More boardgame testing

That was an intense Sunday at the COGD game designer’s meetup! 🎲 I was so excited to run a playtest of my game in development, Escape from Nemo’s Island, and it was a blast, even if I forgot to snap new photos! (The one above is from a previous session.)

My crew for the session included Kyle (playing the Mariner, who starts with the boat) and Mark (the Scholar, starting with Nemo’s Diary). I played the Scout, but honestly, I was so focused on playtesting I forgot to even use my ability! 🤦

Overall, the game felt solid! The split Column and Row Clue decks are definitely a keeper, driving exploration nicely.

However, Mark exposed a major flaw: he easily sailed to victory! He pointed out that the Column clues that let you keep the card are seriously overpowered. Since the location on his card was discovered early, he was able to endlessly farm treasure and supplies. Lesson learned: that permanent clue power is getting patched!

A few other snags came up:

• The Healing Grind: We saw players having to spend a full turn just to heal at the Nautilus sub after an injury. That’s way too much downtime and completely takes you out of the action.

  • ⚡️ Quick Fix: Next time, I’m testing 1 action to heal from injury, and 2 actions to recover from passing out. Much better, hopefully!

• The Sub Launch Flop: The mechanic for “Building Steam” to launch the Nautilus at the end of the game got some lukewarm feedback. It felt too easy for players to trigger an early launch. I hope I just explained it poorly, but it needs an overhaul.

  • ⚡️ New Direction: I’m going to treat the Nautilus Sub like any other location players have to discover (like Nemo’s Library). Players can spend 2 actions to draw 2 clues there. To stop early game clue-camping, I’m enforcing a Clue hand size limit of 6. You gotta explore!

• The Volcano Fizzle: Sadly, our Trap Clock only hit 9, and the Volcano never erupted! This made the end of the game feel a bit anticlimactic, even though I was successfully stranded.

  • ⚡️ Adding Heat: I’ll implement a difficulty system where experienced players start the Trap Clock further along to guarantee that fiery finale!

A great suggestion came up to make the game fully cooperative. As semi-coop games can be tricky to balance (and publishers sometimes shy away from them), this is tempting!

I could easily make the switch by removing the Pistols and introducing a Group Victory Point goal. To keep the tension, we could make VPs from treasure and supplies secret—that way, the group never knows if they’ve really won, enticing players to stay on the island longer than they should!

Huge thanks to Kyle and Mark for the excellent feedback! Back to the drawing board to implement these changes for the next round of testing!

What’s the most overpowered card you’ve ever had to remove from a game? Let me know! 👇