If your curious about how this game came about, here is some reading about the process and ideas that went into the game! This is the first part.
It all began with this.
A motif by amazing artist Anthony Cournoyer for a game mat I had commissioned for my board game store. He really knocked it way out of the park and I immediately felt I had to do something more with this beautiful neon-drenched futuristic vision!
Ideas started to pop up for this brooding city environment and it felt natural that players was not to be any good guys, but different shady movements exploiting this place to the very core. It was great fun coming up with the inhabitants of the city and especially see Anthony bring them to life!
So with the theme set I started to think about original gaming ideas. We all know area control, we all know worker placement. But combining the two seemed very interesting to me. The concept of a worker not returning, instead staying where you put him for the rest of the game, still having impact on the area. I really liked that idea as it would also keep the game short and sweet, with a fixed set of rounds.
Of course, to make area control interesting at all, it needs to be possible to manipulate the already placed workers. So not only would you place your worker to get a resource and increase your control of the area by leaving it there, the spaces would also let you perform different actions to allow players to manipulate both agents and resources in creative ways.
So, how could I achieve this in an easy and elegant way? Well, what if the resources doesn’t get spent, they simply get different functions depending on where they are? In your possession they’re loot and on the board they add to the area control value. Thats when the concept of a swap mechanic started to take shape.
On your turn you would swap one of your workers with a resource, and all area control actions was also to be based around swapping. Resources swapped with other resources, workers swapped with resources, even resources on players board was up for grabs to be swapped!
It felt very different and became an essential part of the game, to consider multiple factors when making a choice. Going to a place to get wood when you need wood is not super interesting. But if your decision also includes what action you want to perform, and more long-term, which area you want to try to dominate, it became really fascinating and intriguing!
So, about those resources… They need to be very flexible and different right?
Next Part, The Dice & Hidden Information!
