Royal Game of Ur Essay

The Royal Game of Ur – Evolution through Iteration

By Dominic Noble

This essay talks about an ancient board game, ‘The Royal Game of Ur’. I will focus on the game’s history, as well as the mechanics of the game to form a base understanding of how it works. I will also discuss some possible iteration to the game which I have implemented either for better or for worse.

 The Royal Game of Ur (also known as the Game of Twenty Squares) is one of the earliest board games discovered in recent history. The boards were discovered in the 1920s by Leonard Woolley in the Royal Cemetery at Ur during an excavation into the Royal Tombs of Ur, and date back to between 2600-2400 BC (Becker, 2008: p.1).  Though the wood decayed a lot, red limestone and lapis lazuli survived in their original positions so that the shape could still be restored. (BBC, n.d) This board wasn’t the only one discovered in this period, but it’s still the oldest version of it. The game is said to be, at one point in time, used as a tool to predict the future. (‘Dundy O’, 2011)

(royal_game_of_ur, n.d.)

Later a clay tablet was found, which dates back to 177BC, holding the rules of the game; this tablet is the oldest set of rules in the world. I was made using earth and water, inscribed whilst wet then sun-baked to preserve the markings (Kayne, 2003). Irving Finkel is the curator in charge of translating ancient inscriptions on tablets from Mesopatamia at the British Museum. He was the man who translated the Royal Game of Ur rules from an ancient clay tablet in the 80s, and these rules were fairly vague (British Museum, n.d). Since forming a foundation of the rules there have been many different interpretations of them from different historians such as H.J.R. Murray and RC Bell.

The game has been through a though different versions over the years, but I feel that it's important to grasp an understanding on the original rules and mechanics before making any iterations. Though one single set of rules can’t be guaranteed from the translation, I feel that out of all of the alternate rules, Bell's gameplay ideas are the most logical, so I will be using them for my iterations. These rules can be found in Appendix A [on page 8].

Whilst play-testing the original version of the game, I used a tactic in which I worked on moving one of my pieces at a time, hoping that by doing them individually, they stood more chance of reaching the end than if I pushed them all forwards in a group. Unfortunately this wasn't the case, as every time I left my 'safe area', my opponent destroyed my piece instantly; this was because they had moved all of their pieces out at once into their safe area, meaning if they rolled anything between 1 and 4, they could take my lone piece. On the second play-through we both attempted their original tactic and ended up spending 30 minutes with next to no movement on the board, eventually we gave up.

I then tried the later version of the board which was popular during the early part of the second century BC; this version had a different layout, the six squares at the end, on the 2x3 body, were straightened out and added to the combat area, meaning players spent more time in combat. The pieces were also limited to 5 for each player instead of 7 (Finkel, 2008: p.27). Whilst playing it, I found myself getting frustrated by the longer combat area; although it meant more fighting went on, it also felt as if my pieces were never safe and that there was nothing I could do about it.

For my iterations I decided to start with the first variant of the game as I preferred it, but I still felt it was lacking something, and I decided that through iteration I would attempt to improve it. I made a total of 7 iterations to the board game, but there are three problems that I felt are the most important when it comes to improving this game.

The first problem for me is that the game doesn't bring many emotional reactions out of players as it is, or in other words, it's dull. For a game to be made more interesting for both players, it should bring out anger, happiness, satisfaction, or a vast range of emotions. Using the MDA framework makes it a lot easier to achieve these results. We start by deciding what emotion we want the player to feel (aesthetics), we then determine how the board interacts with the player to achieve this response (dynamics), and finally what components we, as game designers, need to add to create them (mechanics). (Hunicke, 2004: p.2)

I felt that it was lacking tension; there weren’t any big build-up events that the player feels anxious about. This is the aesthetic I want the player to experience, so I first had to think about the dynamics and how they create tension. There are a few ways, but I felt the best way for this game would be to create an element of risk; the players are always at risk of having their pieces taken away, but I wanted to add a precise moment of risk which would lead to an ultimatum of emotion. Finally, what mechanics would create risk? Near the start of the board, where a player enters the 'combat zone' in the middle of the board, the first square has been changed into a 'trespassing square', where if the player lands on it, must branch off from the usual route and travel through the enemy's spawn area. I also added one at the other end of the board, where the players branch off to leave; they must then loop around into the middle again (see diagram below). This means that they have to take a longer route through dangerous grounds, as the enemy stands a much higher chance of being able to take their piece.

After testing this iteration I found it worked very well, as whenever I landed on the trespassing square, I felt very anxious and worried for the safety of my piece. I also discovered that it granted me a great opportunity to attack my opponents (previously) safe pieces in their spawn area. In the end I received some unexpected, positive feedback from the game; although going through the enemy territory risked my piece and caused tension on my part, it rewarded me by letting me take my enemies own pieces, causing tension on their part.

The second problem is the lack of player control over the game’s outcome. Though the player rolls the dice to move their individual pieces, this still feels like a very chance-orientated game. To make it more fun, I feel that it's essential to create a good balance between luck and skill; this certainly isn't an easy feat, but if done correctly, it can make a game a lot more attractive to players. By giving players more and more decisions it makes the game more immersive, but right now the players have a very limited set of options (they can choose which piece to move). I need to be careful though, as adding too much skill may eliminate the element of chance, and this would really make the target audience a lot more narrow (meaning children wouldn't be able to win as easily) as well as make the game too predictable (Braithwaite & Schreiber, 2008: p.70).

From looking at the regular variant of the Royal Game of Ur, it's clear to see that the current skill comes from choosing when and where to move each piece, as well as tactics such as 'camping' on the rosette squares then waiting for the opponent to pass over them. To add a greater level of skill to the game, I felt it would be best to enhance the already-existing skill elements of the game; by doing this I would still improve the skill of the original game, whilst leaving the current style and appearance of it alone; after all, it's survived all of these years for a reason. My iteration was to add the ability to move backwards whilst on a rosette square. For instance, if the player's piece is on a rosette square and an enemy piece is two squares behind, they can then roll a two and take it. After that move, however, they must then start going forwards again.

After testing this iteration I found that it also worked very well. There were multiple occasions when, after landing on a rosette square, I was able to take my opponents piece from behind me. Unfortunately it also worked vice-versa, and I found myself frustrating at my opponent using the same tactic. Whilst playing, I actively decided to keep one of my pieces on the first rosette square throughout the whole game just in case of such an opportunity; this shows that I successfully enhanced skill in the game.

My third problem is the speed and tempo of play. The 'tempo' of a game is the intensity of play, it's the time taken between each significant decision made by the player. A high tempo means the player is taking a long time on each decision, whereas a lower tempo represents more frantic decision-making (Venturelli, 2009). Because there are so few options in this game the tempo is far too low, yet somehow it takes a very long time to complete a single game; why is this? It's because there is too much opportunity for a players pieces to 'die' and forcing them to start again, this means that as soon as a player gets anywhere in the game, they stand a high chance of losing all of their progress.

I tried a lot of iterations when it came to this point, some of them worked, some of them didn't. I attempted to shorten the combat area of the board in the middle even more to give less room to move, but this ended up limiting the rosette squares and meaning there was less time spent in the combat area. In the end I came across an idea that worked.

I decided to shorten each player's spawn area to two squares instead of four, meaning they have less time in the safe zone (See diagram below). This worked well whilst testing it and although it shortened the play time a little, it didn't quite shorten it enough. This iteration certainly improves the gameplay, but it doesn't make a huge difference, so it's not very effective. However, I also found that it added a greater element of risk, as it meant the players were forced to move out of the safe zone sooner than before, building up anxious feelings in the players even more-so.

In conclusion, I found that although the Royal Game of Ur has gone through centuries of studying and iterations, with vast amounts of people playing it in different cultures, there was still room for improvement to the gameplay. I feel that my alterations have left it as a better game, modernising it using knowledge from the last few decades, and enhancing elements which were already existing. One thing I didn't want to do was to change the game so much that it's unrecognisable from the original masterpiece, and I feel that I have achieved this goal.

APPENDIX A

The Royal Game of Ur is played with two players, each player starting with 7 pieces. The overall aim is for each player to move all of their pieces from the start of the board to the end of it,  using 4 tetrahedral dice with marks on two tips (this makes them into binary dice) to decide movement. Players take it in turns to roll, moving a single piece at a time (they can get a number between 0 and 4). They enter via their dedicated 'spawn point', there is one on either side of the board for each player, then follow it into the middle and down to the other end of the board, where they branch off to their side of the board to exit (see diagram below). When a player lands on top of an enemy’s piece, the enemy has to take that 'taken' piece off the board to start again with it. There are 5 special pieces on the board, they're called rosette squares. By landing on one of them, the player gets another roll, and the piece that's resting on said square becomes immune to death until moved along (Bell, 1979).

Bibliography

. BBC, n.d. World History: Royal Game of Ur, [online] Available at: <http://bbc.in/uCYHWp> [Accessed 6^th December 2011].

. BBC, royal_game_of_ur n.d. [image online] Available at: < http://bbc.in/uCYHWp > [Accessed 12^th December 2011].

. Becker, A. 2008. “The Royal Game of Ur” in Finkel, ed. pp. 11-15.

. Bell, R. C., 1979 Board and Table Games from Many Civilizations. Revised edition. pp. 23-25. 

. Braithwaite, B. & Schreiber, I., 2008. Challenges For Games Designers Charles River Media (chap 5 & 6).

. The British Museum, n.d. Irving Finkel [Online] Available at: [Accessed 7^th <http://bit.ly/v0vZGf> [Accessed 6^th December 2011].

. Dundy, O., 2011. Ur…I Demand That You Bury Me With My Game! Pt. 2, [online] Available at: <http://bit.ly/sKjtwC> [Accessed 6^th December 2011].

. Finkel, I. L., 2008. “On the Rules for The Royal Game of Ur” in Finkel, ed. pp. 16-32.

. Hunicke, R., 2004. MDA: A Formal Approach to Game Design and Game Research pp.1-4.

. Kayne, R., 2003. “WiseGeek: What are the Clay Tablets of Mesopotania?” [Online] Available at: http://bit.ly/vf7Dkf [Accessed 6^th December 2011].

. Murray, H. J. R. 1952 A History of Board Games Other Than Chess. pp. 19-23. 

. Venturelli, M., 2009. Space of Possibility and Pacing in Casual Game Design – A PopCap Case Study pp. 2-4.

All other images in this essay, namely diagrams, were made by me.