Langskip Development Diary #1 (2020) - "Cat Game"

Langskip, wasn't always Langskip. In fact, it was a struggle mentally to start recounting the events of the past year for this development diary so early because of how different the game was back then to how it is now. On the other hand, as I imagine the position of you, the reader, I've also considered that it could be interesting just to see the progression from the beginning, right up until the end. So let's start with the beginning. 

Langskip, in the beginning, used to be titled "Cat Game" or "Yarn Run!" at one point. These were working titles, but it did give you a strong sense of the thematic direction where the game was heading, which is to say that it definitely wasn't Viking themed. 

On top of that, the gameplay was incredibly different despite having similar mechanisms to the final version of Langskip as well as the same win condition. Two main differences are prominent in my mind as I look back. 

• There were 52 cards in the game, similar to games like "Bullshit", rather than the 18 that are in Langskip, similar to games like "Coup" and "Love Letter". 
• Everyone had a hand of 5 cards instead of 2. 

These two differences, despite not being all the differences, are key aspects in the progression from a game that was kind of fun, to a game which most everyone who plays it enjoys. In a bluffing game such as this, a whopping 52 cards is ridiculous to try and keep track of. Sure there are only 4 of each card (again, similar ratio to Bullshit), but for a casual gaming audience, it's just not fun to have to think so hard and try to remember what has been played, making it super easy to lie. 

The hand limit being 5 instead of 2 had a similar issue in that you had enough information in your hand to gauge what would be an easy lie or not without much thought. However, the true issue with a hand size of 5 is that you can't design less useful cards in purpose (to promote lying and strategy) because they just lay dormant in the player's hand all game. 

As you can tell though, the game was still a bluffing game from the very beginning, and despite the bluffing being hampered somewhat by the ratio of cards, either in the deck or the player's hand, it was fun. So I tried to fix these two issues that I identified early on. Like most designers I'm sure, I stumbled upon the answer. I was actually heading out of my door in the morning to go somewhere, and it clicked.  ​

Now again, this isn't the final set of cards, mechanics or even ratios (and for some reason there were dice?), but the card count was now 20 instead of 52, people had a hand size of 2 cards and I introduced the Mischief tokens, which were there to stay. On top of that, what made it all work, was the introduction of the mechanism which made it so the deck of cards were reshuffled multiple times throughout the game. This allowed for the percentage chances of cards being drawn to be more easily tracked (due to the size of the deck) but would still constantly be changing because of the reshuffling of the deck. 

Also, you can see that the theme had finally switched from fluffy cats to hearty Vikings, meaning that the course was now set, and the journey of development of Langskip was properly underway. 

Make sure to sign-up to my mailing list using the menu on the site to get notified via email when the next blog post regarding Langskip is released! Over the next week or so I'm going to be releasing one every few days in anticipation for the launch on Kickstarter July 30th, so I will make sure just to send a blast right before the Kickstarter goes live, instead of every few days, so you can read the blog posts all in one go. Or, you could just come back to the site and check for yourself! Up to you :)

Thanks, 

Niall from Crab Studios