The biggest problem with cooperative game design is the issue of the controlling player — or if you prefer, the alpha player. It’s such a big problem that some players won’t play co-ops because of bad past experiences with controlling players. Meeples Together, my upcoming book on cooperative game design, offers eight game-design solutions to this problem: play patterns that designers can include in games to deflate or deemphasize alphas.
However, there’s a flip side to this. Few co-op designers with perfectly resolve the controlling-player problem, and some with accept it as the price of creating the sort of game that interests them. In fact, some of my favorite co-ops like Pandemic (2008) and The Dresden Files Cooperative Card Games (2017) have styles of play where alpha players can rise to power. And I know, because I’m one of them. When I play these games I end up fighting not just against the challenges of the game system, but also about my own urges to tell everyone else what to do.
And fighting is the perfect word, because I believe that if you’re a cooperative gamer who suffers from alphaplayeritis, it’s your duty to make the game more enjoyable for everyone else by avoiding controlling the game as much as possible.
Here’s how you do so in 10 easy steps. (And if you’re not an controlling player, this really doesn’t apply to you!) Continue reading