Biomes, the board game, has been re-imagined largely from the ground up. The mechanics that make up the core of Biomes are still intact, especially the exploration mechanic, but most of the mechanics of the old Biomes are gone. The game no longer features secrets, enemy camps, cool downs, injury, battles, stealing, and other mechanics. Instead, Biomes features deck building as a new core mechanic along with the cooperative and exploration threads that are at the core of Biomes. In this blog we will take a high-level view of why these changes were made, the root of the new mechanics, and the new gameplay loop(s) of Biomes.
Why so much change?
I took a break from working on Biomes for about 2 weeks after I played prototype 4.3. This time was immensely helpful for me to reorient my thoughts to what I wanted Biomes to be. When I returned to Biomes I attempted to play it as a single player experience, with some tweaks. I quickly came to realize that lost its soul. Biomes was no longer about discovery or exploration but about questing.
To explain this we need to revisit the essential experience: discovery, exploration, danger, and teamwork. Biomes 4.0-4.3 delivered on teamwork and somewhat on danger but did not deliver on discovery and exploration at all. In these prototypes discovery became a chore to be completed on the way to winning. Discovery and exploration are meant to be the central experience of Biomes, not a chore. Thus, Biomes needed to be re-imagined by returning to that foundation of discovery and exploration.
The Foundation of Biomes
To begin my re-imagining I returned to my original concept of what I wanted to create. I wanted to create a video game about discovery and exploration of a biome. Not really a biome but an artificially constructed underground world kind of like the Truman Show bubble but with a natural landscape instead of a man-made one. In this game players would control a tribe of people, perhaps like the god games Black & White, From Dust, and Godus. These people would venture into a new biome (for lack of a better name) on their way to their ultimate, to be determined, destination. In each biome they would explore the terrain, discover its secrets, combat the danger they encountered, and continue onto the next biome. From this original concept you can see the essential experience. There is a biome with secrets to discover, terrain to explore, danger to combat, and a tribe or team to work with.
Gameplay Loop
In order to translate the experience into gameplay mechanics I decided to begin by working on the core gameplay loop. The gameplay loop would need to emphasize the elements of the essential experience, especially discovery. I ultimately decided to create two gameplay loops: a macro and a micro gameplay loop.
The macro-loop describes the goals the player will have as they play each level. In this loop the player does 3 things. First, they explore/discover the terrain of the biome. Secondly, they quest/discover the the secrets of the level. Finally, they attempt to escape into the next biome. This macro-loop contains the first two elements of the essential experience, discovery and exploration. By making discovery and exploration goals in the macro-loop the players will directly interact with and experience these foundational aspects of Biomes.
The micro-loop describes the tasks the players will complete as they play the game. In the micro-loop players gather resources, build units/structures, and explore/quest/escape. The first two parts of the micro-loop, gathering resources and building, both encourage teamwork by expanding the tribe in some way. The third part of the micro-loop is the current macro-loop goal thereby tying the two loops together.
The close reader will note that danger is not represented in either the macro or micro loop. Instead, danger is an orthogonal mechanic that tries to disrupt the player as they complete these loops.
Closing Remarks
At this point I want to note the influence of 4X strategy games. In 4X gameplay players “eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, and eXterminate” (WikiPedia). In Biomes players will certainly explore and will do some amount of expanding and exploiting, hopefully in unique ways. Exterminating would certainly help in providing danger to the player thereby completing the 4th X, but exterminating is not currently considered a core mechanic and thus may not be included.
With the gameplay loops drafted it is time to build a prototype and playtest these loops. In the next blog we will examine the mechanics of Biomes 5.0, how each of them contributes to the gameplay loops, and how danger is incorporated into the prototype.