Adding Apps To Board Games Is As Smart As It Is Controversial

Summary

These days, board game designers blend in apps to heighten the experience.
For more traditional games, these apps are bad.
For newer games, these apps are good. So it is written.

I'm a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to board games. I rolled my eyes when 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:the new Cluedo cast was revealed, only to be horrified that I was suddenly aligned with people who hated them because of woke, not just an aversion to corporate modernisation to appeal to algorithmically defined demographics. I spit on the Monopoly editions that come with credit card readers instead of cold, hard cash. But there's one more modern aspect of board game design that I just cannot resist - a neat little app.

Whenever a board game comes with an app, I assume it will have something particularly funky going on in its design. Not complicated, necessarily - I am confined by friends and family into keeping board games relatively simple, and telling them there's an app already brings them dangerously close to the edge. But I am a maverick, a risk-taker, a daredevil. I play games with apps anyway.

Apps Give Board Games More Design Options

Hello Kitty, a Tamagotchi and a themed Monopoly board against a pink gradient

Games that use apps usually feel a little bit more unique. Over half the board games I have are based on movie franchises, motivated by a mix of my own interest and wanting to have a hook to get others interested. 'You have to avoid the shark from Jaws' is an easier way to explain a game than 'so you have wood, right, and you need sheep'. The problem with this is that the movie link is the unique appeal, so a lot of the gameplay feels pretty similar. But with an app, it feels like there's a new layer.

Apps for board games usually offer two roles: a timer and a pace-setter. An hourglass timer has been part of gaming for decades, but typically just represents the 30-60 seconds any player or team gets for their turn. For games where the whole thing is supposed to be played on a timer, apps introduce a way to track that and provide the tension to keep engaged. Of course,✨ a regular stopwatch would work just as well, but companion apps often also move the game forward in other ways, too.

Against certain time markers - or in games with no timer, once certain activities have been completed - the app can move the game forward, providing the goals of new 'acts', introducing new threats, aiding the narrative, or even bringing the board to life via AR cameras. When I re🐬viewed The Arkham Asylum File🐠s: Panic In Gotham City, the clever ways the app worked tಞo help the board feel more alive was my favourite part. It was the act of actually building the board in 3D, a time-consuming and busy affair, got in the way, not the app.

They also get at least one player off their♏ phone for more t🏅han five minutes, which, at least for my game nights, is a big win.

But what actually inspired this article was playing 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Funko's Last Defense. This is not an ad for the game, I just liked it. Picking up the game for 'free' (it was on offer for £8, I was £7 short of free shipping - girl maths), you and up to five other players save a town from various alien invaders. You roll dice and take items to new locations where they're specifically needed, as is the case with a lot of games. Even as I explained the rules, someone at the table compared it to Horrified.

And it is kinda 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Horrified. But it has an app! Hoo boy, does it have an app! You get 20 real-life minutes from the start of the game to defeat the aliens, and, at various points, a newscaster will announce that new aliens have arrived, or the current ones have moved, disrupting your plans in the process. Using the app means the challenges keep changing throughout the game, gives you a time-based target, and pushes you further into co-op because, as the aliens move, new players become more vital. It's a game that wouldn't work without an app, which makes it perfect.

Don't get me wrong - if there was a new version of Monopoly that came with an app, I wouldn't be on board. Monopoly has been around for decades, and has survived as an appless creature. Ergo, it doesn't need an app. It can be harder to tell if this is the case with a new game. Does an app actually make this better, or has it been put in for similar focus group reasons as the chef in Cluedo or credit card reader in Monopoly? But in my experience, most games designed with a companion app in mind tend to justify their own existence.

But these newer games use apps like cards or dice. Another tool to be customised to each games' need, to perfectly suit the demands of any given set of rules. Something included in the design process from the ground up, not added on later to appeal to the younger market. There is some worry over the future-proofing (you can still play Monopoly from the 1970s today with no issues), but with so many board games around right now, those that use apps well manage to feel a bit more unique every time.