Choosing a Theme

Choose a fascinating theme for your game. When you tell people the theme, they should immediately be interested.

Players and publishers are not interested in "a monster duel game" or "a train game". To a jaded publisher, a game about the sewage system is vastly more interesting than another game about zombies. I kid you not. Your theme should be interesting, but doesn't need to be totally zany. Zany is definitely good though, if you can manage it. If a publisher somehow gets around to evaluating a boringly-themed game, and the mechanics interest them, they'll just retheme the game to something else — of their choosing.

Don't make your game literally ten times harder to publish, by choosing a boring theme. It's ludicrous to have complete freedom with the theme, because you're designing theme-first, yet not actually choose an interesting or novel theme.

Even if your theme has been done before, and you don't want to change it, you can still put a new twist on it. If you have to do zombies (which you shouldn't), make it "zombies in Japan" or "zombie cats" or something.

People don't actually want something new. They want to experience something they already know, but in a board game.

You might say that your newfangled and unique world is actually really good, and it will resonate strongly with the players. That's great, but are you actually going to be able to convey it? Players aren't going to read some irrelevant story from the rulebook. All you have is your artwork and card names, and the name of the game. Those things alone must convey the theme.

Magic's card sets strongly evoke things you already know — stories, themes, countries, and real history. How about ancient Japan world, with ninjas? How about Indiana Jones adventure world? How about a world based on children's fairy tales?

You don't even need to have a story.

Radlands doesn't have a story. It just has a "Mad Max" theme.

Tap into lore the players already know and love.

I'd like to play a game about running an ant colony, or creating a mosaic. I know what those things are, and I want to play them in a game. I'm not so interested in being the Archmage of Kronglor, or recovering the Five Galactic Shards of Kozmog.

People need to be captivated by the theme of your game, and that's only going to happen if they can actually understand it.

I've designed games on all kinds of different themes, and people's reaction was fairly muted. Then, I started making a game about kids roaming around a neighbourhood on their skateboards, and getting up to all the mischief that kids get up to. This theme resonated strongly with people, and they were immediately fascinated and engaged by it. If you're designing theme-first, this is what you should be aiming for.

Feeling the theme

Your theme works if it matches what the players are doing in your game. No amount of art, components, or tacked-on mechanics can make up for this.

I played a diving-themed prototype. It worked because there's a board, and you go from the top to the bottom, and then back up again.

I don't just want a pretty, pirate-themed game. Make me feel like a pirate — roaming the sea, attacking other ships at will.

I don't want a spy-themed game. Make me feel like a spy — planning secret moves, and having secret information.

In case this distinction isn't clear, think about some examples from real life for a moment, without thinking about board games.

Imagine you're a kid arriving at a theme park, and there are more rides and activities than you can imagine.

Imagine the feeling of exploring a haunted house.

Imagine you're at the edge of a vast, unexplored wilderness.

Think of a game you really like. What is the feeling you get when you play it, or that you got when you first played it?

Turning a real-life feeling into an actual game is extraordinarily hard, but you only need a small amount of that feeling to come through in your game, for it to be an amazing game. That is done not by slapping a theme on your game rules, but by carefully choosing game rules that bring out your theme.

Generic themes

Choose a theme that's rarely done — ideally never.

Do not do generic fantasy.

Fantasy is somewhat relatable, but it's massively overused, and many people already know that they don't like it.

Create your own fantasy. It won't be relatable, but it might be interesting. I don't use creatures from pre-existing fantasy, or even anything that looks like them.

I don't want to see dragons and warriors.

I don't want to see Elemental Overlord with Frost Power.

Even better, find a type of fantasy that people know, but that hasn't been done in a board game.

My adventure game evoked Narnia. The characters were 1950's British schoolchildren, in a very strange — but not evil — land.

Do not do generic sci-fi.

Evoke Bladerunner, Alien, or Akira.

My game Radlands was originally a generic futuristic game, but Roxley changed it to an over-the-top Mad Max theme. It was a huge improvement.

Do not use anthropomorphic animals. This goofy theme has been done a million times.

And, when you choose your theme, tie absolutely everything in your game into it. Every word, every name, every place, every resource. The theme dictates all of these.

When and where?

The real world is where you'll get the most relatable stuff. However, the real world is fairly limiting.

My gangster game fits perfectly into the real world. It uses so many real life places and gangster tropes. It's my most relatable game.

Sci-fi is probably my next choice. It sacrifices some relatability, but isn't limiting.

Early on, there was a suggestion that Radlands could be WW2-themed. But how could I make dozens of clearly-different cards in such a world? A post-apocalyptic Mad Max theme was also suggested, and I enthusiastically endorsed it. This sub-genre of sci-fi does violence and destruction very well, and would allow wacky science, which could justify almost anything else I wanted to do.

Historical settings are a very restrictive version of the present. Dealing with real-world and historical subjects is also increasingly a political minefield, regardless of the intent of the designer. More and more publishers are steering clear of these settings. Leave these themes to the people who specialise in them.

At the start, don't choose the exact time period, location, and size of your theme. Leave it broad, so it doesn't restrict you. As you develop the game, your choice of individual cards and resources will help narrow things down. Theme and mechanics will spiral around each other, and eventually find their place.

Veneer themes

There's an argument to be made that choosing a simple, flashy theme is more important than actually making it match your mechanics.

Some popular themes, like music or cats, can't easily be represented in a board game.

Wingspan is a beautiful and hugely-successful game about building a bird sanctuary, but this theme barely matches what's going on in the game. If it had been about animals in general (or something else entirely), the theme could've matched the gameplay far better. However, I expect it would be nothing like the success it has been.

Personally, I don't think it's necessary or wise to stray into veneer themes.

Theme size

The size of the theme should also match the size of the game. Do not try to attach a big story to a small game.

You want the smallest possible theme. Only go bigger as your game content demands it.

Azul is a game about arranging coloured tiles. The theme is that you're making a Spanish tiled floor. That's an appropriate theme.

Codenames is a word association game. It's themed as a game about secret agents. That theme is completely irrelevant to the game.

In a friend's prototype, you place object tiles around cat cards. When a cat is surrounded by objects, you add up the points on the tiles, to see who takes the cat. This game was mechanics-first, other than the very general "cat" theme.

We went through all kinds of big-picture themes for the game. It could be a cat adoption place. But why would you adopt multiple cats, by placing objects around them? I suggested a cat café. That was better. However, nothing else in the game said "café". We agreed in the end that the story was just that you were having fun with cats. You give them objects, and they like you, and come to you. That was the extent of the story. It was the correct choice, because it matched what the game actually was.

I've seen numerous basic number or colour-matching games, with some kind of epic legend as a theme. Don't just pick the most awesome theme you can think of. Find whatever matches your game best.