Tag Archives: Mr President

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GMT and Exia Labs Are Bringing Mr. President to the PC

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Why make a PC version of Mr. President? There are no titles in GMT’s catalog for which the answer is more obvious. Mr. President: The American Presidency 2000-2020 is Gene’s magnum opus, a wide-ranging, deeply researched labor of love. It models the enormous responsibilities the President must assume when he – or she! – takes the oath of office, and captures Gene’s regard for the presidency as an institution. It is also a monster game: a table hog with a laborious setup (especially for the scenarios, as opposed to the sandbox start) and a huge range of procedures and tables that give the player the tools to tackle the threats and take advantage of the opportunities that confront their very own Presidency.

So, when Jonathan Pan, co-founder and CEO of Exia Labs, approached me to gauge my interest in working with Exia on games about policy and strategy in the modern era, Mr. President came to mind as an ideal project: a chance for Exia to bring its top-tier game engineering talent to bear on a title that was ambitious but already design complete, and directly in line with both Jon’s personal interests and Exia’s strategy. And players excited to experience Gene’s remarkable roller coaster of military, diplomatic, economic, and legislative challenges – but without needing to occupy a large table for days on end, and with modern user-experience patterns to save time on rules lookup, table calculations, and procedure resolution – are in for a great ride.

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Mr. President Sandbox Scenario #2: A Clear and Present Danger

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This is the first in a series of alternate Sandbox Scenarios that offers you different possible world situations and settings that alter the focus and play experience for your Sandbox Scenario games of Mr. President.

In this scenario, we postulate the following: A situation in the mid 2010s that might have happened but, thankfully, didn’t.

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Video: Initial US Special Activations in Mr. President

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Hi everyone! I made this second video to take a look at the initial U.S. special activations phase in Mr. President. It should be helpful to you as you get your games over the coming weeks. Here’s a link to my first video discussing start of game strategy for anyone interested. I hope you all have a great time with Mr. President! – Gene

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Video: Start of Game Strategy in Mr. President

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Video: Start of Game Strategy in Mr. President

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Hi everyone! I made this video to take a look at initial strategies in Mr. President. It should be helpful to you as you get your games over the coming weeks. I hope you all have a great time with Mr. President! – Gene

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“Cat-Herder-in-Chief”: Playing the Mr. President 2017 Hard Scenario (Part 3)

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When last we left our intrepid President, he had spent most of his previous actions to set up what he believes and hopes will be “max odds on both upcoming wars.” And he may well have accomplished that – we’ll see. But the thing about Mr. President is that there always seems to be a new threat axis coming at you – and it can happen quickly. We’re starting the 2nd quarter of Rick’s presidency this time, with the 2nd Activation Phase of the turn, and the first half of the Activation Phase is weighted heavily toward the game opponents’ actions and Rick’s reactions. So we’ll see if or how much Rick’s threat analysis has to change and adapt by the end of the Activation Phase. – GB

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“Cat-Herder-in-Chief”: Playing the Mr. President 2017 Hard Scenario (Part 2)

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Gene: When last we left our intrepid cardboard President, Rick had just finished the first half of Activation Phase 1. Note that the Activation Phases are organized so that the first half (the left column) of each Activation Phase features more “game opponents” actions with some player reaction opportunities. The second half of each Activation Phase, which Rick is beginning now, gives the player more action opportunities, with a small reaction segment for the opponents. So Rick should have a good opportunity during the rest of this phase to plug holes created by the opponent’s actions and to grab the initiative and began to work his plan. We’ll start with his Ally Actions, which can be very useful if you’ve kept your Ally Relationships strong.

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“Cat-Herder-in-Chief”: Playing the Mr. President 2017 Hard Scenario (Part 1)

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By way of introduction, Rick is simply one of the best playtesters I’ve ever known. His enthusiasm for and contributions to the development of Mr. President have been numerous (usually because he was using and abusing the game system in ways that I had not anticipated – which is one thing great testers do). Many, MANY times during the development process, Rick has sent me an AAR with notes about how “easy” it was to win – and Rick REALLY likes to win. That usually ticked me off! ? But he chronicled his games in such great detail and provided me with the “whys” behind what he was doing that it made it very easy for me to compare his approach to what I believed was “real-world-plausible” and “game-legal” and then make the design better (and more challenging) based on his reports. I have received many subsequent emails from Rick – usually after I nuked or modified his favorite way to abuse a rule or Action – that referred to me as “The Evil Game Designer™” (and occasionally questioned my parentage!). As you might glean from that, Rick is a lot of fun to play (or test) games with. At our yearly playtest sessions at Consimworld Expo in Tempe, Rick provided much hilarity over his play-by-play “what I’m thinking as President right now” announcing of his test games.

Our whole team has been incredibly blessed because Rick has been a part of us. Below, you have a recent AAR that Rick wrote, to help give potential players a sense of how the game flows. He has asked me to insert comments on his play throughout. So, I guess this is my chance to get some payback! ? My comments will be in italics below. Enjoy Rick’s article! – Gene

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Pragmatism, Tension, and the Power of Cooperation in Mr. President

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I’ve gone to some lengths to try to keep Mr. President from reflecting a partisan point of view, as I have no interest in being part of any game that would further the deep divisions we already have in this country around party loyalties, personalities, and platforms. What I have tried to do is present you, the new President in game terms, with the reality that you have both a party affiliation and an opposing party to deal with. My problem-solving methods usually lean toward the pragmatic, so I tried to take the same approach with a game about the President, sometimes called the “Problem Solver in Chief.”

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Domestic Tranquility (or not!) in Mr. President

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I’ve had several requests of late for more information about the domestic side of Mr. President. In the recent replay articles I’ve shared, we downplayed the domestic choices and events because, frankly, that piece of the redesign wasn’t quite finished yet. Now I have all the main domestic redesign pieces in place, so I wanted to give you guys a look at what they are and how they work together. I hope this peek under the hood gives you a sense of the domestic opportunities and challenges you’ll find in the game, and introduces you to some of the tools you’ll have at your disposal to become an amazing President – loved by at least 51% of the people! I hope you enjoy the article! – Gene