What Matters?

What matters (in games, at least)?

THEME MATTERS: By theme I don't mean the subject so much as the integration of the theme with the game mechanics. While I will always be more attracted to a game with panzers than (say) plantations, I'll pick a plantation game with a tightly-integrated theme over a generic panzer-pusher every time. I want the things I'm doing in a game to map to whatever the theme is trying to represent. This doesn't require simulation -- Power Grid and Commands & Colors: Ancients both succeed in integrating theme and mechanics for me, because the mechanics make me feel like I'm building a power network or keeping my troops in line, even if the games themselves bear only a secondary relationship to their subjects.

SPEED MATTERS: I will happily play a game that takes all day so long as they mechanisms and means of resolution are swift. I love games like Up Front for their speed of play (among other things) ... I don't care for games that require a lot of pondering, or for games that have a long tail of uninteresting process attached to every action. This is also one of the reasons while I'll find myself barking at players taking too long to make their move. Slowing down a game almost always takes the joy out of it for me. If I'm going to play a game that benefits from pondering (an optimization game like Tikal, or most wargames), then I prefer to play-by-email, where downtime doesn't intrude of my fun.

INTERACTIVITY MATTERS: I like to be consistently engaged in a game. Interactive sequences of play are valued over a game where I can walk away from the table for twenty minutes or more while my opponent takes his turn. I want to interact with the other players as much or more as with the game itself -- this is why I like auction games, or games with plenty of conflict.

COMPONENTS MATTER: Raised on American wargames and first-generation role-playing games, I quickly developed an immunity to production design. It didn't matter if the game was mimeographed, in a ziplock bag, with single-color counters on think, uncut pasteboard ... it was the PLAY that counted. My position was knocked on its ass when I played my first Euros ... there was simply no way I could ignore the value added to the game by the superior components of the best European boardgames. I found my tolerance for American wargames declining when effortlessly punching out the counters of a Euro; I found I really did prefer mounted maps (as I had back in the Avalon Hill days); I came to expect that cards could be part of any game without running the retail price through the roof (Up Front, I'm looking at YOU).

PRICE DOESN'T MATTER: At least, it doesn't matter much. And by this I mean I don't mind paying more for quality. And I also mean that I won't cut a game slack if it is free or inexpensive. This is why I've never been a fan of Cheapass Games ... the games might be inexpensive, but my time is not, and the opportunity cost of playing a poor game over a better one can't be offset by a lower retail cost of a game.

DEVELOPMENT MATTERS: I don't want to be a beta tester. I design games for a living ... when I sit down to play a boardgame, I don't want to discover significant holes in the rules, game-breaking strategies, or substantially imbalanced starting positions right out of the box. If I can spot these things in my first few plays, I expect the designer to have spotted them, too, and to have eliminated them from their design. I certainly can tinker with houserules to address game problems, but I don't want to.

THE PLAYERS MATTER: And the players matter most of all. This was driven home to me at GenCon Indy in 2005 ... everywhere I looked there were games to play, but for the most part I found I was evaluating the games strictly in terms of how they'd go over with the guys back home. Games are engines for social interaction, and if you aren't playing with funny, engaging, challenging, and fun people ... then, well, what's the point?