article on your own feed or share it on other social channels. Don’t like it, let us know! And feel free to do so publicly. The game is still under development so there are opportunities to make your mark on what will undoubtedly become board game history!
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