Prototyping a new game

Prototyping a new game

This is my prototyping a game called Smart or fool. It is a game consist of several mechanics such as memory, push your luck, player judge, etc.

To play this game, we only needs one standard card deck including jokers.

The win condition is to gather more points than other players. When game starts, players take turns, and draw one card each. Players flip one cards on the table and use the ability of the card if possible. Then players put it to their own score pile. Black card is 1 point, and red card is no point. Then player choose one card from the hands and put it on the table to an empty spot where the player just flipped the card. Then player gives turn to next player.
The list of ability cards are below.

List of Ability Cards:

Ace: Move 2 cards of other player’s score pile to the own score pile.
2: Counts as 3 points regardless the color.
3: counts as -1 points regardless of the color.
7: Check 1 cards on the table alone.
J: 0 point card, but it counts as 3 points each if paired with same color of J.
Q: Check two cards on the table. Everyone can see it.
K: Take another turn.
Joker: Check all cards on the table. Place them as you wish.

I have developed the game through several play session of the cs108 class. I edited, revised several rules through three playing sessions.

Here is how I have developed through the play sessions.

Session 1
The first session were really simple. I just started making the rule in class, so it was really rough. The rule was just to gather as many points as possible. Red cards were 1 point, black cards were 2 points.
Here is the session report for the session

Player 1 — me
Player 2

Player 1 drew 9 diamonds, got 9 spades, put 4 spades to table.
Player 2 drew, got 10 hearts and put a card.
Player 1 drew 4 hearts, got A hearts, put 4 hearts to table.
Player 2 drew, got K hearts and put a card.
Player 1 drew A clovers, got 4 spades, put 9 diamonds to table.
Player 2 drew, got 2 hearts and put a card.
Player 1 drew 3 spades, got A diamonds, put 3 spades to table.
Player 2 drew, got 4 diamonds and put a card.
Player 1 drew 7 hearts, got 3 diamonds, put a red joker to table.
Player 2 drew, got a red joker and put a card.
Player 1 drew 2 spades, got 9 clovers, put 7 hearts to table.
Player 2 drew, got 7 hearts and put a card.
Player 1 drew 5 clovers, got Q hearts, put A clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got 4 hearts and put a card.
Player 1 drew 10 diamonds, got 5 hearts, put 2 spades to table.
Player 2 drew, got J hearts and put a card.
Player 1 drew K spades, got 2 spades, put K spades to table.
Player 2 drew, got 7 spades and put a card.
Player 1 drew 2 clovers, got 3 spades, put 2 clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got A clover and put a card.
Player 1 drew 2 diamonds, got K spades, put 5 clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got a black joker and put a card.
Player 1 drew 4 clovers, got 5 clovers, put 2 diamonds to table.
Player 2 drew, got 10 spades and put a card.
Player 1 drew 6 diamonds, got Q spades, put 6 diamonds to table.
Player 2 drew , got 6 diamonds and put a card.
Player 1 drew K clovers, got A spade, put 4 clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got 8 spades and put a card.
Player 1 drew J clovers, got 2 clovers, put J clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got 9 diamonds and put a card.
Player 1 drew 6 hearts, got 10 diamonds, put K clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got 6 spades and put a card.
Player 1 drew 5 diamonds, got 2 diamonds, put 5 diamonds to table
Player 2 drew, got Q diamonds and put a card.
Player 1 drew 5 spades, got 7 clovers, put 5 spades to table.
Player 2 drew, got 3 hearts and put a card.
Player 1 drew Q clovers, got 5 diamonds, put Q clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got K clovers and put a card.
Player 1 drew 8 clovers, got 7 diamonds, put 8 clovers to table.
Player 2 drew, got 5 spades and put a card.
Player 1 drew 6 clovers, got J diamonds, put 9 hearts to table.
Player 2 drew, got 9 hearts and put a card.

Draw pile is empty, so the game is done.
Player 1 had 10 red cards, 12 black cards, so total 34 points
Player 2 had 13 red cards, 9 black cards, so total 31 points
Player 1 won the game.

After the game, we discussed about the game, and it felt like boring. I decided to add some more rules to make the game more fun, so I decided to add ability rule which adds assign several ability to some cards. Assigned ability cards were like below.

Ace: Move 2 cards from the score pile.
2: counts as 3 points
7: check 1 cards on the table.
K: Take another turn.
Joker: Check all cards on the table.

I played the game with the new rules with my family, and during the play session 2.

During the session, the game were more fun because we had to focus on memorizing the place of the cards with not only the color, but also the special cards of several numbers.
However, the game were still quite boring since the majority of the cards were just simple cards that players doesn’t really care, additionally, the ability cards were all positive ability that there were not big differences between ability cards. So, I decided to add more ability cards with some negative effects, and some good effects. In addition, I changed the point system to red 0pt black 1pt from red 1pt black 2pt just to make calculation simple.
Below is the final list of ability cards.

Ace: Move 2 cards of other player’s score pile to the own score pile.
2: Counts as 3 points regardless the color.
3: counts as -1 points regardless of the color.
7: Check 1 cards on the table alone.
J: 0 point card, but it counts as 3 points each if paired with same color of J.
Q: Check two cards on the table. Everyone can see it.
K: Take another turn.
Joker: Check all cards on the table. Place them as you wish.

Session 3 were with my sister. We played the game with the new rules, and I believe that it was much better!