Behold | Game Design

A game designed to bring forth the intangibles that make life worth living

Project Summary | This project was developed for our Strategic Design and Management in New Economies course at Parsons School of Design. The course explores our world through a technological, socio-political, and economic lens.

The Team | Anwesha Sengupta, Radhika Kale, Shivani Bhansali

My Role | Design research, Game concept and ideation, Game Design, User Testing, Iteration and Prototyping

Duration | 6 Weeks

Tools Used | Miro, Illustrator

The Story Behind the Project

The project started off with the desire to understand the concept of value and how it is defined in different contexts around the world. On that journey, we came across the idea of tangible and intangible objects. From the observations and readings, it is clear that today's capitalist society places massive importance on tangible aspirations while intangibles are often pushed down on our list of priorities. This led to the creation of an introspective tool that would help people pause and reflect on things in their life that they truly value and strip back the false hyper consumer desires that the capitalist system fosters. BEHOLD is a 4-6 player game that resulted from the desire to bring forth meaningful conversations. It is a social experiment and an introspective tool that goes beyond fun and gives people the agency to unlock what they truly value. 

Stage 1 | Research

In order to understand what drives the value of products in the economy, the first step was to create a research plan that could give us the starting point for the project. As the plan details out, the primary goal was to understand how value is defined, how it is quantified, and how it is exchanged. Based on the research plan we created the following survey questionnaire which then gave us the following database of answers. The following video is a compilation of our in-person interviews. We wanted to understand what people consider valuable.

Stage 2 | Analyzing the Data

From the answers we received, we started sorting the information on Mural to gain some clarity for the next step.

Stage 3 | Visualizing the Data

This infographic resulted from the categorization of the data we collected from the primary research, survey and interviews. It aims to capture some of the tangible and intangible things that are of value (depicted in green), documents some ways in which value is quantified, and explores ways in which it is exchanged. The world we live in is driven and influenced by value. Everything we sense around us has value to it if we look at it from the right lens and perspective. Much like energy, value is dynamic. It can neither be created nor be destroyed. At a meta-level, it can only be transferred- from one form to another. Much like beauty, value is subjective. Beauty is always in the eye of the beholder. This means it does not exist on its own but is created by observers. The visualization intentionally takes the form of an eye to metaphorically capture the analogies drawn above.

Stage 4 | Converting the Infographic into a Value Exploration Tool

At this stage, our understanding of what drives value in our minds and society seemed incomplete. While our primary research gave a theoretical understanding, we wanted to delve deeper and observe how it differs from person to person. The infographic helped us understand what individuals and society consider valuable. Nevertheless, this mapping exercise did not clarify the transactions of value and how everyone thinks of it. We as individuals are so caught up in our mundane lives that we take the intangible memories created for granted. Feeling, introspecting, and communicating ideas have never been a part of our routine. To further this, the 21st-century form of action has pushed this dilemma further. There had to be a deeper exploration to foster conversations around this concept. This led us to create Behold, an introspective board game developed to understand the patterns and scenarios that govern individuals' decisions, actions, and motives in the world around us.

Introducing Behold

The board game consists of multiple decks of cards which vary from Obstacle, Lifelines, and Belongings, drawing a parallel from life and its works. The belonging cards signify every player's things at the beginning of the game. Like in real life, every individual is born into a social setting beyond their control and choice. As one moves through the game, one gets the chance to acquire more belongings. However, the catch is that they need to trade one in return. 

The obstacle cards represent the nuances that individuals face daily in terms of decisions, opportunities, problems, and societal norms. The lifelines in the game are meant to help the player mitigate or effectively deal with an obstacle, just like one does in real life. The lifelines can either lie with the player, which they can use to solve the problem themselves. If they, however, lack the appropriate card, they can reach out to the players around them and strike a bargain for the corresponding lifeline. The players in the game collectively represent the 'society' and can choose to help tackle obstacles as they arise.

While the game can be considered an exaggerated simulation of life, we hoped to use it as a social experiment. We aimed to read patterns between intangibles and tangibles inspired by the value map and related research. 

Stage 5 | Prototype - Test - Iterate

The prototypes were built on a Miro board to ensure collaboration and easy testing. Through various iterations of the model, we tested the online prototype with people from different backgrounds to better understand the flow of the game and the meaningful conversations fostered in its course. 

The First Prototype

The first prototype was too complex and the flow of the game was not smooth. There were too many moving entities in the game that was leading to confusion and eventually a loss of interest from the players.
However, we decided to eliminate fiat money when it came to the exchange of belongings. The idea of fiat money made the exchanges transactional and was redirecting the game towards a mere tangible expression of exchanges. It took away from our goal of bringing forth a discussion about the intangibles.

The Second Prototype

With the second prototype, we were able to simplify the flow of the game. We eliminated the unnecessary parts. But at this point, we still couldn’t figure out how it should end. There also was no winning metric. At this stage, the game was an endless loop that would eventually demotivate the players, as no one would ‘win’

The Third Prototype

With the third prototype, we finalized the workings of the game. When deciding on the metrics, we included 5 - Wealth, Health, Ethics, Relationships, and Planet. All our research and testing phases indicated that our actions and aspirations directly impacted these five categories. Simulative of how society sets and keeps a check on the aspirations and motivations of other individuals, the other players score the player based on their transaction at every turn. They can either choose to take away their Wealth, Health, Ethics, Relationships, or Planet points. Else they can choose to award the player for their action. The scoring needs to be democratic and logical. The collective score of each meter has to add up to 10 at the end of each round. If it goes below 10, the game ends, as the players have invited anarchy and ruined the world. The scoring of metrics is designed to ensure that all the players have to work collectively to maintain a minimum score. Failing to do so would end the game. 

User Testing

Through the process of iteration, we tested the game with several players through various mediums across the world. The following time-lapses are documentation of two such testings.

Stage 6 | The Final Game

The desired outcome for this game was the desire to create a space that enables people to introspect and reflect on their choices and understand the intangible transactions they are making in their lives. We want to encourage visibility and dialogue around topics that often seem to get lost in our pursuit of material aspirations. The following images are the final designs for the deck of cards, the score board and the game board.

Stage 7 | Pitching the Game

Once the game was ready, we had to design the pitch along with the demo to get the story of the journey across. The following deck documents the pitch. You can read more about the process and the game here.