No more bags, no more grids, usable Mecha parts, let’s fucking do this

M.E.C.H.A. v4.2 has been designed, cut, and printed and we are ready to party. Patrick came over and we played my newest version of my prototype game. Here’s how it went.

Bridges made it more AND less interesting.

We found that that tying the resources to bridges did make for some interesting choices, in terms placement and how to maneuver the board, but after a while we found that 3 spots where our workers just needed to jump back and fourth over the bridges to get what we needed. So…balancing is desperately needed.

Building spots still too ample to be scary.

I had 4 building spots on each building, but the kaiju didn’t move fast enough or target enough buildings for it to really be an issue. Also, we were too concerned with the amount of Citizens that needed to be saving. Speaking of which…

We lost very quickly and without fixing any Mecha parts.

I had 3 Regions, each with 4-6 “districts”. Crisis cards could be drawn from the Kaiju deck which made Citizens appear in a region.

If a Kaiju stepped on a District with Citizens on it, the Crisis Meter for that region would go up by the amount of Citizens the Kaiju stepped on. When a player rescued Citizens, the region’s meter would go down by the amount rescued. If 2 out of the 3 regions were ever filled at the same time, we lose. Unfortunately, the Kaiju got to Region 2 and stepped on 6 people it’s second turn there, cause that meter to fill up and resulting in a game loss.

This made for a very unfulfilling and abrupt ending – rather quickly as well. We played for maybe 35 minutes (not including the rules teach).

One issue was that there were only 2 buildings where you can rescue citizens, and none were in Region 1 (they are randomly placed on the board). This caused Region 1 to fill up by turn 3 with no way for us to fix it.

The civilians felt like just cubes on a map, rather than people in peril.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t artistically lend this mechanic from Pandemic – the OG threat management game that did it exceptionally well. The issue is that those cubes didn’t necessarily represent “a person,” but rather an infection level. And when more cubes appeared, it definitely felt like the infection was spreading.

Patrick said “I want the cubes to feel alive somehow. Maybe they ran away from the Kaiju or did something before getting stepped on, instead of stand there patiently as a Kaiju foot crushed them.” It needed more of the feeling of disaster.

I couldn’t agree more.

Right now, the theme-mechanic connection is getting a bit closer, but the game still feels as flat as a pancake.

Things are starting to work a bit smoother, and the game is feeling closer to a “game,” but the overall fun factor is about a 0.5/10.

Lot’s of work to do.