Rational

In September, I gave my nephew, who had just turned three months old, a bed bell that consisted of five Muppet calves that, once switched on, the group of calves would turn to music. I had only given him this toy because I wanted him to find something in constant motion to exercise his attention span. Surprisingly, my sister called me one day and told me that the baby’s preference for toys had changed very quickly and that he would not be interested in any other toys for a few days, but on the contrary, this bed bell had become his best friend, he would talk to them, make soft coaxing noises, and sometimes it was as if he was arguing with them, which was very funny. So I wondered if this behavior and physical play were both part of an early form of play behaviour?

I read several papers on this subject and found that many scholars had summarised and categorized the differences between children’s play behaviors at different stages of life, and found that by the age of three months babies were beginning to be able to swing their hands at objects or reach out to grab hanging objects.

Personal Aims

Design goal: Try to design a social game that brings people closer through physical reactions.

Mind Flow

My investigation then extended to the relationship between physical play and oral narrative (both of which require a focus on the player’s abilities and the human body itself) and I found that No components games are biased towards oral narrative, there are rules, but there is no fictional world. So rule, here it is.

I also have found many examples of drinking games, party games, and children’s games. For example party games related to talking: daft definition, Say The Same Thing.

And then I began to design my first no components game, I named it “Over-enthusiastic”:

 1. The scope of the phrase is limited to the character name( with a limited length).
 2. One person rolls the point and says the name of the character corresponding to the point.
 3. The other person tells the origin of the character's name, if it is right, he/she will win the right to roll, and if it is wrong, the other party will get the right to roll. 

 1.First draw up a theme, such as a favourite colour, and then start the game after everyone has spoken in turn.
 2.1 Say the numbers 1-9 at the same time and the person who says the same number says the other person's favourite colour.
 2.2 Start with a number at random and say the numbers in order. The person who has said the Multiplier of the start number, will be required to say the favourite colour of the beginner.

Critical Reflection

After the playtest, both prototypes have corresponding problems that need to be solved.
For “Over-enthusiastic”, the roll point in the key mechanism would require dice, violating the requirement of no component, and if using rock-paper-scissors as rules instead, it would correspondingly limit the number of words in the phrase to 2, 5, and 10.
For “Name my features”, the test result was a little more stable, but the different branches also create different problems. If the “2.1” rule is followed, and there are more than 2 participants, then there will be a situation where more than one person saying the same number at the same time, which makes the game more difficult and confusing. If the “2.2” rule is followed, subsequent players can keep the game going by always remembering the color that the first player said, making the game less difficult and less fun.

Resource List

Age Determination Guidelines: Relating Children’s Ages to Toy Characteristics and Play Behavior