Enjoying Board Games

Mr. Shimada, how did you first get involved in board game design?

When I was a university student in Professor Fumitoshi Kato's lab at SFC, I thought that creating "play" was interesting. After graduation, I joined the game maker Namco (now Bandai Namco Entertainment).

There, I worked on digital games like the racing game "Ridge Racer" and family-oriented ski and sports games for the Nintendo "Wii."

However, I still felt an attraction to play that involves face-to-face communication. While working, I started units called "JOYPOD" and "daitai" with friends from the same lab, where we began making board games and holding workshops.

While doing that on a small scale, I encountered Game Market, and since around 2010, I've continued activities like exhibiting the things we've made.

I graduated from Keio in the same year as Mr. Shimada, but during my university days, I belonged to the Magic Society. There was an interesting board game left by an alumnus in the club room at Hiyoshi, and we all used to play it in our spare time.

What game was that?

It's a game called "Scotland Yard." Of course, that was fun too, but right around that time, "Catan" was released by Capcom and became a huge hit all over Japan. There were big advertisements in Shibuya, and events with hundreds of people at the Shinjuku Koma Theater. There were even people playing it in the courtyard at Mita. I got hooked on it then.

And that led you to want to open a board game cafe?

Not immediately (laughs). After graduation, I got a job and moved around different regions, but around 2014, when I returned to Tokyo and met an old friend, we talked about going to a board game cafe. That's when I realized how incredibly interesting recent board games are.

Originally, I was thinking of starting a business in a different industry, but due to various circumstances, I had to give that up. Deciding to start a business in a different sector, I chose to enter the rapidly growing board game industry. I found a good property in Tamachi, so I started operations in 2019.

For me, games became linked to my research when I went to graduate school at Nagoya University. My mentor, Professor Yukio Hirose, was using educational games to teach social psychology classes.

There was a game called the Virtual World Game that about 40 people would spend a whole day playing, and there was also a version of the card game "Doubt" (Cheat) modified to help understand the mechanisms of illegal dumping. Cards were treated as waste, and you had to decide whether to secretly dump hazardous waste or pay honestly to dispose of it.

In 2000, triggered by my participation in environment-related civic activities, I created my own game called the "Persuasion/Agreement Game," and from there, I began researching communication games.

Around 2004, Professor Hatsuko Yoshikawa from the Faculty of Business and Commerce invited me to go to the International Simulation and Gaming Association conference held in Munich, Germany. At that time, she took me to a toy store in Munich, and the walls were completely covered with board games. I was amazed by this.

After that, every time I went to Germany for research, I would go to the toy department and buy up games, thinking, "This looks like it could be used for something."

So encountering German board games was a big turning point.

Yes. German games first of all look wonderful, and the rules are also wonderful. At first, I thought about modifying the rules in my own way to create new games, but I realized that playing the games themselves is actually a tremendous learning experience.

By having students think about what world or structure the game represents and what lies behind it, I found they could acquire a new perspective for looking at society through board games.

My shop has over 500 types of games, mostly from Germany and America. However, France also releases many games, and recently Taiwan has been increasing. Unfortunately, Japan is very much a developing country in this regard.

Even if we just say "board games," it's a very broad term with many different types. It's not just games that use a board; there are card games and things you do with writing utensils. I feel like it has become more of a conceptual term.

That's true. If we think again about what a board game is, one definition might be that there is a part that all players can see—that would be the "board." It's the shared part. Including the pile of face-down cards, those kinds of things are the board.

So, even if there isn't an actual physical board, as long as there is a space where cards are played or a space shared by the people playing, that might be enough. It could be played on a table, or it could be something like Sugoroku played along a wall. In that sense, I think various types of boards can be imagined.

There's even a game themed around a Wild West duel where you throw burritos. In that one, there isn't even a table; you flip a card and it gives instructions like "Throw!" (laughs).

There's no board at all. It's like a pillow fight, isn't it?

So I don't think we need to be obsessed with the definition. But when you say "analog games," it feels a bit different. You don't say "analog game shop," do you?

The term "analog game" makes me feel a strange sense of isolation, as if it's strictly different from digital. It's fine to use digital elements in a board game, isn't it? In fact, such things exist.

Recently, there are even games that link with smartphones.

I feel a certain breadth in the expression "board game."

The "Catan" I mentioned earlier is the third best-selling board game in the world. First is "Monopoly," second is "The Game of Life," and third is "Catan."

Many people think "The Game of Life" is a Japanese game, but it was originally a foreign game called "The Game of Life." However, Japan has created many spin-offs.

The Japanese version of "Catan" came out around 2000, but according to one YouTuber, "Catan" was the first trend to finally appear in 50 or 60 years after "Monopoly"—where you roll two dice, move pieces, and exchange money. Until then, "Monopoly" and "The Game of Life" had monopolized the market, and "Catan" broke in for the first time in decades. It was that overwhelmingly popular.

"Catan" has world championships, and Japanese players are active there too, aren't they?

Japanese people are strong at these kinds of games. "Catan" won the "Spiel des Jahres" (German Game of the Year) in '95. The following year, it won awards in America, and from '99 to 2000, it was number one in the "Japan Tabletop Game Grand Prix." It has also won awards in the Czech Republic and Poland.

What's a bit frustrating is that there are few Japanese-made games that are globally successful. Especially in the prestigious field of "heavyweight" games that take over 90 minutes to play, there are almost no Japanese creators. I haven't heard anything about them breaking into the top ranks of famous overseas awards.

Why is it that such creators aren't emerging in Japan?

I've spoken with creators from Taiwan, and it seems they have a solid community of people making games, and they devise strategies on the premise of winning the Game of the Year in Germany. In Japan, there are still many people with the mindset of "I'll just be happy if it sells enough to not lose money, as a memento."

Why does it turn out that way?

High production costs are likely a major reason. I make games too, but for heavyweight games, the budget becomes enormous for amateurs, including shipping costs.

As for whether major Japanese toy manufacturers will make them, the distribution volume of board games in Japan is at a level of 1/20th or 1/30th compared to European countries. Because mass production is difficult, they are avoided because manufacturing costs become high or profit margins become thin.

Therefore, the current situation in Japan is that there is an inevitable abundance of small-box games containing about 50 to 100 cards that can be produced at low cost.

I've heard that other countries are working on building board game markets as a national effort. Also, they are investing heavily in digital. It's a shame that Japan is now even falling behind in digital games.

However, from what I know, there is an interesting game called "Deep Sea Adventure" made by a Japanese manufacturer called Oink Games. You dive to the bottom of the sea to collect treasure, but since the oxygen tank is shared among players, if one person consumes a lot of oxygen, others won't be able to return—it's a game of shared destiny, so to speak.

The fact that the power itself is shared with others is interesting. I thought this could be useful and used it in my seminar, and one student even wrote their graduation thesis on it.

That's amazing.

Also, although it's currently out of print, a German game called "Keep Cool" that deals with environmental issues is interesting. It's an international negotiation game themed on global warming, with a world map board where you build factories around the world.

There is a meter representing the world's carbon dioxide concentration, and if you take actions that prioritize private interest according to given goals, the world's temperature rises. Due to that temperature rise, the risk of disasters increases. I've been using it in classes for over 15 years.

Digital games are all about the correspondence between input and output. On the other hand, board games have various boards, cards, and pieces, and you move forward through trial and error while touching them and wondering, "What does this do?" Sometimes you even proceed with a mistaken understanding of the rules.

Regarding the rules, when you realize, "Oh, I see. These are the rules," you can feel a certain kind of brilliance in the game. In other words, I think there is fun that includes the process of acquiring the rules yourselves.

That may certainly be true.

For example, in a situation where you are saved if you roll a 6 on a die, if a 6 comes up, everyone cheers with joy. It's not like the person who rolled the die is responsible, right? But the fact that that person rolled it and got that result has meaning for the people there.

In psychology, this is called having a sense of control. The person rolling the die feels as if they can control the situation. If it's just about rolling a die, I think you could let a machine do it, but why do we roll the die? That aspect of luck and misfortune is fascinating.

So it's an experience that can only be gained because you use an item like a die.

In today's world, when unexpected things happen due to various unpredictable factors like COVID, disasters, or wars, what should we do? I've been thinking lately that board games might be providing opportunities to simulate such situations.

I also thought that games have suggestions and value for living in a world with high uncertainty, so I can really empathize with what you just said.

The moment I entered university, I declared, "I'm not going to study anymore" (laughs), but in reality, I learned so many things while making games.

I had to research various things, and since I had to work in a team, I had to communicate there. I feel that doing that has been very helpful in my life since then.

I think making a game is like creating a set of rules or creating a world. Recently, when I interact with children, I encourage them to think for themselves as much as possible, create their own rules, and create their own place for play. When I say, "Let's try making a game with this wooden stick and board" and we do it together, I think that experience leads to "doing something about it yourself."

I believe there is value in the act of "making" a game itself.

Since when have board game cafes existed?

I believe it was JERRY JELLY CAFE that spread them in Japan. They opened their first shop in Shibuya in 2011, but at the time of opening, it seems it was opened as a coworking space where you could play board games in your spare time. Eventually, the demand for board games gradually increased, and they have increased the number of stores through franchise expansion and other means.

About how many board game cafes are there in Tokyo?

There are about 100 stores. They seem to have started increasing around 2016.

The customer base is roughly divided into two: those who come in groups, and those who come as individuals or pairs wishing to share a table. Most group users are people on their way home from work or school. In many cases, they are having fun and making noise while eating snacks and drinking juice. I also often introduce things that can be enjoyed easily in a short time while chatting.

It's like a club room after school.

Yes. We often match customers who come in small numbers and want to share a table, but I try to identify and introduce games that each person might like, and explain the rules in a fun atmosphere so that the whole table gets excited.

Right now, due to COVID, customers have decreased by about 70%, and there are many customers wishing to share a table in small numbers. It's probably hard to invite people from the same workplace on the way home. Customers who absolutely love board games are gathering.

Does that mean for those people, unlike video games played at home, it has to be something like a board game?

We have a very large number of customers who love "Pokémon" (laughs). I've even been told, "Sorry Manager, I'm busy with Pokémon so I can't come for a while," so I think they like both. They even try to recommend "Pokémon" to me, which is a problem (laughs).

Many people become repeaters because the memories of playing board games at our shop were so much fun. There are also customers who make appointments with other regulars, or give me their contact information and say, "Let me know if someone wanting to share a table comes. I'll be right there."

It has the atmosphere of a salon for adults. In that case, I would want people with good manners to come.

Tamachi is a good neighborhood, and we are blessed with customers who have good manners.

In Professor Sugiura's seminar, is there a place where students spontaneously play board games after it ends?

We haven't been able to do it much lately, but about five or six years ago, we often held what we called 'sub-seminars.' We would reserve an empty classroom, and I would bring a selection of games from my lab for them to play and then report on.

We also play them during the seminar itself. For example, a game called 'Aber Bitte mit Sahne' (Piece o' Cake), where you slice up a cake, gets very exciting, and we also discuss individual gain and fairness. During open seminars for recruiting new members, we have them participate in board games so they can experience the atmosphere of the seminar.

There is a children's game called 'Viva Topo!' (The Big Cheese Race), but even adults can gain a lot from playing it.

Depending on the roll of the dice, you manipulate four mice to get the largest possible pieces of cheese, but you have to decide which mouse to advance and which to give up on so they don't get caught by the cat. Such situations occur in our lives as well; resources, time, and opportunities are finite, and there are things to be learned from failed choices in this game.

It seems there is much to learn from the gameplay and the rules.

In a game called 'Diamant' (also known as 'Incan Gold'), which is themed around underground exploration, players compete to see how much treasure they can acquire. The deeper you go underground, the larger your share becomes, but the risk of having the treasure you've gained so far confiscated also increases.

It is a simple decision-making game of 'go forward or go back,' but it is influenced by predictions of how others will judge and how they actually decide. Despite being a simple game, some students have used it as a subject for their graduation theses or created their own applied versions for research.

I also often play German games about waste sorting. Germany turns various topics like traffic safety, the environment, and health into games.

Germany really does have a diverse range of games. In Japan, games with academic content seem to have a hard time becoming hits.

I was in Germany for a little less than a year until last September on a university-endorsed study abroad. I happened to be living there during the lockdown, and while only shops selling daily necessities like supermarkets and drugstores were open, even the drugstores sold board games.

So they are treated as necessities.

In that way, board games are normally integrated into daily life. You often see people playing card games in cafes and restaurants. So, perhaps there is no need to intentionally create game cafes there.

It seems Europe has had that kind of culture originally.

There is a game called Backgammon, which is like Sugoroku, and I have seen people playing it on the street while drinking coffee.

That's like how people used to play Shogi on the streets in old Japan.

I was once interviewed about board games for a Shogakukan magazine called 'Sho-gaku 8-nensei,' which targets all elementary school grades. Nowadays, those kinds of magazines even come with card games as supplements.

Media exposure has increased significantly over the past few years.

They also appear in fashion magazines as something stylish. They are being featured on TV as well.

Because TV production budgets are being cut, board games are easy to use because they are inexpensive and exciting. The providers are also cooperative because it leads to promotion and the spread of board games.

The game 'Word Basket' by Mobius Games became an instant hit after Arashi introduced it on TV.

Then there's the game 'Ciao Ciao.' It sold out immediately at our shop. After that, the price skyrocketed to double on Mercari.

You can learn about them if they are featured on TV, but there aren't many places to encounter them normally. Although recently they have started being sold at electronics retailers and such.

Just looking at the box, it's hard to know which one to buy. When I first started playing board games, I wanted to buy a game because we were all going on a hot spring trip, but there were so many types I didn't know what to get. I asked a shop clerk, and when I bought 'Incan Gold,' which we mentioned earlier, it was a huge hit.

So, it's faster to ask a clerk. If it's a clerk at a specialty shop, they will definitely know.

There is a board game specialty shop called 'Sugorokuya,' and the manager, Mr. Maruta, was originally a digital game creator who was involved in 'MOTHER 2' (EarthBound). I was very impressed by his comment that for board games, it is important to use videos to explain simple games for beginners in an easy-to-understand way.

The shop called Pineapple Games in Tamachi is also good. The manager claims to be the best at explaining games in Japan (laughs).

Mr. Shimada, what kind of things do you want to create?

I like games where a person's individuality or some creative aspect comes out.

There is a game called 'Dixit' where you look at cards with pictures and give them a title that comes to mind. For example, suppose you give it the title 'Sad Tears.' From that title, the other players choose one card from their hand that they think is most related and put it out, and the storyteller shuffles and lines them up.

The players other than the storyteller vote for the card they think is the 'card chosen by the storyteller,' and the way they test each other's expressions is very interesting.

Are the ones you are working on also that kind of game?

Yes. There is a game called 'Jarebon' that I made with my colleagues. It's a game based on the relay novels we used to do in elementary school.

First, a team of about four people is formed, and the first person gives a mysterious title like 'A Rechargeable Octopus' and writes the beginning of a novel and passes it to the next person. Then, the next person writes while looking at the sentence the previous person wrote. However, they turn the page before passing it so that the person after them cannot see the part the first person wrote.

You look only at the content of the person immediately before you, imagine what kind of story it might be, and write. You can try to connect it smoothly, or you can make it a forced development.

It's like a game of telephone.

Exactly. Only the common title can be recognized. When you read it back after the story is finished after about two rounds, it's usually funny. When people do this, they enjoy it a lot and gradually start smirking. I really like things that naturally get exciting like this. I think it's also easy to play at a board game cafe.

I also create board games, and the four conditions for a hit by Yoshiki Okamoto, who created 'Monster Strike' and 'Street Fighter,' are very helpful. First, 'interesting to hear about.' Like hearing a presentation or a rumor. Second is 'interesting to look at.' The visuals. Then 'interesting to actually play.' Finally, 'interesting to play repeatedly.'

I thought 'Jarebon' met all four of those conditions. I have the impression that there are many games where these four conditions are surprisingly not followed. I believe the current situation is that this kind of know-how has not permeated, perhaps because domestic games are often created by amateurs individually.

The game 'Asterisk' (now MARIMBA) that Mr. Shimada introduced to me before. It's a very good game, but I'm sorry to hear that it cannot be mass-produced.

This one ended as a prototype. It's something like fitting wooden hexahedral cubes and measuring-box-like pieces into a board.

What I wanted to do was to see if the act of creating a board game itself could be made into play. You create the rules while talking about what kind of rules could be made within these objects. So there are no fixed rules; it's like there is a rule to 'create the rules on the spot.'

It's a very good game. The cubes and board are made of wood, and it's a pleasure just to hold them.

That sounds fun. Can I buy that now?

It costs about 50,000 yen each (laughs). I had a woodworking shop make a one-of-a-kind piece for an art exhibition a long time ago, so it was very expensive. I looked into it quite a bit to get it into circulation, but it's difficult so far, and it has ended as a prototype. However, the concept is interesting, so I'm wondering if there is a next step.

Running a shop, I occasionally see very gentlemanly people at shared tables. They are good at explaining games, clean, considerate of beginners, and use polite language. When those kinds of people are playing board games, you want to play again.

But unfortunately, there are occasionally players who are the opposite. People who start clicking their tongues when they start losing, or who get grumpy and hurl abuse, or who suddenly quit the game when defeat is imminent...

There are surprisingly few players who have been playing board games from the start who have bad manners. I feel that such people are occasionally found among players who entered board games from video games or online games.

Is it that they bring the ease of resetting in online digital games into the real world?

Even things like clothing aren't known to the other person online, right? In the past, someone came after eating garlic ramen, and I had to ask them to leave (laughs).

That's exactly a 'real' feeling (laughs).

It's about how to create pleasant communication in public spaces, isn't it?

I think this is training. Among small children, there are those who get frustrated and throw tantrums when they lose, right?

Conversely, it is very important to be able to experience losing in a real game. Not just in games, but also in outdoor play, it's about how to interact well with people within that.

It's a place where you can learn rules and manners.

With COVID, classes and meetings have moved online, but in a video conference, for example, what you are seeing is only a cropped scene or audio. In other words, we can focus only on that purpose without perceiving much other information.

This has its good points, but when you are meeting face-to-face in reality, you are perceiving various things as information other than the original purpose, such as clothing, facial expressions, or clicking of the tongue.

When playing board games face-to-face, we must be perceiving something beyond interacting according to the rules in a place we are not conscious of. In a game where you write a novel in a relay, what kind of expression did that person have when they handed it over? What were other people doing next to you while you were writing? That kind of information also constantly comes in. I think this is a very important thing.

That's a part that's hard to feel with digital. You might say something slightly different while playing, or try to bluff.

Psychological maneuvering like 'You just smirked a bit when you handed over the card' or 'This is definitely a weird card' is what makes it interesting.

Play includes those things as well. Games with negotiation and dialogue become even more interesting when played face-to-face.

The online version of 'Catan' and such are almost like competitive games, and there are parts where negotiation has become systematic.

There was a game that really shocked me. There's a trick in the rules, and just when you think you've won, it turns out you've actually lost. Also, conversation is prohibited, so you can't coordinate the rules. I was amazed that there was such a way to play.

Realizing that something you took for granted is actually different is like an encounter with a foreign culture, isn't it?

I am very glad that I have worked in game creation. My main work now is workshop design, but the experience of creating rules and emotional ups and downs while making games is very useful there.

Enjoying games you like, learning how those games are made, and trying to make them yourself might be one way to enrich your life.