Board Design
I was inspired by the various types of games I have played and researched. I knew I wanted the game to be competitive, exciting and strategic. I therefore began my initial designs towards a board game that could contain all of these elements.
My initial design ideas for the board game were similar to the layout of monopoly and trivial pursuit but soon realised that this did not offer the users enough freedom (thanks partly to the discussions held with the focus group). My first idea was to have 4 cells placed on the outside of the board (as displayed below) and have squares set up similar to monopoly allowing players to only travel around the outside of the board, but this would have restricted the players more than I intended.
One idea I did consider and discussed with the other players was whether guards could perhaps be integrated into the game at the beginning, giving players the option to be an inmate or a guard or have the guards moving around the board independently with throws of the dice. Although the introduction of guards sounds appealing I decided it would make the game more complicated than it had to be and finally decided against it, although the idea of players being able to use guards to their advantage during the game (with the use of attack cards) could still be implemented in my future plans. With this I began steps towards my first designs and prototype.
After deciding to design the board as a grid I began to sketch some designs and write my plans before constructing my first prototype. The image to the left shows my early sketches and ideas of the 8 escape cards, 8 blueprint cards and 8 tool cards required to escape along with one of my first designs for the layout of the board game. The sketches on right show different types of board designs rather than limiting myself and my ideas to the standard square shaped boards. Not long after deciding on my preferred design I began constructing my first prototype >>>