Seriously though, you would think that there could have been a bit more creativity involved. Well, at least it’s not yet another re-themeing of Monopoply. Maybe I’m judging it a bit harshly though, I can’t claimed to have played it. I have played what it seems to strongly resemble. Perhaps we’ll be reading about a lawsuit soon ;).

The same is true in other boardgames. I still see games produced today based upon a roll-and-move mechanism, which each player does nothing until their turn comes around, and the winner of the game is primarily based upon luck of card-drawing or dice-rolling. Over the last decade, there have been significant advancements in board game design.

So, if you are a budding game designer, looking to make the next great game with a library theme, look at making it an interesting and engaging game experience and not just a rehash of something from the past.

As neither of the commentees have played (nor me) I’m not sure what you can assume by just ‘the look’. Trivial Pursuit was based on a number of earlier games (NBC’s Trivia game from 1970! for example) and in itself didn’t have a huge amount of innovation. I think you’re missing the point of why this game appears to exist - as a family game - TP isn’t it’s just and exercise in demonstrated ego - and in terms of play - traditional methods are always going to be better than contrived examples just for their own sake.

From what I read the trivia part isn’t so trivial and only appears to play 20% of the game play anyway. So much for judging a game by its cover…

I look forward to seeing how this one develops and playing it eventually…then I’ll pass a more critical comment.

I just stumbled on your web site and would like to put a link to it on my blog page if that is OK. I love your site. I have just got out of library school and want to set up a meeting place for librarians to blow off steam. Please let me know what you think of it. Thanks for posting this. \

DHVIBE.

As for missing the point, I don’t want to be snide but who do you think I play games with? I’m in a regular board game group, I’ve been playing all types of games with my friends and family for a long time now. The problem Scott and I both talk about is rampant in games from the larger retailers and those who try to cash in on similarity. It’s also something I’ve noticed occurring frequently in education from both the perspective of a student as well as those times I’ve looked over the material myself.

If a particular game is enjoyable, I’m willing to play that game. However, I rarely would be willing to spend money purchasing a nearly identical one except for a re-theming. Were I an educator, I’d have to see something more conclusive on why this game is better than Trivial Pursuit for Kids or something that I’d be likely to already own.

One disclaimer as well, I must admit as well I’ve never liked Trivial Pursuit that much. It’s often long, boring, and an exercise in endurance. My experience is the same with Monopoly.

It’s true sometimes games can look identical but play different. Clue and Kill Doctor Lucky are both games I’ve enjoyed in the past. It’s likely that Kill Doctor Lucky was inspired by Clue, but the feel is different and feels cleverly done.

I’ll stop my rambling, but I think the concerns Scott and I have both are very valid. From the descriptions and pictures I’ve seen I’d guess that you go around and land on spots. Particular actions can be associated with spots, like “losing a book” or having to do something to get a book. So a combination of roll and move and trivia. Not my cup of tea, nor has it ever really been.

I think we can all agree that TP is ‘broken’ in many senses and an exercise in ego - who know most wins…! Isn’t there room for a simple, maybe flawed game which just encourages interaction about books (therefore not technology) and acts as a vehicle to ‘pull’ kids (and adults…) into things that they might not find otherwise?

Generally, I’m less interested in the ‘holy grail’ of a perfect game because I’ve yet to find one but I’m willing to celebrate anyone who attempts something different who isn’t big/corporate/cynical in development terms. I’ve been hunting and found quite a mixture of blog comments on Bookchase to-date (as it appears to be quite new) and they fall into a ‘mixed-bag’ response from move over TP to ‘this is great but I lost’ and ‘irritated’ because it wasn’t all questions. I think all this does is illustrate that the world is big enough to have many variations of play and therefore levels of satisfaction in board game play. I personally have always found TP and Monopoly irritating too because they weren’t the all-inclusive family games they pretended to be. It appears that Bookchase might be just an excuse to play a board game about books. Seems an OK start point to me…

Thanks for the link to Wits & Wagers I’ll check it out.