Posted by Caroline.
In an effort to get players to the fun stuff quickly, a lot of recent games aim for minimal setup. This is a good design impulse; we all have limited time and we want to get to the good stuff fast. Ideally, games get you into play quickly by being well-written and designed so you have what you need right away (to then jump into your fun game loops).
But some games that get you started quickly fail to get players what they need to play meaningfully or easily. There is such a thing as not enough setup.
Groundwork
Setup includes building and agreeing upon a shared, foundational imaginary truth. What / Who / Where is our game about? What do we need to know to get the ball rolling? If we’re co-creating fiction, we’ve got to agree on the basic facts of our fiction.
Setup is also about laying the groundwork for meaningful exploration. What types of relationships / themes / experiences is our game about? Why will I care about this thing we are creating?
When setup is broken down into concrete procedures (with requirements to build upon what other players have contributed, Ground Table style), we end up with a set of fictional elements that allow us to create and explore a world / characters / theme – whatever the game is about. It gives us a sense of ownership, a shared understanding of what’s going on, and an investment into the deeper meaning of what we’re making. Good setup sets us up (haha) for good times.
- Creating relationships and needs in Fiasco.
- Making bonds in Kingdom.
- Adding symbols to traditions in Downfall.
- Describing the departed’s goal (and whether they achieved it) in Epitaph.
- Creating the starting statements in In This World.
All of these are vital parts of the games and allow players to confidently build fiction. They’re fun to do! And they allow what comes next to be meaningful.
Grist for the mill
As a game player, you are author, actor, and audience. A short setup allows you to go into actor and audience mode more quickly, but it can sacrifice players’ ability to be an effective author.
For example, in a recent game, the rules only asked us to give our characters a name and a short description. That bare-bones approach didn’t tell us what our characters desired or feared, or how they related to each other. It didn’t give us much to work with. I struggled to make decisions about a character that I didn’t understand (while also trying to relate to another character that I didn’t understand), and the game fizzled out.
Contrast that with a game where we start with a hot relationship issue that we’ve decided together. Everything our characters say to each other has meaning. Our characters can leave things unspoken, but we know there is trouble there. We can confidently make fiction because we’ve set ourselves up with enough good, shared information.
For me, time spent on a solid setup procedure helps the whole rest of the game flow. Coming up with an idea for a scene, or the next thing to say to another character, or a twist to introduce to the world is so much easier with a shared understanding of the fiction and a set of fictional tools at my disposal.
Not only that, I truly think the setup part of a game can be deeply fun and satisfying, especially if what you create then is designed to be incorporated throughout the game. To me, it’s well worth a bit more time up front.