From roughly 1989 to 1992, I explored the concept of prediction markets (which I then called “idea futures”) in part via building and testing a board game. I thought I’d posted details on my game before, but searching I couldn’t find anything. So here is my board game.
Hi, I want to try the game but I need to get some good movie or tv show for it. Do you have some proposals? Ideally something where is easy to get a list of suspects on the beginning of the movie...
Could be a frustrating game to play with any non-standard murder mystery, e.g. one in which there's more than one murderer, in which the murder turns out to be a suicide or accident, in which the victim was actually a twin, etc.
Also: couldn't this be used with any narrative (including real-world events) that has an uncertain but reasonably bounded set of outcomes?
@robin_hanson:disqus How did you actually make the market board for playing this? Some off-the-shelf product that happened to work (link?)? DIY (instructions?)? It would be easy to use a giant posterboard, drawn upon, but slots would be much more aesthetic.
To clarify, my thought was that if you have a "whiteboard" at the top, as in your diagram, but with each bottom bar name replaced with a colored background that can be written on, and have cards that are colored without a name, you can have the players write in names they want to bet on during the game, and let the choice of who to suspect grow naturally.This way, the color codes are for individuals who are suspected. It definitely adds a bit of play-time complexity, but it also lets you use the game more than once, which seems critical if you want someone to buy it...
Maybe, but the structure of the story has advantages:
1) All the suspects are known at the beginning of the story2) Characters dying in turn throughout the story will lead to large changes in the market value of each character's card.
Yeah, cheaper to make game where colored cards say "Pays 100 if A did it", etc and a separate visible erasable board with different color sections that says "A = Andy, B = ..". But that would make the game a bit more awkward to play.
I could see making a card for "Other person did it", but much harder mechanically to let players split that into particular others.
I suspect that if you made the game, the names of the suspects should be only on a whiteboard or other re-usable surface, and the cards should just be color-coded to match the listed names, so you could use the game for any murder mystery / equivalent. (Who dies next in Game of Thrones?)
You'd probably also want to clarify that the players can make chits for additional suspects, with the same prices.
Other options:You could ask a game-maker to guarantee that if a crowdfunding campaign hits some given number, they'll do production, with some royalty deal.You could have it made by https://www.boardgamesmaker... or thegamecrafter.com , then offer it for sale by them.
I really want this alongside another, well-known board game. Most awesome: the players can also trade and incentives are somehow still aligned. For example if everyone put in cash at the beginning and at the end the winner of the board game got 1/2 of it while the other 1/2 was distributed according to each player's points in the trading game? Skews some of the risk tradeoffs in the game proper. Oh, and complete destroys the game due to collusion/kingmaking. Hm. Okay two groups playing at once, each trading in the other groups' market and not allowed to view their own? Seems impossible to limit table talk, have to pay attention to both games, might still be fun...
Hi, I want to try the game but I need to get some good movie or tv show for it. Do you have some proposals? Ideally something where is easy to get a list of suspects on the beginning of the movie...
Could be a frustrating game to play with any non-standard murder mystery, e.g. one in which there's more than one murderer, in which the murder turns out to be a suicide or accident, in which the victim was actually a twin, etc.
Also: couldn't this be used with any narrative (including real-world events) that has an uncertain but reasonably bounded set of outcomes?
Somehow I missed your product link, never mind...
@robin_hanson:disqus How did you actually make the market board for playing this? Some off-the-shelf product that happened to work (link?)? DIY (instructions?)? It would be easy to use a giant posterboard, drawn upon, but slots would be much more aesthetic.
The dynamic content swapping seems a great fit for a web game.
I'm interested in working with others to make the game real.
The best suggestion: "Murder, She Bet".
This would pretty fun to do the art design for and throw up on The Game Crafter. Would you be interested?
To clarify, my thought was that if you have a "whiteboard" at the top, as in your diagram, but with each bottom bar name replaced with a colored background that can be written on, and have cards that are colored without a name, you can have the players write in names they want to bet on during the game, and let the choice of who to suspect grow naturally.This way, the color codes are for individuals who are suspected. It definitely adds a bit of play-time complexity, but it also lets you use the game more than once, which seems critical if you want someone to buy it...
One bit of awkwardness: you have to do a bit of research on the story so you can list all the suspects before you start watching it.
Maybe, but the structure of the story has advantages:
1) All the suspects are known at the beginning of the story2) Characters dying in turn throughout the story will lead to large changes in the market value of each character's card.
Yeah, cheaper to make game where colored cards say "Pays 100 if A did it", etc and a separate visible erasable board with different color sections that says "A = Andy, B = ..". But that would make the game a bit more awkward to play.
I could see making a card for "Other person did it", but much harder mechanically to let players split that into particular others.
I suspect that if you made the game, the names of the suspects should be only on a whiteboard or other re-usable surface, and the cards should just be color-coded to match the listed names, so you could use the game for any murder mystery / equivalent. (Who dies next in Game of Thrones?)
You'd probably also want to clarify that the players can make chits for additional suspects, with the same prices.
Other options:You could ask a game-maker to guarantee that if a crowdfunding campaign hits some given number, they'll do production, with some royalty deal.You could have it made by https://www.boardgamesmaker... or thegamecrafter.com , then offer it for sale by them.
I really want this alongside another, well-known board game. Most awesome: the players can also trade and incentives are somehow still aligned. For example if everyone put in cash at the beginning and at the end the winner of the board game got 1/2 of it while the other 1/2 was distributed according to each player's points in the trading game? Skews some of the risk tradeoffs in the game proper. Oh, and complete destroys the game due to collusion/kingmaking. Hm. Okay two groups playing at once, each trading in the other groups' market and not allowed to view their own? Seems impossible to limit table talk, have to pay attention to both games, might still be fun...
Probably better overall to use something more obscure, so participants don't believe others have a huge advantage.