THUGOPOLY
A Gang-Affiliated twist on Monopoly™
Table of Contents:
Team Credits:
Chris Gascoyne
Travis Nugent
Justin Snell
Michael Rivera
Chris Tillis
MDA Analysis of unmodified game. (Monopoly)
The mechanics of Monopoly center around movement on the game board and using money in various ways. Players have game pieces that represent them that they take turns moving around the board based on the rolling two dice. The game board is covered in spaces, mostly property spaces that players can buy with money they can earn. Money is used to buy property, pay rent, or paid as a penalty. Money can be collected by passing the GO! Space on the board or buy collecting it from other players. Property spaces are grouped together and go up in value the further along the game board they are. Houses and hotels can be purchased from the bank to upgrade properties that a player owns, which increases the amount of rent other players pay upon landing on the property.
During gameplay, the game progresses by all players moving around the board and interacting with the spaces each turn. Spaces can have a positive outcome, like being able to buy an unpurchased property, a negative outcome, like going to jail or paying rent, or an unknown outcome, like drawing a card that can give the player various results. Which spaces are positive and negative will change as the game goes on, as properties are bought and upgraded by the various players.
The goal of Monopoly is to force all of the other players to go bankrupt by running out of money. This creates an aesthetic where players are scrambling to build up the properties they own and create monopolies on them before the other players have a chance to. The intention of the game’s creator was to give players and understanding of how exploitative monopolies and certain economic systems. This means the intended aesthetic may not be entirely positive. Feelings of frustration or unfairness are part of the intended experience. To win, players are forced to think in the long term and try to maximize the amount of money they can take from the other players. The random elements in the game cause the players to stay engaged with the moment to moment gameplay, as any role of the dice could result in a reward or a sudden loss. Players can feel frustrated when losing money to other players but conversely, take satisfaction in gaining money. This push and pull keeps players engaged and puts them at odds with the other players. The only way that players directly interact with each other is through auctions. Most of the conflict between players is indirect.
Video explanation of Monopoly by Triple S Games
Evaluation of Modifications
To create a new aesthetic, the role of the players is changed from prospective property owners trying to amass land to drain the wealth of other players to criminals using money to directly attack their opponents in an attempt to defeat them. This can be implemented in Monopoly by changing the roles of the board spaces and player pieces. The board spaces can directly give money to the players when landed on and then those players can use that money to buy upgrades to protect themselves or offensive options to attack other players. Also, the option is added for players to directly attack one another if they land on the same space. This changes Monopoly from a game that is won by waiting for the other players to lose influence and fade away to a game that is won through decisive attacks and liberal spending of money. In this version of Monopoly, hoarding money isn’t a worthwhile strategy, as the only way to progress is to spend money on upgrades and attacks. Players will feel like they have much more influence on the state of the game and feel like they are more directly responsible for their victory or defeat. It’s a lot more engaging to be constantly fending off attacks from other players and retaliating in turn. Players are not rewarded for their patience, but instead for their aggression and strategy.
Rules of Modified Game (Thugopoly)
Video explanation of How to Play "Thugopoly"