BoRT: Jan '09 - Uzumaki the Board Game

I figure that the new year would be a good time for me to join in on the fantastic Blogs of the Round Table series over at Man Bytes Blog.

This month, we're Putting the Game Before the book.  The question is asked, "What would your favorite piece of literature look like if it had been created as a game first?"  

Initially I considered Raptor Red, as it's one of my favorite books.  That, however, would essentially be a Sim along the lines of Lion or Wolf.  Passing over The Giver, I began thinking of Poe.  For a time I was desigining something for The Black Cat - a maddening, Noir-esque piece where you control a hulking madman with an axe as he destroys his house hunting down his taunting pet.

I at long last settled on Uzumaki.  It's a manga by Junji Ito, set very firmly in the horror genre.  In english, the title translates to "spiral."  This may not seem very scary at first, but Uzumaki is a fiction powered by monomania.  Spirals are taken to the extreme and become instruments of insanity.  Snail shells, fingerprints, suspension springs, hurricanes - anything is fair game.  Once the insanity strikes, death is generally not far behind.  

Ultimately, like a maelstrom, there is a point of no return, where you can no longer escape from your doom.  The curse is just too strong to flee.  I don't know about you, but Inescapible Doom is a powerfully disturbing theme to me.

(Read it top right to bottom left!)

SPOLERS BEYOND THIS POINT:

I felt that the best way to continue the spiral-madness was to make the town, and its events, into a board game.  The track of play would become a spiral, ultimately turning into the swirling longhouse that appears later in the story.  In the center of town would be the pond, which the players are attempting to get their characters to, first.  

Why would players actively be trying to get themselves to their destiny first?  No, it isn't the Cthulhu Cult mentality of 'getting it over with first.'  Instead, the player is actually the Spiral-Cave itself.  The board, on the other hand, represents the characters' desire to escape their destruction.  In other words, spaces on the gameboard will push characters away from the middle, while the player's actions will drive them towards it.

I imagine a derivative of Chutes and Ladders for automatic gameboard mechanics.  Switching places with another gamepiece, or otherwise moving your opponants around would also be present. 

Now, time for the monomania.  In the center of the board, inside the pond, is a dial-and-arrow players can flick to select directional effects.  Instead of dice, dradles will suffice.  Circular event-cards, with a spiral backing, would be an obvious choice for events.   My co-worker suggested a Tornado Rex-style top, that can threaten to knock pieces down at certain spots as it parades around a spiral-track; it's a delightful idea due to the twister-causing troublemakers that show up later on in the story.  I'm just not sure if I can have that 'track' built onto the board, and have the board roll-up when you're done playing - to get spirals on either end.

I think the point has been drilled home, though.  This board game of troubling events attempts to affect the players the same way the story does: make you obsess over spirals.  Personally, I will always remember the horrors of Uzumaki - especially when I have a visual cue that's so subtley prevelant in our lives.