Rats Vs Cats
Rats Vs Cats is a project that I co-created with a friend of mine over lockdown.
It's a strategy board game where humans are extinct after a nuclear bomb was set off. However, cats and rats evolved to fill their shoes. The rats use scrap to build crazy contraptions for their king, while the cats sell catnip stocks to fill the Fat Cat's pockets.
You need to use strategy and resource management to capture and control territory from the enemy force in an intense player vs player battle.
My main focus when co-developing Rats Vs Cats was to focus on the rules and ensure that the game would flow well and create a thought provoking, strategic game everytime. I encouraged playtesters to give me some feedback so that the game could be iterated on.
In University, with permission from my friend, I revived the game for my Analogue Games Project. I attempted to build on what had already existed, adding water which affected Cats as their microbes would disintergrate under the cleanliness of the water and so on.
When play-testers played the game however, they found it boring and extremely unfair for the player who went first. So I redesigned the game from the ground up. It became more about building up your resources by capturing zones to destroy either the Kingpin or capture the enemy base!
Reflecting on what I have achieved with this product, I have a full board-game on hand which I can pull out to play with my friends as and when I please. While it is rather unbalanced (I want to make a third iteration eventually), my friends always love to play it as the fantasy of overwhelming your enemy is too addictive for them.
If you would like to play a round or just see the iterations. Here is a link: