[Forty Thieves] Short game

[Colin Fredericks]

Hello again.

I got bored one day and decided to get some design practice by making a few very short games. I thought I'd be able to pull off one every day or three. They took forever. :) The first one I've actually managed to finish is Forty Thieves (that's a half-meg gzipped .pdf file).

It's a whopping six pages, and it assumes that you already have gaming experience. It has six attributes (three positive, three negative), has highly focused character concepts (see the game's title), and I found some very nice public domain art for it. It's not quite "beer and pretzels", but it could easily be used that way.

Comments are welcome.

--Colin

[Josh Roby]

Comments are welcome.

Do you have any specific questions that you'd like addressed?

[Colin Fredericks]

Not particularly. I was doing this mostly to have fun and get some practice with something other than my main projects. I figured I'd see whether other people like it or not, and what they think. If someone has a suggestion for things I should do with Forty Thieves, or ways to improve on it, or if they want to use it as a base themselves, I'd be glad to hear them.

I guess it might not belong in the "indie game design" forum, but there's no "indie game release" forum. :)

--Colin

[Unco Lober]

Hi.
I found the game to have possibilities to be fun. And yes, it may be a nice choice when a group of roleplayers gathered together, but have nothing to do and no game prepared (which indeed happens from time to time).

I haven't played it, so my thoughts may be of less value, but after reading the system I had a feeling that:
- the dual length/heigth think may blessen fun a bit, because it is quite less controllable (or, to be precise, more _seemingly_ uncontrollable) by the players (if this needs to be further explained, please ask);
- IMO, the game is womewhat incomplete without the chapter of possible encounters. Just as You provided the ways to use attributes (which spawn ideas), I think You should have included the short "mission" ideas also, or even an easy "mission generator". Just suggesting, of course.

Overally, I quite liked the game and am possibly going to try it out another week or a bit later. Thanks {:{)= .

[Zach]

Athletics is called Acrobatics at the top of page one.

The other bit that caught me was the variable damage system when confronting traps and living creatures. Is it simply a measure of a thief's luck and finesse that he can lose three rounds to a palace guard (or perhaps six rounds to two palace guards) without taking a scratch? I can see that if the guy is rolling beneath scimitars and dodging behind pillars every time that he "loses" a roll instead of getting sliced up.

Only small critiques, since I like it. I may have to try it sometime.

[Colin Fredericks]

Thanks. I'll fix that.

And yes, the idea is that you're jumping around like a gymnast to avoid the nasty traps and guards. I should put something in to that effect. I wanted to avoid both having a separate health mechanic and having a death spiral.