Signposts - How Games Direct Us Down Strategic Paths

The experience of sitting down to start playing a game and navigating its decision space doesn’t always quite feel the same. Some designs are directionless vast spaces in which the designer has deemed the fun, in-part, getting to know that space and much of the play of that game is trying to string together an ascertain a viable strategic path which will get you to the destination (victory) more efficiently than the other players. In other designs, the designer may have constructed signposts, any game element which guides the player down a specific strategic path, to assist players in finding their way through the decision space. With this lens, playing a game is a metaphorical journey and these key elements of a journey inform our travels:

• Victory Conditions = Destination

• Paths (through a game’s decision space) = Strategy

• Elements of a game that nudge players down a specific path = Signposts

Signposts give players a sense of direction but they are not the destination. For example, end game scoring objects aren’t really signposts as they’re not necessarily denoting a specific strategic path, just a destination for the players’ actions to take them. On the contrary, elements of a game such the unique player powers of Cosmic Encounter, or a players’ starting hand in Race for the Galaxy, do provide meaningful strategic direction without being a destination in-and-of themselves.