You Gotta Have a Gimmick

I had a post about all the games I played at Gen Con ready to go, but then I received a Birthday Blog Challenge in my RSS reader! Virtual Moose, a blogger I enjoy who writes about indie video games (particularly adventure and story-driven titles), challenged their readers to write about an obscure game. Since it’s my birthday, I thought I’d celebrate by taking the challenge by telling a little story about a playtest from Gen Con. It’s hard to get more obscure than a game that’s not fully released yet, right?

My phone kept saying I was going to die. It was the end of the day on Saturday at Gen Con and tornado warnings were causing hundreds of phones to shriek in terror all at once in the hotel. The alarms were piercing! The all caps pop-ups were ominous! There were reports of flooding in the convention hall, but the convention spreads out to several hotels. We were on the second floor of the JW Marriott. From the hotel lobby, my friend Paul and I had a fantastic view of downtown Indianapolis besieged by rain. The streets were windy as hell. We were supposed to meet some friends for dinner, but there was no way we were stepping into the Noah’s Ark LARP happening outside.

Paul and I just finished a fantastic game of Dragon Strike, a 90s board game was made by TSR, the company that originally published Dungeons & Dragons. Dragon Strike successfully boiled the flavor of D&D into a family-friendly board game. (It’s an ideal entry point for kids into the world of fantasy tabletop roleplaying.) We loved our play through, but as we walked past the windows of the storm outside, our excitement from Dragon Strike transitioned into dread for the weather.

Convention Tip: If you’re at a crowded con that spans a convention center and a hotel, use the bathroom at the hotel. You’re going to have a less disgusting time. In line ahead of us for the hotel bathroom was a mustached guy in his 30s wearing a trucker cap that read, “ASK ME ABOUT MY GAME.” As a game designer, I immediately recognized the power of that hat and told him I liked it. Paul fell completely under the spell of the hat and asked him about his game. Let’s call this hat-wearing designer Steve. Steve had a clever crate with drawers, wheels, and an extendable luggage handle, which contained his game prototype. He said he was workshopping a new fantasy roleplaying game and asked if we’d like to playtest it. We had no other games scheduled and we couldn’t leave the hotel or risk getting blown to Oz, so we agreed.

We found a spare conference room to squat in and sat around a small table. Another game session was going in the room. They didn’t seem bothered by the storm at all, maybe because the curtains were mostly drawn. But through the crack in the black curtains I could see doom swirling around us.

Steve proceeded to layout multiple printed Google Doc manuals, one for each character type. He placed dice, miniatures, and a clear plastic mat with a grid pattern. He drew a map onto the plastic with an erasable marker. Our character sheets were stuffed with dozens of spells, slots, attributes, abilities, and assorted tables. Keep in mind, I’m not a D&D newbie. I’ve played many TTRPGs, both mainstream and indie, but this one immediately struck me as unusually complex.

In Dragon Strike, I played as the warrior tank and Paul played as the magic-wielding elf, so I suggested we switch archetypes for this playtest. Paul played as a savage barbarian and I played some kind of spirit wrangler. It took me a while to understand the rhythm of my character’s mechanics. Basically, every time I called a spirit on my turn, I would have to wait for the following turn for the spirit to arrive, so I could instruct it to attack. There’s nothing more fun than being told repeatedly, over the course of a game, that you can’t do something, but that was my experience. I felt like Sideshow Bob getting hit in the face with a rake over and over again. But even Paul, who should’ve had an easier time, found movement and attacks surprisingly difficult. There were so many options on the character sheet, it wasn’t clear which options were correct.

Together, Paul and I managed to defeat two monsters over the course of 30 minutes. Mostly, I felt like I was conquering my understanding of the design, rather than the monsters themselves. Afterwards, Steve presented Paul and I with surveys to give our feedback. Can you guess what I wrote down?

Nope, I said nothing about the complexity. I used to complain that a lot of tabletop games were too complicated, but I’ve evolved on that opinion. Complex is not inherently a bad design choice. In fantasy TTRPGs, I think it’s actually a feature for many players. More complexity means more opportunities to show mastery over the rules and lore. More mechanical tools to use strategically in battle. More immersion into the gameplay (when you finally understand what’s happening). Complexity is fine. It’s not to my taste. I prefer the Dragon Strike approach of streamlined gameplay, but I respect complexity.

Here’s what I saw as the major flaw in the prototype. There was a lot of intricacy and cleverness on display, but there was no hook. No raison d’etre. No standout mechanic. No spark of inspiration. I’m imagining a group of D&D, Pathfinder, or Daggerheart players. A friend of theirs asks if they want to try this new game. They ask him why? And he says… well, it’s another complex fantasy tabletop roleplaying game, like the one they’ve been playing for years, but this one… has a class where you have to wait a turn to do ghost attacks. I can’t imagine them getting super psyched for it.

I thought of a sequence from the 1959 musical Gypsy. (Hi mom! See, I do know something about musical theater! You can be proud of me now.) Our protagonist Gypsy is being introduced to the world of striptease. The veteran strippers sing her the song “You Gotta Have a Gimmick,” where they demonstrate their unique acts. They don’t just bump and grind. They stand out from the competition by playing the bugle, wearing light-up costumes, and incorporating ballet. Can you imagine going to a strip club and seeing a stripper play the bugle? You’d remember that!

The same is true for the awesomeness that is pro wrestling. (Okay, bye mom!) It’s not enough to be good at grappling and taking bumps. You need a larger than life personality so you’ll stick out and fans will remember you. That’s why most pro wrestlers in the 1980s had some kind of occupational gimmick. It’s hard to forget a pro wrestler who’s also clown, a Canadian mountie, or a tax professional. Pro wrestlers I currently love include a dinosaur man, a 1930s starlet who comes to the ring in black & white, and a cool guy who wears shades and wrestles with his hands in his pockets. Gimmicks!

I’m not saying every game needs a gimmick. If you’re making a hobby game to play with friends, it doesn’t really matter. Just have fun. If the game is an artistic expression of your soul, but it’s not mechanically all that different from Slay the Spire, I’m fully in your corner. And who knows? Your unique artistic voice might end up being a great “gimmick” for the game!

However, if your plan is to release a commercial game into the competitive, stormy marketplace, the strength of your gimmick is the umbrella that protects you from getting blown away. If gamers won’t even pay attention to a tornado whirling around outside, why are they going to pay attention to your game? They have hundreds of others to choose from!

A gimmick doesn’t even have to be mechanical! Cuphead’s use of hand drawn 1930s cartoon art was its core gimmick. Monty Python’s Cocurricular Mediaeval Reenactment Programme brings the beloved goofy tone of Monty Python into tabletop roleplaying. Gloomhaven has a huge box! For the type of gamer who wants a big box with a lot of pieces, Gloomhaven has the biggest box with the most pieces. Gimmicks can be more subtle, too. Players often complain about randomness in roguelike deck builders. If your deck builder had little to no randomness, I bet that would turn heads.

Whether it’s mechanics, setting, narrative, art, or something else, I believe every commercial game needs something unique to set it apart. That’s what I wrote to Steve, in a kind and concise way.

A few minutes after the impromptu playtest, the storm died down. Paul and I met my friends Caity, Dan, and Mike at an Indianapolis institution called Yats. When people come home to Indianapolis after a long time away, Yats is the restaurant they want to go to. It’s a cajun spot serving creole favorites like gumbo and jambalaya. I had a delicious Chicken Maque Choux that melted in my mouth. Delicious, authentic cajun food over 800 miles from New Orleans? Now that’s one tasty gimmick.

🎲 Your Turn: What’s your favorite game gimmick? Do you come up with hooks for your projects? Or do you leave hooks for fisherman and Robin Williams movies? How are YOU celebrating my birthday weekend?? I’d love to hear from you! Reply directly to this email or leave a comment by hitting the orange button below.

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