Will's blog

Posted by robin on Wed Feb 22 12:46:25 2006
This might not directly answer your question, but as a would-be game designer I've done a fair amount in this area. While I've always wanted a data-driven approach, I have not got around to building anything in Python. Instead I use OpenOffice.org and tweak the cards manually.

First I make a draw template for each style of card I need in the game. I copy each of these as many times as I need them, and lay out a grid of cards on a single page: 3x3 fits well.

Seperately I compile all the information I need in order to build the cards: rules text, colourful quotes, whatever else is going to be on the finished cards. Having this resource in plain text files is convenient.

In my "dumb but simple" way of doing things, this info is simply copied into the draw document: I use no fancy mail merge or other operation. In this way I can tweak formatting, etc. to fit. Visual style rules over convenience of assembly here.

To test what I'm doing, I print to normal paper and cut out the cards. I use spare cards from some other game (I have tens of thousands) and simply insert my mock-ups into a card sleeve, using the spares as a card back and to provide rigidity. This is "good enough" for playtesting, and since I have never got beyond that, it tends to be "good enough" for playing as well!

If I was to ever get to the next stage I would also need to find a suitable card stock... but I would think any card stock that fits the printer would be good enough for demo purposes. If you're talking a professional finished product then there's no way you'd do the printing yourself, so the issue is moot.

Posted by Hans on Wed Feb 22 17:47:51 2006
For my home-grown card game, I've been doing much the same thing as Robin... create PDFs with the cards (usually just rectangles with text in them, etc), print them, cut out the cards, and put them in sleeves. It's not real pretty, but it works.

As it happens, I've been thinking about a site with "do-it-yourself" games... provide PDFs with the cards, and people can download them, print them, and make their own card game. (Or board game, or whatever.) What appeals to me is that users could also contribute their own cards or card ideas. In order for this to work, the game has to be extendable, though.

Posted by PaulJ on Tue Feb 28 13:12:06 2006
In my efforts as amateur game designer, I've mostly availed myself of PDFs and Kinko's, which will print  doublesided on cardstock for a reasonable fee... $20 or so got me a medium-quality incarnation of my game suitable for playtesting at a 'con... one step up from self-printed and put into cardsleeves (also a great idea, btw), but one down from slick finished games.  About like a Cheapass game, actually.