Solitaire 4 Card Rush Game Write-up
My name is Matthew Montalvo and my partner is Sydnee Evans and we are group 13 and we struggled to agree on a group name so I will be undecided on the name. We collaborated over the last few weeks to create the solitaire mod "4 Card Rush." Solitaire 4 Card Rush takes the simple concept of solitaire and added just a little to it.
- This mod is similar to 3 card solitaire but instead of 3 cards it's 4, but when you reach the end of the deck you put the last card in the discard pile on top of your deck for a new series of 4 card hands. This mod is targeting the strategic players, this mod is all about strategy.
There were a few major issues that we encountered when creating this version, I will talk about each in detail but for now, I will list each issue.
- Playtesting the mode felt a little slow
- The rules were hard to make crystal clear
- Some rules didn't work as intended
When writing the rule sheet it was very difficult to format to where the simplest of people would understand. This is a mod but I can't assume anything so I explained how to set up the board without a visual representation...bad move, sometimes it's better to show a visual rather than explaining it word for word. To further back up the point that our rules weren't clear is that people had to ask us questions during the playtest day.
We had a few rules that we tested and tested and couldn't get them to work or they just weren't a very fun mechanic. A rule that we tried to perfect was 5 card solitaire but when we tried this you went through the deck way to fast and we found that you lose more than you would win. We tried another rule where when you run out of cards you would take the last card in the deck and swap it with the first face-down card on the board but this rule caused mass confusion among everyone that played it. When testing this rule it got frustrating when trying to keep track of what stacks you have used. In the end, the rule was removed for good reason.
When the 2 people playtested the mod they both completed it.
What I would wish for if I did this again is to fix the time issue, like maybe think of another mechanic that could speed up the process. I wanted to write clearer instructions but I just couldn't think of different ways to phrase rules.
Some things that I know I need to change about my development process would be how often I test whatever I'm currently working on, I know I didn't play this one enough. I need to make more changes because I didn't make enough, the game feels too similar to solitaire. I need to make more risks because my groups mod feels a little safe. I also need to meet up with my group more, this time our schedules were very tight so we didn't get to meet multiple times a week so our information on each other was pretty transparent so I'm hoping to find a partner this time where we share a similar schedule.
