I’ve started writing rules again.

Writing the rules for a board game is, for me anyway, The “homework” portion of game design. It’s boring and dry, and requires a technical precision that my creative soul can get bogged down by. I’ve written a LOT of rules documents in my years of game design, and with very few exceptions, it’s never been fun, and certainly not my favorite part of the process.

Reading game rules can be equally miserable for me. With very few exceptions, if a rulebook is more than 8-ish pages (depending on how good the pictures and diagrams are), I start to glaze over fast. And I’m someone who loves complex games.

For Disco Candybar, accessibility is a top priority. As deep as I can see this game getting over many play sessions, I know the rules documentation is going to take a lot of care and dedication to get right. There’s a balance of “did I make everything clear enough?” and “is this going to bore people to death?” that I need to thread a very fine needle on. If the rulebook is more than a few easy-to-digest pages, I’m going to lose my audience before they even start the journey.

The plan right now is for this game to have a “Lore Book” that tells the tale you’re exploring. Quick half-page narratives that help set the scene for your combat scenarios and story choices will be linked throughout the Lore Book like the pages of a Choose Your Own Adventure book.

Adding a rule book in addition to the Lore Book is not an idea I’m excited about. Right away, it gives players a split focus on what to read first, and makes the game look more daunting on initial approach than it needs to be. One of my first ideas to solve for this was to combine the two, folding the rules documentation right into the Lore Book. It would deliver players just as much as they needed in the moment to play whatever was happening right now. Read story, decide what to do next narratively, then turn to page X and get the rules there that explain what to do next mechanically.

There’s a problem with this though that I’ve run into with other games I’ve built with a learn-as-you-play rule book. Once I know the game well enough to play almost unaided, but I have a nuanced rules question that I need to look up, it’s really hard to find that single sentence again in non-linear rules.

Linear comprehensive rules, on the other hand, are easy to reference and are indexible, but they can be overwhelming and intimidating, and will reveal more than needed to players who are trying to experience a story chapter by chapter. Plus, mechanical elements that act like spoilers suck.

Many legacy games — Frosthaven, Charterstone, Clank Legacy, and plenty more — use linear rule books with gaps that get filled inn with stickers as the scope of the game and its mechanics grow. I like this, but it requires the addition of a sticker pack (often several pages unto itself) to go with the rule book, and we’ve now got a triple “where do I start” thing happening; do I start with the game rules or the Lore Book, and what is this envelope of extra partial rules all out of order? For a game intended to be an entry point into long-form adventuring, this structure was not working for me.

I think I know how I want to get the “best of both worlds” goal to work with the reduced component count that I’m aiming for. Instead of adding paragraphs to a linear rulebook that starts with gaps, I’ll have a single book — the Lore book — with pages you tear out to make into a rule book as you play.

One book that includes as many removable pages as needed, and a folder (remember Trapper Keepers?) to put concise “rules pamphlets” into as the world of Disco Candybar grows around you.

When you start the game, there’s just the Lore Book. No rules doc, just a big callout on the cover of the Lore Book that says “START HERE!”.

You read the opening of our story, and turn the page. Page 2 tells you to read pages 3 and 4 (with a nice, distinct header that says “1: CHOOSING YOUR CHARACTER AND GEAR”)… then instructs you to tear them out and save them in the empty (but not for long) RULES FOLDER!

As long as each rules section is lo longer than 2-4 pages and is clearly presented for fast understanding and reference, players never need to look at something as overwhelming as a monstrous second instruction book.

Frosthaven is an amazing game experience. The rule book is 80+ pages, and you need to understand roughly half of them before you start your first adventure, but you don’t know that when you first open the box. There’s actually another 4-page leaflet that tells you what you need to know before you read any rules… and how to tell the rule book from the other two books of scenarios that come in the box. I love that game, but it’s the exact opposite of accessible.

In contrast, Disco Candybar will be, with some thoughtful design and execution, a genuinely “open the box and go” experience. And I’m loving that vision.

LET’S GOOOOOOO!

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