Nice Try, Wise Guy Backstory

As my wife and partner, Barbarella, likes to tell the story, it all began with a gin martini. I like that. It lends a certain speakeasy vibe to the story.

On this particular day, the martini in question was served up with three olives and a deck of Hendrick’s Gin playing cards — a souvenir from an adventure we had had aboard their blimp, The Flying Cucumber. On each of the playing cards was a piece of green masking tape with words like Poison, Double-crossed, and Whacked, written on it.

“I want to try something,” I said as I began laying out the cards. “I cooked up this  card game…”

Barbarella was mystified. “What? When? How?”

“In the night,” I replied. “After you fall asleep. When I’m lying in bed, thinking.”

At my core, I am a designer. Whether it’s high-end loudspeakers, photographs hanging in museums and galleries, documentary films, packaging for Barbarella’s chocolates, or tomorrow’s dinner, I am always thinking about design. And I do my best thinking when I am relaxed, comfortable, and undisturbed — under a scalding hot shower in the morning, or laying in bed at night.

I explained to Barbarella how I’d recently stumbled across the Tabletop Deathmatch series on YouTube — a competition where indie board game designers pitch their ideas to a panel of experts for a shot at mentorship and publishing. Listening to the experts discussing the design, mechanics, and flaws of each game had me enthralled. Though I had known about “Game Theory” in the context of college courses and plans for nuclear conflict, surprisingly, I had never really thought about it in terms of, well… games.

From the series, I learned about The Ogre Problem (when one player amasses so much power that no one else has a chance to win, thus making the game un-fun) and End Game Accelerators (if you have a game of attrition, you don’t want the last two players to battle on endlessly because that would be boring for those who have to sit there and watch.) It wasn’t long before I found myself lying in bed at night musing, If I were to invent a game, what would it be?

My mind drifted to The Thin Man films—a series that began in the 1930s about a witty, cocktail-loving couple named Nick and Nora Charles, known for their rapid-fire banter, flirtatious charm, and knack for solving crimes in style.

Over a series of nights, as I lay in bed, my mind conjured an entire world of mob bosses, malice, and martinis.

I didn’t want to make just another party game. I wanted something with panache—something where mechanics and mood worked like a poker face and a hidden ace.

So I built a world where wise guys are whacked, dames are double-crossed, and no one gets out with their hands clean.

— David Fokos