I'd Watch That

An improv storytelling game where players follow card prompts to entertain each other with hilariously chaotic tales.

Design Process

Background

Development

Play Testing

Takeaways

Background

I'd Watch That was a personal project born out of my love for both story telling and one particular indie card game. This game is a riff off of my favorite game, I'd Eat That, by Jordan Draper Games. In I'd Eat That* players get random ingredient cards that they assemble into three dishes (appetizer, entree, and dessert - one dish per round). In I'd Watch That players are assigned story elements and must put include them in a three part tale; complete with an exposition, climax, and resolution (one part per round). In I'd Eat That players grab an additional ingredient card if all other participants say they'd eat the player's dish. In I'd Watch That players similarly grab another story element card if everyone would continue watching their improvised movie.

Development

I created the cards in Canva and attempted to replicate the styles of both the I'd Eat That cards and instructions. The cards can be viewed here. In order to come up with story elements I researched and brainstormed popular movie genres and tropes; deliberately adding ones that would compliment one another and others that could clash and lead to unexpected storylines. I included the full rules below ⬇️

Play Testing

I had a blast play testing this game. I played several sessions with my partner before bringing my prototype to a D&D session and play testing with my players. Some iterations I made along the way:

1. It was difficult pinpointing exactly how many cards a player should begin with. With 8-9 it felt overwhelming to include every element, but with fewer the game lost its chaotic charm. I settled on 7 after several rounds.

2. Some cards can be quite contradictory and break the story. For example: you could have a story with assumed dialogue and pull the "silent film" card to include in your resolution (this happened to my friend while playing). At times this could lead to some very funny work arounds (he had been telling a story about a romance set in space and ended it with "in space no one can hear you scream, this was a silent film all along" plays card) though I could see other players getting a little frustrated while finding ways to include the contradictory plot twists. To combat this I am considering having certain cards marked so they can only be pulled when initially distributing cards, and have separate, less-broken cards that can be pulled mid-story.

Takeaways

This game was a hit with friends. I had multiple people ask for me to share the file with them, and it validated my own love for the game - this positive feedback was especially uplifting after struggling to make Panya.
Something that I had not expected was that a few friends into writing felt I'd Watch That would work as a fun way to generate writing prompts. I think I had been so focused on I'd Eat That, that I hadn't thought of my game concept as something that could stand alone and serve as something useful in it's own right.