Disregard the absurd AI cover – I’m playing with styles and getting this site and these blogs off the ground, and she needs some colour, if you don’t like that, deal with it.

Okay, now to think back on what the process was. I didn’t have any structure or plan to be frank, it was just a creative idea I wanted to play with and see what happened.

The disadvantage of starting this blog late and trying to recite and write about it months later, also means my damaged brain will not accurately remember the specifics – so stay with me, I’ll piece together what I can. You just enjoy the ride. Or don’t. I’m not your real dad. (Well, maybe)

I want to say the first thing I thought on, was the building, which meant the board, the tiles, and the building functionality – or at least concepts for it. Look, if it wasn’t that, it is now. History is written by the victors MFers.

To allow for dynamic movement around the board, I decided my tiles would be hexagonal in shape. This way each piece has six directional options for players to move, and the tiles will craft together neatly in a honeycomb manner – visually and structurally appealing! It makes for good overlap of neighbouring tiles and eliminates any confusion of diagonal movements on square tiles.

Being the creative that I am, I knew that to make this game as good as it could be, it meant crafting the experience in a way that was true to the concept. Building and climbing a mountain. Now, none of us mere mortals have built a mountain – A REAL ONE! – so that’s conceptual, but even still, there elements to it. Climbing a mountain however, is something humans HAVE done. Even me. Not Everest or anything, but alas a mountain. When people climb big mountains, they advance through the elements of nature. There’s that word again. Elements. As they get higher, the nature of the mountain changes, so too does the challenge.

Then the idea of terrain tiles was solidified. For every advancing level of the mountain, the terrain would change, and so too would the risk profile – but that part comes later (she’s a fun one methinks). So, I crafted 5 levels from bottom to top as dirt, grass, rock, snow and ice. To mimic that of a mountain. Pure genius, I know.

This gives the mountain we’re building on our living room tables, or wherever you play, somewhat of a comparable visual accuracy to a real mountain – sort of. It helps players identify their place on the mountain, and thus how close they are to victory or demise. I can also scale the cost of building each of the terrain types so the challenge grows over time.

There’s a cost? But what is it? And how do I manage the risk profile? Well, more on worship and Mother Nature in another entry!