Oh gosh, I used to do stuff like this as a kid. I only needed a piece of paper and pencil though, no other tools. I would draw an adventure puzzle like this, but the big thing was it used BOTH sides of the paper. When you went through a door, you went to the other side of the paper (you'd have to bend the paper around your finger a little bit to estimate where the door led to).<p>Also, there were many locks and keys and items (think Zelda). A door might have a strange symbol on it, and you needed to find the key with the corresponding symbol to advance. Or you needed to get the lava suit to get past the pit of lava.<p>This is what I did during class in elementary school, and challenged my friends and brother to beat them. Now that I'm 26, I still do the same thing, but with computers and in 3D.
These days not being able to sit still is considered a medical problem, when the truth is that it's just boys being boys. In fact, probably those who are bored more easily are engaged at the difficult to solve problems and games. When I was a kid, I was told my attention span was short and that I had ADD, but in truth it was that I was bored. Given a difficult programming problem, for example, such as learning Win32 for example, I could spend hours working on it because it became a puzzle. Kids that think creatively are probably easily bored by conventional attention getters. They like solving problems.
Whoa, this is hell cool! It make me miss the fun I had with my uncle...<p>My uncle loved to spend LOTS of time drawing stuff like this and making games similar to this one (although less RPGey and more puzzley)<p>Sometimes he did it with whatever paint software was available on the machine.<p>I never understood why instead of becoming a artist (he draw really well) or a game designer (he loved to design games) he went to become a prosecutor...<p>Also, another fun variation my uncle taught me: make your maps with matches, and use paper balls as characters (or coins, or beans, whatever), with matches you can simulate doors, opening and closing them, and have a more freeform roleplay thing, like simulate for example a space ship, and then a accident, as a asteroid hit the ship, and you then throw a heavy coin in your matches and see as they make a hole on the thing, and then the players try to survive in the ship full of holes, broken walls and stuck doors.<p>By the way, my uncle is still alive, is that we don't have time anymore :/ (also living 600km apart does not help either)
As a dad Of 5 years old boy all I can say is thank you. He loves playing lego with me, and video games too.<p>A friend of mine with two boys close to mine did this for his kids: He would go one day earlier to some close hike trail or peak, and would put some coins in the ground, different places, etc. The next day he would go with the boys with a pirate map looking for the treasure.<p>Boys (and could be girls too) love these things. My son for example can get completely concentrated when comes to fishing (even if it's with some made up rod, and fake stuff in there). Last time we went to lake Casitas (California). He was hooked (unlike for him) for an hour doing his fishing.
Just to add, you can do this in an even simpler form and cater it toward your child's age. For example, instead of drawing a detailed maze like that, you can build a dungeon with blocks. It doesn't have to be big. Put some toys inside it to represent monsters, treasure, traps, etc. If your kids are 2-4, you can even skip the dice too. Put a puzzle of some sort before the final boss, like you have to play a series of tones on a toy flute to unlock the door, or pick a colored key, or say a magic word ("please"), etc. For child-friendly play, the monsters can be scary at first and then become your friend. Everyone can live happily ever after at the end (spiders and monsters too).
Another way to do "fog of war" is to imitate Warhammer Quest / Hero Quest where floor tiles are placed on the table. Might be a bit much for a 5 y/o given the articles points about the greatness of magnets.
I love the creativity in this, it's just wonderful. Any chance of slightly more detail about the rules? Are chests populated with treasure when you design the map or is it generated randomly during an encounter? Is there a 'goal' or is it a just explore-neverending story type game?
As a child, I would draw similar maps with monsters and artifacts using MacDraw Pro. I'd draw black layers to simulate fog of war and delete as play progressed. My friend and I would take turns creating maps.<p>It was loads of fun. If something like this gets kickstarted as others have suggested, I'd recommend a kid-friendly way to build maps. Creation can be more fun than playing and also gives kids a different set of problems to explore.
This is really cool! My 5yo loves to draw games on paper. I let him play on the iPad almost as much as he wants, but often he prefers to draw the games, expand on them, and create his own. We make mazes for each other, and he creates levels for me to figure out.<p>I go down to our local newspaper, and buy newspaper end rolls for $1 each. These are the rolls of paper left over after printing. They are about two feet wide and probably 100 feet long.<p>Just today, I found a game for the iPad that lets him create his own platformers. He's excited to try it out tomorrow. It's called "My Doodle Game" <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/my-doodle-game!/id572842495?mt=8" rel="nofollow">https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/my-doodle-game!/id572842495?...</a><p>PixelPress also looks promising: <a href="http://pixelpressgame.com/" rel="nofollow">http://pixelpressgame.com/</a><p>If anyone knows of other easy game dev tools for kids, I'd love to hear about them. I think it's good to keep the momentum going when he's having fun with something.
This is great! A few years ago, I did something similar for my son and 3 of the neighbor kids. It was a very minimalized D&D type of game where they each picked from a stack of predefined player charts, then played a simple but thrilling campaign to rescue the kidnapped king. There were a few routes they could take, each with different hints and warnings from villagers along the way. In the end, 4 boys from ages 4-7 sat at the table, engrossed and attentive, for over 3 hours. They've since made their own maps and stories, though I think the making has been more fun for them than actually playing.<p>I love this approach, though, as it is almost something a kid could play by themselves or more easily create for one another and play together. It could even be played in the car on trips, reducing whining about playing with the ipad. (I didn't have ipads when I was your age!!)
This game reminds me of another drawing game: "How To Host A Dungeon". More info and instructions are here:<p><a href="http://planet-thirteen.com/Dungeon.aspx" rel="nofollow">http://planet-thirteen.com/Dungeon.aspx</a><p>"How to Host a Dungeon is a solo fantasy pen-and-paper dungeon-building game. The game follows the progress of an imaginary dungeon from the dawn of time through to an arch villain attempting to conquer the world.<p>The creation of the dungeon is driven by random tables and procedures as monsters, adventurers, civilizations, and arch villains interact in an underground environment. The player records these interactions, maintains the dungeon map, and makes some choices in how they play out.<p>The end product of the game is a complete unique dungeon map and history which stands as an interesting artifact on its own or can be used as the basis of a dungeon crawl role-playing game campaign."
This looks super-cool. I kinda wish I was a dad to have a chance to play with my son (he's going to be born in October, so there's hope, and I should start preparing).<p>However, I must be totally stupid, but I don't get the rules, even after reading them twice, and looking through all comments on the post and on HN. I get the movements turn-by-turn. But how do you decide the outcome of encountering a ghost/spider/arrow with the dice? how do potions work? what's in the treasure chests? which other items can be collected? (in short, what am I missing?)
Oh man, I did something like this years ago, but for teenagers. It's super fun to make them. Just think maze + dice and you can come up with some cool stuff.