I took a break from doing game prototyping to work on some of the visuals and the art of the cards. I asked my friends for some feedback on the card designs I had designed already and from there, I iterated some more. I also did a lot of playtesting to figure out the rules of the other ideas I had!

My friends had suggestions to mix and match a bit like with a straight border for the top and curved for the bottom, so I thought that would be interesting. I sketched some ideas and came up with a new idea for another couple of symbols I could add. One for their importance in the story (which could be a number) and the other by the general time frame that they first appear (which could be one of three symbols, each representing one of the three main arcs). I'm not sure if this is adding too many extra parts and unnecessary symbols, but I thought it might be fun to think about, since I had some game ideas for it. But overall... I decided I probably already have enough symbols to keep track of, so ultimately decided not to add those in the end.

Another piece of feedback I got was that the blue I was using in the prototype as a placeholder shouldn't be final. While I didn't intend for the color to be final, it did get me to start thinking that maybe I should start coming up with a color palette. Color palettes are usually fairly difficult for me, so I opened all of my inspirations and analyzed their color palettes and how they work. I came up with a rough color palette for the card colors, just to try and find some that looked okay together.

So then I did some redesigning of the card. I'm starting to like the look of having the straight edge on the top and a curved version on the bottom. And the more I do these, the more I'm realizing I want the full body in the front as well. I'm still not sure what to do about the back, whether I want one character or it repeating, but I'm getting somewhere. I also updated the colors so they might be closer to what's in the final for the blue.

I did a few tests with colors and changed them around a bit when testing how they'd look with the characters. I did mock-ups of at least one of each type, and the 18 prototype cards I've been working with in the digital version. I drew the traits I needed, at least first drafts, and then I used nanDECK to automate saving out the cards.

I found a new process to batch open/crop/resize images in Photoshop and then used Google Sheets to rename them all so I could make them the smaller sizes that I use in the RPG Maker game. It's a lot quicker than having to do all of that myself, so it worked out pretty good.

And then I imported the files into RPG Maker and got to see the new updates made live with what I had so far! While the designs aren't final, it looks so much better than the tests I've been working with in the past, so I'm excited to see these populate in so quickly with all of the automation that's set up.

Then I started to brainstorm ideas for the other game types. I was trying to come up with names for these modes as well, but still thinking through those. For the Type Battle one, it's a game where you're trying to end the game with no cards left, kind of like Uno, but you have to match types. If you match traits, then certain things happen in the game like having to swap cards with other players, looking at their hands, and more!

I also thought about ideas for the Match Traits mode. For this game, you have a pile for each type/trait of the character cards, and you have to take turns playing your cards in each pile until you run out. So you're collectively building upon each other's cards and can only play cards if everyone has played at least one in the pile. If not, you have to draw more cards until someone runs out. When they do, you count up how many cards everyone had in each pile. The player who has the most amount in each pile loses that hand, and the player with the least stacks wins. This one will definitely take some testing to figure out if that's how it all works, but I like the idea of it so far.

I spent some time playtesting on my own with some classic playing cards to try and get some rules down for the two games I hadn't made digital versions of yet. I was mostly testing the Match Stacking game. I played at least 5 rounds with variations to try and figure it out. It’s definitely the most fun with 4 players, but I’m trying to find ways to make it fun with 3. The first round I played was with 4, and I changed some rules so you just have to play the card in the stack with the person across from you. You can only play if the person across from you has played a card or if no one has; you can’t if someone next to you has in that pile. This required the most strategy and drawing of cards, which made it more unique.

Then I tried with 3 players where all 3 players had to play before you could play again in a stack. This one finished without using the whole deck, but everyone tied and it went fairly fast. So if this is a method, I might think about dealing more than 7 cards so it lasts longer.

Then I tried 3 players where they could play in any pile, but then after all three play their cards for that round, I drew a random card, and that would flip over one of the piles. This would shake up the scores a little bit and be more interesting with how they were played, but it means there’s not really any drawing of cards or skipping turns, so they kind of just would win based on if they were lucky and got a good hand.

So I tried another 3-player game, but this time I tried to emulate the 4-player game. This time, I played with a "CPU" character. Each player would be paired up with another player or the CPU for the pile, so then they could have a different rival for each pile, so one person wasn’t just stuck going against the CPU. This made it kind of more like the 4-player version I enjoyed most, but because the CPU is random and not playing by strategy (it just draws a random card and plays that), it made some of the players get "stuck" not being able to play for multiple turns, which kind of made it a little less fun in that regard. So I might think about trying to create a "hand" for the CPU instead to see how that goes. To keep track of who was rivals for each pile, I also used colored papers to track that, so it’d be easier to tell who is which.

Then I tried a simple 2 player version to see how that would go. It was definitely the least exciting of the 3-player versions that I tried. I tried to come up with ways to make it more exciting for next time though, so it might improve it a bit.

I decided to finally print the first iteration of my prototype so I could have a physical version and test with actual cards. I've only been working with the cards digitally and haven't tested with any real people, so I wanted to prep those and have them ready to test in case I was able to grab some friends to try it out, or test on my own with the actual cards.

Then I tested the Match Stack game with the actual cards and was a lot more exciting! I did a 4-player match because that's what I enjoyed the most originally, and it was good. I decided to lock in traits to require more strategy, so depending on which trait is played (e.g. summer birthday), all players have to play that for the full game (can't play something like a winter birthday after the pair is flipped). I've been thinking about changing up the rules to see if I want to see whoever has the most piles wins instead of whoever has the least piles. I might have to test with real players to figure out which is more fun. I do want to play around with more balancing so it's not tied to just the people across from you as well though.

Then I finally tested the Type VS Battle game, with 3 players. This one ended up going on for a while but was pretty fun. Because the weaknesses are in trios, I made up a new rule while I was playing to break out of the trios if you play a type that's strong against the card, then you can play an additional card outside of that trio (or in it) to switch it up. I might think about adding the weakness/strong vs types to the actual cards to make it easier, but the cheat sheet works for now. 

After printing, I realized that I think I prefer the card designs with the shoulders up so it's easier to see the characters. The full body ones are kind of hard to make out the details on such a small card. So I was glad to test that out to have a better idea for the direction to go with those.

Then I decided to print more cards so I could have another ~20 added, and I tried to balance which types and some of the traits that they had so I could test better. I also updated some of the colors so they could hopefully print a little better.

And then I made finished versions of all of the trait art. There are a few I'm still deciding between, but I at least have a basic symbol for each of them now. I decided to rename some of the traits and am still trying to finalize those too.

I added the traits to my massive Google Sheet and started assigning some to the characters that I'm planning to add to the game so I could start figuring those card details out and balance where I need extras. I spent a few nights filling out details in here.

Then I decided to playtest again, but with the extra ~20 cards I printed, so I'd be able to more accurately test. I tried out the stacking game and instead of the way I had been playing it, I tried a new method. This one plays in a way where you stack on piles and count how many traits match, and you're trying to win more points by matching the most traits and by being the first in the pile to play a card. This way, it was a bit more fair and involved blocking people out of playing less.

I kept iterating on this and doing more playtests. I tried to stack characters more so that once a character is played on a pile, their traits are now what the players are looking at, and the first character's aren't applied anymore. I also added some tokens and tiles (temporarily using ones from other games until I make my own) and it helped me keep track of scoring more and who played which card. I really liked this one a lot more and it made it start to feel like its own new game. I was having fun playing it, which was great!

For the next playtest, I tried a "3-player" game, but used 4 rows, so it would require a bit more strategy. I also used different tokens for tracking points and having those actual numbers was a lot easier for keeping score than just individual ones. I added a new rule to draw a card after each turn so it provides more strategy and variety. And then I decided it'd be more fair to have the player with the lowest score so far go first for the next round, so they'd have a chance to catch up more.

Then I tried playing a "6-player" game with 7 rows and while it was a little hard for one person to manage being 6 people, I do think it'll work well with that many people when they're real people. I also tried out tracking the order that they're going in for each turn with colored tiles and that was really helpful for keeping track of that throughout.

Next, I tried the Type VS Battle mode and it was pretty easy and straightforward. So I started to think about how I could make that one a little different and more unique to make use of the traits and everything. I came up with a new mode for collecting matches. You basically need to get 5 of the same type in your hand to win the game. Depending on what card you discard and its relation to the previous card in the pile, it allows you to do extra actions like trading a card with another player, they choose one from your hand, reverse the turn order, etc. The first time I played it, it was pretty long and was difficult to get a full hand, but that's also partially because I knew everyone's hands too.

While I enjoyed the type match ups for this game, I thought it might make it even more interesting to involve some of the traits a bit more. So I tried a few variations. My favorite was to allow you to match types, birthdays, or traits, but not world, gender, or category. I tried a game with all of them and it ended after picking like one card because there's too little variety that they match fairly often. So overall, this is how I enjoy playing this mode most.

So overall, I did a lot of playtesting this time! I think I'm starting to figure out the game modes on my own, so I may be ready to start playtesting them with actual people if I find a group that wants to test it out.