Mistakes to avoid when designing family games
What makes a game a family game?
A family game is a game that a wide range of ages (8 and up) can enjoy playing. If a game is only really going to be enjoyed by children, then it’s a children’s game, not a family game. Family games should have wide appeal. They are not designed for expert players or niche interests. You should need no special knowledge or skill in order to play.
Here are 8 things to avoid when designing games for families.
Playing Gnome Grown
Complicated rules
Rules for family games should be as short and easy to understand as possible. This is not because children can’t cope with complexity; it’s because most adults really really don’t want to read rules for new games. Ideally you want to have a good idea of how to play from reading a few sentences on the back of the box. For a game to be suitable for families it should be easy to learn and quick to get started.
You can play my new family game Roughly straight from the box, with zero set up.
Tedious set up or clear up
Again – it’s about getting started quickly. If you have to sort out hundreds of tiny components (which were thrown randomly into the box at the end of the last game) before you can actually play… you may lose some members of the family before you start playing. The set up and clear up are not fun… so minimise the time that has to be spent here.
Too much downtime
Your family game should keep everyone engaged for as much time as possible. Design with momentum in mind. Keep turns quick, use simultaneous (or real-time) play, or give players ‘passive’ actions to do on other players’ turns. Don’t give players the chance to switch off.
Too many things going on
When you have multiple systems within a game, players have to understand how all of them interact in order to play properly. Younger players may understand how each mechanic functions independently but grasping the implications that one system has on another is much more difficult.
Good family games are often focus on a single mechanic. And of course, when you simplify mechanics, your rulebooks become shorter and less complicated! Bonus.
In my game Top Secret Briefs you’re just trying to work out which underpants other players are wearing.
Too luck-based
Even if a game has simple mechanics, the player must still feel as if they have agency. If another player can take your turn for you while you leave the table to make a cup of tea, something is wrong. To be engaged in the game, players need to feel as if they have some meaningful decisions to make that will affect their destiny within the game. Yes, we want to embrace randomness… but when randomness ruins agency, we have a problem.
In my game Skullduggery, you could snatch a glorious victory from the jaws of defeat in the very last turn.
The game being (or feeling like) it’s over for one player
We want to create games that give families the opportunity to play together – but if a player is eliminated, they are excluded from this joint play experience. This feeling of exclusion can also infiltrate when there is an obvious runaway leader long before the end of the game. Losing players may disengage if they feel their actions are no longer meaningful.
Ideally we want games that keep everyone interested until the last turn. You may be behind, but you want to still feel like there’s a world in which you can triumph.
Small amounts of ‘Take That’
If the main activity within a game is non-combative (e.g. collecting items, building a network, developing technologies) it always feels really bad if you’re attacked by another player. For example, you’ve been building a beautiful garden, but another player flips a card which tells them they can come and steal some of your flowers… that’s not fun. These small acts of ‘take that’ can cause enormous upset at the family game table because that’s not the main point of the game.
If you want to include direct conflict, it’s better to make this the central mechanic of the game so everyone enters into the game in the spirit in which it is intended.
A Midsummer Night’s Fayre is a family game that embraces take-that and makes it a central mechanic. The theme of mischievous magical creatures also leans into this.
Too long
Family games should play in under 45 minutes. People want games that fit easily into family life. It’s sometimes hard to get everyone to the table and if a game takes an hour or more, it’s going to be even harder. It’s much better to make a shorter game that can be played and then immediately replayed!
Of course, if you’re designing family games, it’s crucial that you play lots of modern family games. If you’ve only played traditional ‘roll & move’ games where players progress along a track, landing on different kinds of spaces and and drawing event cards… then you’re likely to use these sorts of mechanisms in your own games. Family games have come a long way in the last 40 years. Phew!
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