YORKTON - When it comes to board games simplicity is rarely a bad premise to start with when designing a game.
Certainly, you can add depth to things adding layers of rules, but it’s also easy to tip the game into the realm of being more complicated than play suggests it’s worth.
Conversely of course keep things too simple and you end up with Xs and Os 2.0, and that doesn’t attract a crowd of players either.
And so we come to Slidestone from designers Joshua Snead and Jonathan Snead.
The game is a 2022 release that is a pure abstract strategy offering which of course in a game ‘genre’ that always draws my personal attention – less so for fellow ‘Guilders’ though.
What the Snead brothers have created is a game where each player has six pieces which – yes you guessed it – slide over the board.
On a turn you slide a stone in a single direction as far as possible until it reaches the edge of the board, or another stone – there are no captures.
You win if you get one of your pieces to stop in the centre of the board.
It’s really super simple, but not without its inherent depth and the charm that comes with a ruleset so easily grasped.
The game plays smoothly, but at times there seems a bit of a lack drama with individual moves. You are waiting for a build up of stones that allow you to come up to that pile and be on the center space for a win. It’s a bit of a dance in a sense, but it can feel sluggish especially early on when moves don’t feel as though they are accomplishing a lot.
On a very positive side the board is great, a sort of ‘stone material’ with rules right on board. The hefty weight is nice, although I imagine shipping is a bear.
So a bit about the game from the brothers Snead who live in North Carolina.
“We are both artists: I am a professional jeweler and metalsmith, and Jonathan is a music composer and multi-instrumentalist,” said Joshua Snead.
As brothers they have played games together since childhood.
“We've been playing games together since childhood and together have quite a collection of games modern and old,” said Joshua Snead. “We played Clue a lot as kids but our fascination with the board game world began with Carcassonne, which is still a favorite of ours.
“My personal favourite game of all time is Go because of its simplicity of design yet depth of play.
“Many of our favourite games are abstracts such as Go, Hive, Abalone, Looney Pyramids, etc., but we enjoy all kinds of games.”
When you review the Snead’s favourite games it was rather obvious Slidestone would be an abstract strategy game.
“The core mechanic of Slidestone was inspired by a Legend of Zelda video game puzzle where you slide blocks across frictionless, icy floors,” explained Joshua Snead. “We decided to try it out on a 9x9 Go board and it was surprisingly fun. We played around with the number of stones (although the original was six each) and starting positions, then the idea occurred to me that a hex board would add more movement possibilities and make the game more unique.
“I played around with a few shapes before settling on the current design. Last year I acquired a laser engraver for my jewelry shop and found out I could engrave tile which led to the unique material selection for the board.
“We wanted to create a game that was both accessible and enjoyable for both gamers and non-gamers, young and old.
“One of the features we love about the best abstract games is how simple, intuitive systems can create deep, challenging emergent gameplay. We realized early on that Slidestone's core mechanics had the potential for this kind of elegance, so a lot of our design choices centered on keeping the game as easy to learn as possible while providing a lot of strategic depth.
“It's not a replacement for Chess but it's no Tic Tac Toe either.”
The latter statement is about as accurate as one can get regarding Slidestone.
So from the designer’s perspective what can players expect here?
“Slidestone is about as minimal a game as there is, which makes it incredibly intuitive and simple to learn, fast-paced -- most games take less than 15 minutes -- and yet it still provides a deep strategic challenge,” offered Joshua Snead. “It's the perfect game to play during a quick break, or to spend an afternoon trying out new tactics to outwit your friends.”
It is most certainly a coffee shop game that could simply be on a few tables for those looking for a quick game diversion over a java with a friend.
Jonathon Snead note his “favourite element of the game is baiting my opponent into traps that lead to a surprise victory. This is caused by the interaction of two design elements: first, the hexagonal grid provides many potential paths to victory, promoting complex, aggressive tactics; second, the limited number and movement of the pieces means that you almost always need to rely on some of your opponent's pieces to pull off your strategy.”
Joshua added “as a craftsman I appreciate simplicity in design, so I would say that is my favourite aspect. A lot of game designers claim their game is simple, but we really mean it!
“Because of this simplicity players can easily learn to read multiple moves ahead which leads to that fun moment where you say, ‘I can win in ‘X’ number of moves, can you stop me?’
“I like complex games too but for those times I need a game to just whip out and play, Slidestone is the way.”
