Weirdness Reigns in Organic Games

Blogging from cafe Shaika the other day, my curiosity was piqued by three guys at a nearby table who were crowded around a stack of handwritten cards, a pair of die, a pile of markers and an eclectic bunch of figurines. Intrigued by this lively mess, I interrupted their session to ask what was going on, and ended up meeting Sam Fraser, founder of Organic Games, who explained that they were in the process of working out the kinks in a newly-developed card game.

In a moment of illumination, I realized that I was in the presence of an Independent Game Developer. We quickly exchanged contact info and a week later I found myself at the same messy table with Sam and Brux, immersed in a game called Thief. What makes Thief cool and unique is that throughout the game we got to define new locations, characters and objectives, all within a fictional city, and to respond to each new element in whatever creative way we could concoct. New developments are incorporated permanently into the deck, making the game of Thief more complex (and more wacky) with every round.

“I call my games Organic Games because there’s always an element of creative input…I like the weirdness that results,” Sam says.

Weirdness? How about a character called Carl the Constipated Hot-Air-Balloon driver, who hangs out at Jim’s Scientology Hut? Yet - so long as players are more-or-less cooperative - there is a certain down-to-earth coherence about other parts of the game. For instance, during the round we played, we developed a stipulate whereby all new city developments required approval from town council (this being a reflection of my own nerdy passion for urban planning).

A self-proclaimed nerd, Sam has tried a whole variety of role-playing games but none of them really hooked him. He says that found their rules too rigid, or was frustrated that the only way to win was to shell out tons of cash for rare, powerful cards. He plans to change that scene Thief and other Organic Games, but he has found that developing a game with rules this flexible requires plenty of workshopping.

If you want to make your mark on the future of gaming, Sam is still looking for volunteers to test out his wares, and is incorporating solid creative ideas into the framework of Thief. If you want to try it out, drop him a line at sam @ organicgames.net

Photo by Brooks Yardley, who incidentally also won the round of Thief last Sunday.