Goblins Drool, Fairies Rule! [WIP] - a game of rhyme and reason for kids of all ages

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Hey everyone! I’m presenting this work in progress of Goblins Drool, Fairies Rule!, which is a digital port of my tabletop card game of the same name: http://www.game-o-gami.com/games/

For a long, long time, goblins and fairies have lived in a magical world right beneath our noses. If you look hard enough, you can find rings of mushrooms, called “fairy rings”, which act as doors between their world and ours. Today, a gang of mischievous goblins escaped from the fairy ring, and it is up to the players to send them back before they cause trouble! But an ancient spell of rhymes which transforms goblins into fairies and fairies into goblins makes this a trickier task than you might think…
Goblins Drool, Fairies Rule!, a card game of rhyme and reason for kids of all ages, is for 2 to 4 players, and has special solitaire rules for a single player. The game consists of 20 unique cards, each card having one side representing a Goblin, and another side representing a Fairy. Each side of a card has one of four Symbols: a Sun, a Moon, a Mushroom, or a Frog. The names of the Fairies and Goblins are divided into five rhyming groups, each name ending in one of five sounds.
Players begin the game with 4 cards each, goblin-side-up. Four cards are placed fairy-side-up in the middle of the table, called the “Fairy Ring”. The goal of the game is to be the first player to get rid of all their Goblins by sending them to the Fairy Ring, or be the first to obtain six Fairies. Players take turns adding one of their cards to the Fairy Ring. When a card is added, any other cards in the Fairy Ring which rhyme with the name on the added card are flipped over: Fairies become Goblins and Goblins become Fairies. Once all rhyming cards have been flipped over, the player then takes any cards from the Fairy Ring which match the symbol on the added card. The first player to end their turn with no more Goblins or with six Fairies wins.

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GDFR was originally created out of my desire to create a children’s game with beauty AND brains… a game that parents could play with their kids and not get bored, and that would nurture and challenge children’s language and logic skills.

The digital version of the game is coming together nicely. I and a programmer are currently working together on it, preparing it for Kickstarter and then release on PC, iOS, and other platforms. The current build of the demo can be played using the Unity WebGL Player, for 1-4 players playing locally:

GDFR demo build - alpha 1.9

We’re looking for any feedback you can offer us: gameplay feedback, user experience, aesthetic feedback, tech feedback, etc…

More features and improvements will be added soon:

  • “How to Play” slideshow
  • more game modes

And then eventually:

  • online multiplayer
  • voice-over of card names
  • achievements
  • and more…

This will be Game-O-Gami’s first computer game, and is the work of:
David Sanhueza - game design, art direction, UI art, project management
Landon Kirk - programming
Mike Maihack - card illustrations (I know, right?!?!?!)
Rodrigo Picinin - prototype programming
Craig Nisbet - prototype programming

Thank you for your thoughts and feedback on the screenshots and demo!

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Since the “How to Play” slideshow that teaches the game hasn’t been added yet, here are some instructional videos using the physical card game:

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Art is beautiful.
Not sure how well this will do on KS - its really a crap shoot, though if you have a large player base of the traditional card game, who is excited to see the game in a digital version - could possibly work.

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Thank you!
I understand what you’re saying about KS, I am also curious as to how well a game like this for PC will do on Kickstarter. We do have a few things going in our favor, I think:

  1. The traditional card game does have a large player base and a good reputation, including a past successful Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gamesalute/goblins-drool-fairies-rule

  2. We won’t need a lot of cash to finish this game, so we can set the funding goal reasonably low.

My current thinking is for the base KS reward to be $5 for 1 copy of the game on PC, with Private Beta access, Early Access on Steam, and some KS-exclusive player avatars.

The plan is to run the KS to fund completion of the game for PC/Steam, and then use sales of the PC version to fund development of mobile versions for iOS, Kindle, and Android.

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Here are some close-ups of the artwork, by Mike Maihack:

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We have a fantastic new coder, Landon Kirk, picking up the programming end of the project! You can check out the latest alpha build of Goblins Drool, Fairies Rule! via the web player, here:

GDFR demo: Alpha v1.9

This new build adds a bunch of beautiful new music and fun sound effects. It also fixes a few bugs, implements some game balance changes, and adds animated text to the card flipping.

Go ahead and check it out for yourself! On the main menu, the only working button is “New Game”. Feedback is very much appreciated.

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Hello everyone,

I’m very excited to be taking over the programming of this project. An enormous amount of improvements and features are in the pipeline for the near future. We recently completed Alpha v2.0 internally and that will bring many new bug fixes and other small improvements. Further down the line, work on v3.0 is well underway and will include many new features including a new game mode, improved AI, a brand-new tutorial, and many other enhancements.

If you have any questions about the game - either specific to it’s design or technical aspects - I would love to answer them. Additionally, we would appreciate any constructive feedback on the current build of the game.

Happy Thanksgiving to our American friends!

Landon

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Here are a few of the avatar portraits that players have to choose from (and A.I.s choose from them randomly) when they start a game:

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GDFR demo 2.1 is ready for playtesting through WebGL:

Goblins Drool, Fairies Rule! - Alpha build v2.1

This update includes a few bug fixes, animation improvements, and a new “Goblins Rule” game mode. This game variant flips the script on the Fairies, with the players’ new goal being to get rid of all their Fairies or be the first to collect the most Goblins!

We’d love to get your feedback, if you take some time to try out our game. More updates we’re working on include the Tutorial, varied A.I., and polishing up the visuals for larger screen sizes.