What the article does not really go into is how designers iterate on game ideas introduced by previous games, taking the parts that were interesting, and changi

What the article does not really go into is how designers iterate on game ideas introduced by previous games, taking the parts that were interesting, and changing the rules that are detrimental to the enjoyment of the game. Take Werewolves, for example[0]. This is a classic roleplaying game, considered one of the originators of the "social deduction" genre. It pits villagers against werewolves hiding among them, where either all villagers end up eaten by the remaining werewolves, or all werewolves are lynched by the remaining villagers. See link for a full description, but the important bit here is that: - the villagers can only win by determining who the werewolves are, but there are no in-game reasons to suspect anyone of being a werewolf; it is 100% based on roleplaying. - the game is played out through a process of elimination, removing two players per turn (one suspected werewolf, one werewolf snack). If the group is ten people, that means some people will be watching from the sidelines most of the time. Both of these issues can be big hurdles to enjoying the game. Resistance is a "second generation" social deduction game, which removed player elimination[1]. Players are resistance fighters trying to topple an oppressive regime, with a few double agents among them trying to sabotage their efforts. Each turn, players decide together which two or three members will go on missions. If the saboteurs bluff themselves into being sent, they must try to sabotage the mission while deflecting suspicions that it is because of their doing. Meanwhile, the resistance has to figure out who the saboteurs are, to avoid sending them on missions. Which side wins depends on how many missions succeed or fail. More recently, the lack of in-game discussion starters was solved in Deception: Murder in Hong Kong, where players are investigators trying to solve an ongoing murder case, and one or two of them are secretly the murderer(s)[2]. It adds a clue system that is a bit hard to explain here, but in practice immediately provokes discussion while still maintaining the social deduction aspect[3]. So over two "generations" of game design, two major flaws were eliminated from an otherwise very innovative game genre. And this kind of stuff happens everywhere: all kinds of new, innovative mechanics to solve specific problems are shared and remixed. [0] https://www.werewolves.com/werewolf-game/ https://www.werewolves.com/werewolf-game/ [1] https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/41114/resistance https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/41114/resistance [2] https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/156129/deception-murder-hong-kong https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/156129/deception-murder-... [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDWvHrt6kG0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDWvHrt6kG0