Going to Market

This cozy family-friendly game has players race to finish collecting food items from market stands to complete their recipe cards and win the game. 

This was a quick two-week project so we started by quickly looking at board games on the market we were interested in were both colorful and had a rustic feel to them. We were drawn to games that had a story and didn't require too much reading. We were more likely to play a game because it was "cute" which influenced our choices when looking at different games. Food and picturesque locations were the common themes found amongst these games.   

In easier iterations we though about doing a grocery store where you would go through the isle and pick up food from shelves. With this idea we were thinking of going for a 1950's retro theme where the player would collect tiles in a metal basket. One of the problems we saw with this design was its restrictions on the players movement on the board as well as the tiles not having a permanent space on the board which could confuse the players. We liked the idea of collecting tokens and needing to complete a recipe card.    

Our design is a farmers market where the players move their baskets around the board collecting tiles of ingredients they need to complete their recipe cards. They have a chance of landing on sudden event spaces that would cause the player to pick up the corresponding card inflicting a reward or consequence that a player will face. Players can have up to 10 ingredients in their baskets at one time and can drop off ingredients at other stands. Players will use strategy to quickly make it to market stalls collecting tiles. The first to collect all their ingredients and get to the finish wins the game.   

User testing informed us that in a next round of iteration, we would need to make a less wordy rule book to avoid confusion that occurred from players forgetting what was said and wouldn't take so long to read. The players also experienced frustration with the small spaces for the baskets making it clunky to get around the board so the moving spaces would need to be larger. They also wanted to have a more cohesive art style across the board and pieces along with an insert for the tiles to sit within the market stalls.