Mini Postcards and NPCs

I've updated the print and play to the latest version, G03.  Most of the changes of this version are graphic design changes and aesthetic changes.  Tests have been much cleaner since this iteration, and also the last version proved to be a bit too tight of a fit for a mint tin.  This version should fit in a box for 54 standard poker cards, as it consists of 96 mini cards (half the size of a poker card) and a rulebook.  This version also adds two bases that the players aren't meant to play, but I want to talk about the graphic design changes first.

Antiquated Postcards

Since the micro cards were proving to be a bit too fragile from the Game Crafter, I have opted for minicards.  This provides me with more space on the card, so I've decided to reintroduce reference text on them.  The way activation works makes it a bit easier to communicate this, because the cards make it clear that it takes a distinct separate action to use the action described on them.  In past iterations, players would think they'd take those actions by playing them from their hand, but the action system is much clearer now.  I've taken this opportunity to stylize the cards as pieces of a map, as you're essentially exploring and claiming territory and expanding your control.

Another significant change was the separation of the base and the setup card.  Describing your starting symbols as part of your base made it feel weird that you have to quell it in order to survive, no matter how many times the rules repeated this.  I've opted to change the base 3 icons into a card that resembles your other cards much more, and have it titled your Antiquated infrastructure, the implication being that it is animating your engine, but it is also a burden that must be resolved.  Your setup card is now a postcard that describes your starting setup, this gives me a bit more freedom to stylize the back to give each player a bit more visual representation of what their starting home looks like.  This is placeholder video game asset art, but I like the idea behind them.

Non Playable Characters

Wait, did you read that sentence like I did?

I've taken this opportunity to stylize the cards as pieces of a map, as you're essentially exploring and claiming territory and expanding your control.

I've been reading Playing Oppression lately, and I was feeling a bit of discomfort over the fact that Bread still has you performing colonialist actions.  Very early concepts of the game were designed to imply that you were colonizing each other, but testing and iteration eventually evolved to the current state.  Honestly even back then the idea that you have land you control but just haven't fully explored was still colonialist in nature, but the point is that this is a thing the game has you doing.  Granted the game does not have infinite resources, and does force you to deal with the consequences of displacing people as you go claiming territory, and asks that you get what you need rather than the most to win. In those ways I feel like it opposes a lot of hierarchical ideas of how we navigate these systems.  However, you're still doing it.  I'm a bit too satisfied with how this game forces players to confront these ideas within a somewhat familiar framework, but I wanted to acknowledge this uncomfortable truth.

I had two spare cards when I was done, and I felt inspired to create a couple unusual setups as a consequence of some feedback from Matthew Hocker.  I added a base where you start with all your cards in your hand, and bread in your base to immediately quell your antiquated infrastructure called the Dweller's Home.  I added another setup where you start with nothing but unrest called the Evicted Nomads.  Rules as written, neither of these bases are intended to be played, they're for Non Playable Characters (NPC). In a page of the rules titled "DO NOT READ" is a brief manifesto from the NPCs to the players, and well me.  I also added one note to the rare victory condition where all unrest is quelled before the deck is consumed that describes how even the NPCs survive.

The game now directly asks the players not to think about the people or creatures they may be displacing or invading. My hope is that this bit of reverse psychology will motivate the players to instead think about them.  This doesn't absolve the game of these issues, and I hope the way the game tries to vocally ignore these implications makes that evident.