Gameblog

Gamer profile

I’m always trying to come up with new ideas to develop our gaming group. To help newcomers find their future favourite games, I’ve come up with this idea (actually, it’s stolen from someone on the Spielfrieks list) of gamer profiles and matching games to gamers.

I’ve graded all the games on five categories: luck element, fun element, strategical depth, length and player interaction. Each category is graded from 1 to 5, with long, verbal descriptions. So, you choose your profile and then you’re provided with the ten best matches for you.

At least for me, it works out fine. My profile is 2-2-4-3-3 (luck element is weak, the game should be pretty serious, I like games that require some learning effort, I prefer my games to be under 1½ hours and I like moderate player interaction). There’s one exact match, El Grande. Web of Power is one off. Other close matches include Puerto Rico, Mahjong, Princes of Florence, Tigris & Euphrates, Samurai, Tikal and Mexica — all games I really like. Only mismatch is Medici.

Currently I’m testing the system with some more experienced players, if it matches them to their favourite games as well. I’ll have to try it with some newbies as well. Hopefully, the system will give new players some idea on what kind of games would be good for them. Knowing a few names could make your first club meeting better — “Hey, I’d like to try Web of Power, it was recommended to me”.

Or, they won’t even understand the questions as they won’t have enough experience with board games. We’ll see.

If you want to, you can try the matching system. Unfortunately, it’s in Finnish. To help you out a bit, the questions are in order: luck element (1 = no luck, 5 = all luck), fun element (1 = very serious/dry, 5 = a joke, very light), strategic depth (1 = very simple/totally chaotic, 5 = a lot of learning and study is required), game length (1 = 15 minutes, 2 = 30 minutes, 3 = 1½ hours, 4 = 2 hours, 5 = more) and interaction (1 = multiplayer solitaire, 5 = all trading/negotiation).

If you try it, please tell me how closely the suggestions match your profile (tell me your profile, if you send feedback), did the system recommend your favourite games to you. All feedback is welcome and appreciated!

Mikko

11 responses to “Gamer profile”

  1. I came up with this:
    Profiiliasi (2 — 3 — 3 — 1 — 4)
    En Garde (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Manhattan (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Hare & Tortoise (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Verräter (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Give Me the Brain (eroavaisuus: 4)
    Web of Power (eroavaisuus: 4)
    Bohnanza (eroavaisuus: 5)
    Alcatraz (eroavaisuus: 5)
    Medici (eroavaisuus: 5)
    Lord of the Rings (eroavaisuus: 5)
    The suggestions all look sensible to me. This would be cool in English. It’s a pity that the BGG can’t handle this stuff.

  2. Well, if it’s cool in English, then I’ll just have to translate it, I guess. Of course, my knowledge of games isn’t huge, but then I’ll just have to set up a system to take in rating suggestions from the visitors, counting averages or something — that would probably produce the best set of grades. I guess. I’ll have to think about it, but translating it won’t be a difficult operation and I’ll do it sooner or later.

  3. Very, very interesting concept. 🙂
    I get:
    Profiiliasi (3 — 3 — 3 — 3 — 4) vastaavat parhaiten seuraavat noin kymmenen peliä:
    Lord of the Rings (eroavaisuus: 0)
    Profiili: 3 — 3 — 3 — 3 — 4
    Settlers of Catan (eroavaisuus: 1)
    Profiili: 3 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 4
    Great Dalmuti (eroavaisuus: 1)
    Profiili: 3 — 3 — 3 — 3 — 3
    Tigris & Euphrates (eroavaisuus: 2)
    Profiili: 3 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 3
    Medici (eroavaisuus: 2)
    Profiili: 2 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 4
    Carolus Magnus (eroavaisuus: 2)
    Profiili: 3 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 3
    Illuminati Deluxe (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 3 — 4 — 4 — 4 — 4
    Drachengold (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 2 — 4 — 3 — 3 — 5
    Universumin valtiaat (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 3 — 4 — 2 — 4 — 4
    Svea Rike (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 2 — 3 — 3 — 4 — 3
    OK, I am 3-3-3-3-4 which makes me Mr. Average Gamer. 🙂 [To be fair, I think most people are likely to start 2-2-?-?-? rather than 3-3-?-?-?.] I do like LotR and Settlers a lot — both are good picks. After that, it picks a lot of games that I probably should like, except that I don’t. Frankly, I can’t work out how you can cope with that sort of thing. 🙂
    Perhaps the logical conclusion would be some system a little like Matthew Gray’s Board Game Recommendation System, to try to get a variety of how people perceive the various games. Also, with only five options for each category, it’s fairly hard to give anything a 1 or a 5, so the categories are pretty broad.

  4. It strikes me as being similar to the Advanced search on the BGG, but with the subjective data you’d actually want to search on.

  5. I have it all thought out now, how the system could work. I’ll see if I have time to start coding today. I think I’ll have seven-level grading system , perhaps that would work better than five. Ten or nine is too much…
    Well, there are details to sort out, but as soon as I have something to show you, I’ll let you know. I’m going to need lots of volunteers grading the games, then, so be prepared…

  6. Be careful with making it too elaborate. Remember that I’ve got a fetish for usability!
    I’d be glad to help.

  7. Worry not — I’m a minimalism fetishist what comes to websites, also I’m totally useless with graphics. So, at least I won’t drown everything with fancy looks. Also, I’m not planning to have lots of features — very simple “set your profile, see the suggestions”.
    The grading system is a bit more difficult, because there’ll be tons of games. But that’ll have a bit more restricted user base, I think. Still, it’s going to be a challenge to make it easy to use.

  9. What kind of a gamer are you?

    From GameBlog (“Recording the gory details of the gaming life of Mikko Saari.”), a Gameblog: Gamer profiling system. I’ve graded

  10. I came up with:
    Profiiliasi (2 — 2 — 4 — 3 — 4) vastaavat parhaiten seuraavat noin kymmenen peliä:
    Medici (eroavaisuus: 1)
    Profiili: 2 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 4
    El Grande (eroavaisuus: 1)
    Profiili: 2 — 2 — 4 — 3 — 3
    Web of Power (eroavaisuus: 2)
    Profiili: 2 — 2 — 4 — 2 — 3
    Settlers of Catan (eroavaisuus: 2)
    Profiili: 3 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 4
    Verräter (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 2 — 2 — 3 — 2 — 3
    Mexica (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 1 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 3
    Samurai (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 1 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 3
    Lord of the Rings (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 3 — 3 — 3 — 3 — 4
    Tigris & Euphrates (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 3 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 3
    Carolus Magnus (eroavaisuus: 3)
    Profiili: 3 — 2 — 3 — 3 — 3
    I haven’t played a number of these, but from what I have read about them I think I would enjoy them! Not sure where Tikal (which I enjoy) would fit in — close to Mexica? Can we add more games to the list…. and English?!