Hanabi-style cooperative set collection game with a twist of competition!

Eric Teo + Tom Sarachan
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Global Game Jam 2016 kicked off with the theme “RITUAL” and Daniel Nayeri, Jonathan Ahern (1st year MFA), Thomas Sarachan (1st year MFA) and I decided to form a team and create a non digital game. We brainstormed and on the first evening we came up with a basic draft of Gift Swap.

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We did not rest on our laurels though and decided to work the next day to come up with some other prototypes just to explore what else we can come up with. We finally decided to continue working on Gift Swap and playtested it and iron out some of the problems we were having.

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The abstract of our game is this:

When it comes to parties, there are rules that everyone knows, and rules that are unspoken:  Never arrive empty handed.  Say “thank you” even if you hate your gift. “Re-gifting” is unsatisfying for all parties involved.
You are part of a group of friends with the sincere hope to give the set of gifts that each of you most desires. As you throw parties for one another, you surreptitiously gift and regift–acting out the social courtesies–until everyone is satisfied. But if you cycle the same tired gifts for too long, the pretense comes to an embarrassing end!

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We received many good comments about our game after submission to the global game jam and we are very excited to work on this further and see where it can bring us!

In this project, I was the designer as well as overall graphic + card designer.