Historically, we put our games through a gauntlet of local playtesting, development, blind playtesting, data analysis, copyediting, and proofreading, plus a few pre-production copy playtests (typically by coworker Joe and then me and my St. Louis coworkers). Most of these playtests focus on making the game as fun, functional, balanced, and intuitive as possible.
But over the last year or so, we’ve added two enhancements to this process: One, we often ask Panda to make a pre-PPC copy as soon as possible after the proofs are approved. This looks like a real copy of the game, or at least what the game could be. Two, when we get to the real PPC stage, we make 4 PPCs instead of 1, and each of them is reviewed and playtested by multiple people. Both of these help us playtest the game as a product and to increase the chances of finding anything critical that was missed during the oversight process.
This brings me to Wingspan Pocket.
In some ways, Wingspan Pocket is one of our smallest games. It’s only around 6x4x2 inches, it only takes 30 minutes to play, and it asks each player to manage only 1 row of bird cards. Yet by another metric it is our biggest game, as there are 175,000 units in the first English print run, by far the most in our 14-year history.
With that much at stake, we really, really needed to get it right.
At our January company retreat in Phoenix (the first time all 8 of us have ever been in the same place), I proudly presented to my coworkers the pre-PPC of Wingspan Pocket, the product I had carefully crafted over the last year with the designer (Elizabeth Hargrave), playtesters, proofreaders, and the graphic designer.
I say this with love, appreciation, and humility: My coworkers proceeded to tear apart every aspect of the product. Not the game design–that was fine. Rather, it was the product design (a major component of my job) that fell short of their expectations.
The following result of 3 days of conversations, playtests, and pages of notes was a vastly superior product to the pre-PPC, especially in terms of onboarding. Accessibility is important in any game, but it’s even more important when a major goal of the game is to invite anyone and everyone into the world of Wingspan.
Many of the initial discussions focused on the box itself. The original box was an awkward shape, kind of like a smaller Oceania expansion box. With 130+ cards and 60 egg tokens, we knew the game wasn’t literally going to fit in anyone’s pocket, but the box needed to fit a smaller space on a shelf (whether that shelf is yours or at a game store).
After the company retreat I actually visited Barnes & Noble to look at their small-box games to see if there was a size that felt right, displayed well, and would fit the components of Wingspan Pocket. The end result is a box that is roughly the size of my hand.
The art for the front of the box had some debate, but with the name “pocket,” I felt strongly that we should keep the illustration of the pouch nest while making the word “Wingspan” as big as possible. (Of course, we had already debated other game names like Wingspan Go, Wingspan Swift” and Wingspan Nest, but we ruled them out due to connections to Pokemon, the Wingspan swift-start pack, and the Wingspan Nesting Box.)
The back of the box also went through a number of revisions to convey the simplicity of the game. We landed on a method used by many publishers for streamlined games: Explain the game with an image and 3 short phrases.
As we played the pre-PPC, we found that the reference card needed a lot of work. My initial goal was that someone could play the game from the reference card alone and only use the rulebook for a deeper dive, but there’s still a key difference between referencing key elements of the game and actually understanding the entire game.
In revising the reference card multiple times, we also revisited the rulebook itself, especially the first page. We truly wanted Wingspan Pocket to be accessible to everyone, including those who might be daunted by a short hobby game rulebook, so right on the front page we talk about what you need for your first game and showcase a rules video QR code.
While most of the discussions focused on the product design, a few gameplay-related elements came up as well. Originally, after someone played their 6th bird, players each took an extra turn (after each player had taken the same number of turns in the game). While this didn’t bother previous playtesters, we found at higher player counts that it really didn’t feel necessary and could turn a 30-minute game into a 45-minute game. So I talked to Elizabeth about removing the extra set of turns, and she approved the change.
Also, the goal cards in the game (which score 1 VP per egg on specific types of birds) were previously the default way of playing, and the rules suggested that players remove the goals for their first game. Instead, we switched to the goals being excluded by default, and for “advanced play” you can add them. Wingspanners accustomed to goal tiles and bonus cards should have no issues adding these cards.
I don’t think we’ve ever had a product that went under the microscope to the extent of Wingspan Pocket. We collectively put our hearts and minds into this game as if it is the only game we make, and I hope the final result brings joy to your table.
I’m sure we are far from the first publisher to playtest both a pre-PPC and multiple PPCs to improve the design of a product. But I’m sharing this because maybe you aren’t aware that these are options to explore–granted, very expensive options on a per-unit basis–as you seek to increase the chances of success of your product and to reduce errors.
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