TCG Design Log 1 - Concepting a new game
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- Опубліковано 15 лип 2024
- Most of my content on card design has been more theoretical - this video series aims to be a bit more applied. I'll walk through the design process from creation being ready for alpha testing. (This game is not for sale, and never will be.)
0:00 Starting out
0:55 Inspiration and core concept
2:00 Creating basic rules / mechanics
5:06 WARNING - HIGH GRADE CHUUNI CRINGE, SKIP THIS SECTION
6:09 You're safe to come back now
6:30 2 lessons from this phase of design work
This has been a really fun project to work on, and there's plenty more to talk about with its design journey. For this video specifically, I definitely stepped a bit outside my comfort zone when doing the flavour segments - both in the amount of audio / visual effects going into it, the painful attempt at "voice acting", and just the raw level of chuunibyou on display. That being said, I'm a firm believer that chuunibyou is one of the most powerful creative forces on the planet, so being afraid of coming across as a hopeless dork is really just going to kneecap your creative process. At least that's what I'm telling myself as I hesitantly hit the "Publish" button.
Also, if you haven't seen Mazumaro's Bad End animation, I really recommend it. Even if you know nothing about vtubers, it's a fantastic piece of fan work. The animation, the music and effect work, and the general story telling are all really good, and it's honestly amazing the entire animation was made by just one person.
using "two-face" card as central idea sure is brave, excited to see how the game actually ended up
I was a bit worried that the concept would be a bit unwieldy, but I'm pretty happy with how the final version turned out. Glad the concept seems interesting!
@@tcgacademia yeah at a glance it's pretty hard mechanic, either you make most card two-faced which hard to balance, or make two separata face that make it feels clunky as you need two cards, but it is a strong flavored concept for sure. But speaking from experience, that hurdle sometimes what makes creativity burst. And that's why when it's you making it, someone that dive well into these tcg design, I'm excited to see how it ended up
Watching this reminded me of the cards I designed in my notebook in school. My designs and rules were terrible, though. Good memories.
I designed so many games back in school. The art was... something, and the game mechanics were dubious, but they are still great memories, definitely!
Just wanting to say that I've been at a design roadblock for quite some time now and your videos have really helped me see a different perspective for my card game designs. Thank you so much for making this content! Also your game looks like a ton of fun, you've made a lot of headway with it! Great flavor and the mechanics line up with your theme!
Thanks, that's awesome to hear that my videos have been helpful! And yeah, I'm pretty happy with how this game turned out in the end.
It's cool seeing your process laid out like this. Funnily enough, I've actually been working on my own game for the past few months, and I also settled on four factions, only divided by gameplay archetype: Aggro, Control/Stax, Midrange/Combo, and Ramp.
Yeah, dividing up the colours and how their play patterns are different is always more complicated than I expect, and I'm still not quite sure I have the division of mechanics and play-styles down quite right.
Hi, remember me? I made the rule book for my game, it's on a doc now if you want to check it out, I'm modifying somethings but it's the current rules for my game, it's the one that I've been talking about, it's changed alot since we last commented.
If you want to check it out, feel free to ask.
It is the WHOLE game, think of it like the creator of Yu-Gi-Oh thought of the game today, all the different summonings and card types, and wrote them down and released them separately and slowly, the only difference is that he did not, and did not plan this so powercreep reared its head, I plan on making the whole game and releasing it slowly while monitoring all the cards to make sure it aligns with what the game is going for and so I can't hammer in powercreep's head, it is a big project and I'm basically the only human working on it, so there might be errors in my game, and I'm hoping you can help me with something, hince the modifying of the rules.
Also your game should be an anime, it looks like it has a good plot to hold.
0:38 I personally vowed not to scavenge for art for my cards. Why? Well, first, it takes me hours to find something mildly acceptable, and it usually doesn't convey what I would actually like to convey. (As in for the general flavor of the card.) It might be partially cuz both for my custom magic sets and potential card games I come up with rather specific ideas.
Another part is that once you get used to the "wrong" art it might dilute the underlying vision of the game.
Finally, it just doesn't bring anything in the early stages of development. I'd rather make a stick figure drawing in paint then scavenge for art. At least it's obvious it's temporary and doesn't influence the perception of the game universe proper.
Definitely a reasonable position to have. For me, I love having an excuse to waste time on pixiv looking through all the phenomenal art folks are making, so justifying it that it's totally for the game I'm making is just an excuse. Beyond that, though, I find it a little easier to stay interested in a project, and a LOT easier to get other people interested in a project if I add a bit of polish to the play-test cards. Even MTG used scavenged art for its early playtests. That being said, for a game I was more certain I was actually going to end up releasing, I'd probably do what you describe and put basic stick-figure art onto the test cards - it makes it even more exciting when you can slowly replace that test art with real, commissioned art for the final game.
love the concept. There is a lot of faction possibilities here from Lovecraftian horrors to demons.
Loving the design breakdown. Had some ideas of my own that definitely could have used a stronger theming foundation like you started with. I think the idea of hidden magic identities is a cool idea, and it reminds me of Aquarian Age with the focus being less on wrangling your units and more on the thematics of the Masquerade. Really looking forward to more updates.
On another note, I took a BW Deus deck to the last Ceremony using the Rena combo that you brought to my attention on this channel. Been playing it for a bit and it did pretty well. Lots of fun!
That's awesome to hear there's still people out there reping Virtuals! Rena's definitely been power-crept a fair bit, but she still plays a pretty unique role with her 0-ener vanish. It's one of the few virtual cards I'm still running in the deck. Glad you enjoyed the video!
I won't lie, I started drooling as you described this game. I crave eldritch lore.
I definitely enjoyed crafting this game world - I'd really like to develop it more at some point down the line. Glad you like it!
This is really interesting! I always love seeing how other people are doing in the development of their own card games! I have also been working one of my own lately and I am very happy with its current state. Definitly had that period of constantly revising mechanics until it all fell in place. Having a fun and unique mechanic that sets it apart from the others is definitly very important! And I got that feeling from your concept of Front and Shadow cards.
Keep upt the great work!
Thanks! From what I can remember, for the first few (smaller) games I designed everything seemed to fall into place pretty naturally. Made it even more surprising the first time I ran into that constant revision period where it felt like nothing was working. Definitely a period you just have to work your way through. Glad to hear your game is in a good state!
I have been kicking a game around for a like 8 years now, I studied the things I liked and hated about TCGs, then I singled out the things I wanted in the game and wrote lore that would go with the mechanics and eventually a story was hashed out to bring the lore / mechanics together. I just have to decide when I'm finally done with the 20th odd revision of the rulebook and just print a set to playtest again.
Very intriguing!
Very excited to see where this goes. Keep it up!
I NEED the rest of these videos. Really helpful and engaging stuff.
Just found this channel, and I love it! Great to see other people workshopping their own TCGs for fun.
Marvelous video I must say. Has cleared some of my doubts about how I'm supposed to go with the design of the mechanics and such thanks to the example.
This idea sounds pretty awesome.
F&#$ you for being awesome. ✌🤟👍
I have to watch the rest of this dev log now. You have me hooked to know more.
I don't know how I found your channel, but I am glad I did.
Now thats interesting!
Looking forward to the next video
Super cool take on design!
interesting ideas this video rejuvenate my motivation to make card game
Ahhh another brother of the fate aeries
I've been making my own card game watching your videos over this last week. To know that we're doing this in tandem is so shocking. Absolutely following & you've gained a person who will stick around. Thank you for your fun & enlightening videos. Your theme here is great! Reminds me a bit of Persona, but with a super interesting twist of trying to seal away the opposing, hidden god. That's sick.
Thanks, and good luck with your game!
v interesting. excited to watch this game come together
I love the idea of backs and fronts that you can mix and match and move between. Makes the game look very modal. The win on looks a bit sketchy since I cant see myself ever choosing to put my god into play if it can kill me, but either way, a fascinating concept with some cool flavor. Looki g forward to the next devlog!
You will be forced to put the god into play eventualy due to how the seals reduce handsize by 1 each. Once it drops to 0, you will have to play it because you lose if it gets discarded from handsize and you have to start with it in your hand. That's how he justified it.
@@Liliana_the_ghost_cat ahhhhhh
That makes more sense. I did like the way that seals force play. Be interested to see how it plays into the final design.
@@Manned0Missiles yeah. Me too.
Love your video, very concise and clear
Those are both things I actually worry about a lot, so it's nice to hear they turned out well here - thanks!
I followed you for a while, but as I started thinking about making my own card games I came to see some of your videos for instruction/inspiration and was shocked to find that the card game that you are using for this series have very similar flavors to mine (people trying to free a godly entity while trying to stop the other player), but with very different mechanics. Keep up the great work bro!
Nice, good luck with your game! There's a lot of different directions you can take a theme like this, but it's really fun to work with.
i might start my own tcg. i feel inspired
For me, I had to ladder develop my game. In a way one should find the spark and work from there to try to make it a full game.
In my example, the system of triple triad was a simple game: place cards on the field of play and when a foe's card is next to yours, they battle with the winning side gaining the card for their side. The one with the most spaces/cards marked as their own wins.
I liked the simple combat but wanted a more fully deeper game. I made that a (simple version) while the full version made use of a different method of play where you can control your attacks, build energy, keep options if desired, and have the system not rely on any big spells or intense draw by effects to "flip a table" like some other games.
Of course one limit is to not go with 5 colored realms and that all of them can be played but have their own tempo. (I still need to make it more over but the depth is there.)
Hope that you feel confident with your game.
Yeah, I think it's really important not to lose sight of what you really want to express in a game you're working on. Like a simple, elegant combat system or having a secret 'back' on all cards - I think it's really easy to get lost in the design wilderness if you lose sight of your core idea.
holy shit, i paused the video to check because i could not believe that someone else in the word actually knows what shiroAN is and isn't just a fever dream that i had
I've gone down some DEEP rabbit holes while digging for art. Definitely some great songs!
You should do a collaboration with Kohdok on how to design a great TCG
I've seen some of his videos and a collab would definitely be interesting!
A1 Series
I loved the concept!
I hope there is a way to contribute in development process of this game.
For the moment this game is just meant to be a design exercise, but if I ever decide to go further with it, I'll definitely be open to help from viewers.
Im mentally working out a card game that works with the limited deckbuilding seen in games like Keyforge, but offers flexibility by a deck coming with more cards then needed for a whole deck, and using a colored mana resource system instead of the house system the previous game worked with.
That sounds really neat! I like the idea of limited deckbuilding and think there's a lot of neat space to explore there. Hope your game comes together well!
@@tcgacademia part of the design process involves making the side deck the extra deck as well, letting certain effect tutor from *the other world* like its some kinda isekai, and you pick what cards go there too! Because it is your side, made up of the cards you deemed don't go in the main.
Is it more costly produce double face cards compared to the standard one side ones? (On a large scale)
It'll end up slightly more costly overall, yeah (ignoring the need for 2 pieces of art, which makes them much more expensive on smaller scales).
0:53
What is that magical girl game? I don't recognize it.
The Caster Chronicles, not sure if it's still continuing tho.
It's key mechanic is the magical girl card that function the same as MTG's land, but you may put any card face down as colorless land
@@comettcg8830 Yeah, not sure how well it's doing right now - I'm about 90% sure it's dead everywhere, and 100% sure it's dead in English. It had a lot of flaws, but it also had at least a few interesting ideas I wanted to dig into in a future video.
you should make it a real tcg, I would love to play it.
Thanks! For now it's just a demonstration of the design process, but I'm really happy with how the game turned out and I really enjoyed the flavour work I came up with for the game, so who knows? I'd love to keep working on this game in the future.
This double side is interesting bit not really sure how it works. Its interesting no theless that normal characters cant enter combat without a demon possesing then
It's not actually double-sided - it's just two card types that are each single-sided, but to play a shadow card, you have to put it under a front card, and then the two act like a double-faced card and you can flip them back and forth. In Magic terms, it looks like everything has an aura attached to it, except the aura comes into play face-down.
Can you like, credit the art you used
I wish this video existed 4-5 years ago! You put my entire process into a video and I Loved it. If you ever need another playtester please message me. I also wish I could make a video like this about my game, but when I take art from Pixiv and use the IPs of existing things to flesh out my games I feel bad about sharing them. This helped me realize that its okay when I am still making the game. I would love to talk more if you ever get some time, but if that never comes I am still more than happy just watching your videos! Thank you for helping me organize my brain better.
Responding to comments helps me organize my brain better, so thank you! I eventually do want to make a video about using pre-existing art in the design stage. Art is a really important part of the appeal of a card game, and trying to get the game running without art is missing that appeal. So while I think it's important to be honest that the art's not yours, and its not affiliated with your project in any way, it's also important to have some kind of stand-in art to give yourself and your testers an idea of what you're aiming to create while you work on the game. Even Magic used copyrighted images in its first playtests - they used pictures ranging from Star Trek to the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip. (Sharing it in a video is a greyer area - the only reason I'm doing it here is because it's about showing the creative process, rather than attempting to promote or share a game)