For some more information about Drupal the Card Game, go to rules and video.
The idea to have a game about Drupal first came up at DrupalCamp Stockholm, fall 2009, that NodeOne hosted. If I remember correctly it was during the aftercamp, just a short while before the Kitten Killers started their show. I was talking with Ken and Amy Rickard, and Gerhard Killesreiter. I have both played and worked with board games so the topic was discussed (the traditional, physical, type of game), and Ken had the excellent idea that of course there must be a game about Drupal.
Later that night I had thought up a first draft of a game, which I discussed the next day at least with Ken Rickard, Rob Purdie, Morten.dk, Matts and several others from NodeOne. Three days later after many small and one major revision (the big one mainly to make the game more accessible), the game rules was in large parts the game that we have now.
The focus of the development was to make a game that is quick and easy to learn, while also being fun to play many times and having a strong Drupal theme. It is quite different from traditional cards games with a regular deck. If you have not played any new card games from the last 10 years you might be a bit confused by the rules and not see what choices are good for you the first time you play. The good thing then is that the game is very short, and you can easily play again.
The quickness aspect worked out, the game takes only 5 minutes to play. However, one of the goals was missed slightly, one play might be needed to learn the game. This is difficult to avoid given the other requirements and once you have learned, you know a game that you can enjoy to play many times. Quick games that you understand completely immediately is often too limited to offer much in the way of replay value.
The theme of the game is focused on two activities in the Drupal community. There are many other parts that makes up this great community, but to make a game of manageable complexity I chose to limit the game to module development and site building. Players work together on modules, and then everyone can benefit when building their sites.
The real game part of the game, the part that makes it a competition rather than a cooperative game, is that you try to maximize your reputation (your points) by making sure that you contribute the most to modules (to get their points) and to try to play so that only modules that you need for your sites are finished, not more. A cooperative game would have been a completely different game, for example competing against a set goal to beat some other CMS on future development.
I hope you will enjoy the game!
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