Early in our chat, developer Max Brooke brought up three concepts that he says have helped him design mechanics in his board game design career: simulationism, gameism, and narrativism.
It turns out that the current people developing the X-Wing miniatures game (Max Brooke, Frank Brooks, and Adam Davy) have a lot to say about the art of game design, and even were able to share some lessons that apply to the video game space.
After a discussion of “simple yet exquisite” mechanical design, one viewer asked the X-Wing developers what methods they used to refine mechancis that start out as raw ideas.
While X-Wing Miniatures is a game that relies on the former 2 concepts, all 3 help shape the game’s design in some way, and guide its developers to build systems and abilities pulled from the world of Star Wars.