by The rwinder

Introduction and Goals

Hello, everyone. About six months back, I proposed my first attempt at arriving at a modest rigor in assessing a question that continues to ignite my neurons. Namely:

:star: “What even is a make-as-you-play game?”

With about half a year of rethinking behind me, I have an update to the concept that I wanted to float, and while it is more finicky than my original effort, I think it does a better job at capturing my goals with such a scoring. Is it perfect? No. I think perfection is impossible, but despite how assertive and snarky I am below, please believe that I am coming from a good faith effort of trying to do this marred only by my own frustration with myself at how difficult it has been to get this far.

So, my goals, you ask?

Goal 1: The score should express the initial principles set out when I first expressed “Make-as-You-Play”

As a reminder, those principles, which you can still find stamped here and there online as the essential elements of make-as-you-play are:

:star: You start with some rules and minimal materials, where these materials can either be purchased cheaply or taken from a wide variety of other games
:star: You make almost all the content yourself staying within the bounds of the rules
:star: You use your imagination to supplement these rules—either in writing stories or naming content
:star: You can continue to play each new game in a campaign using ALL the content from the previous games you played, so the game continues to grow indefinitely

Now some of these elements are more essential than others. I think you can lose a few and a given game would still count as make-as-you-play. Below I’ll get across which ones I think, for now, are must haves and which are optional.

Goal 2: Any value of an overall score greater than 0 on the score gets a game “make-as-you-play” status

This is the problem with the original score I used: M(ISC). I am not going to restate all of M(ISC) here, other than to say although elements of it live on in the new score I’ll propose, the compromise I made originally was that you had to get a M(ISC) of ~20 or higher to get “make-as-you-play” status. Awkward, I know…

Goal 3: It should account for the genres out there that are kinda make-as-you-play but really should be treated differently.

And it is with Goal 3 that I will spend the most time explaining myself as a lead-in to the new approach and the new score.

Sparing the Innocent through Exclusion

Before I launch into the list of similar genres that are not guaranteed to be make-as-you-play, let me remark that this is not an attempt to state that make-as-you-play games are better than them. On the contrary, I am taking this view at the outset to attempt to exclude certain genres because I believe firmly that the people who like those genres are NOT looking for make-as-you-play games… usually. I see no value in branding many games with the make-as-you-play label when they already have a brand of their own working for them.

Nevertheless, as we go down the list, the distinctions between the exclusions and make-as-you-play get weaker, but they do inform how I think of scoring.

Exclusion No. 1: Legacy Games

It’s not the oldest legacy game, [1] but Rob Daviau’s Risk Legacy and its many descendants are some of the most popular games of all time, some of which (like Pandemic Legacy) have been the #1 game on BGG for a time. While I have waited for Deep Future and my other games to get their place at #1 too, it’s looking like it might never happen!

Why is that? Ugh, do I have to explain? OK, fine… well, I hope you’ll forgive me invoking Return of the Jedi out of left field, but here goes… You might be aware that David Lynch was considered to direct the third Star Wars film and (while I have never been “invited” to design a professional legacy game), I still think his quote about meeting George Lucas about this possibility is an amusing analogy. In the relevant part of David Lynch’s own words on the subject:

“… I always admired George. George is a guy who does what he loves. And I do what I love. The difference is, what George loves makes hundreds of billions of dollars.”

If we cast the board game professionals (designers and publishers) as a whole as “George Lucas” and myself as “David Lynch” then this best gets across something of the difference between two different artifacts both created out of love, the legacy games on one side and the make-as-you-play stuff on the other. One is invariably going to attract more players than the other. And that’s right, I also get to be David Lynch in my analogy.

Exclusion No. 2: Print-and-play one sheets

While there’s a huge scope of print-and-play, as wide as the scope of board games itself since the term basically means “I made this myself at home and I can choose how crazy I want to get with it,” there are the games that all seem kind of like make-as-you-play games at least when looked at sidelong. I am thinking of games like Utopia Engine or 1572: The Lost Expedition, black-and-white one-sheets that are easy to print out. You definitely mark up these sheets and in some cases draw on them.

And yet, they don’t really occupy the vibe of make-as-you-play, so I am going to try to make that distinction a little better than a vibe.

Exclusion No. 3: Solo Role-Playing Games (especially, the journaling-type games)

Here I am imagining games like 1000 Year Old Vampire or Apothecaria, and I think these are going to be much more debatable. I expect some of these to mostly end up in a lower scoring end of make-as-you-play even if they are not totally excluded, but I also think this is where there is some more likelihood of a crossover of interest between what I design and where there’s actually a market for products.

That said, I don’t usually recommend my designs directly to fans of solo RPGs. I think those players are largely looking for structured imaginative play and creative writing, and the make-as-you-play games are (usually) a little more “prescriptive” than that. More on that below…

Exclusion No. 4: The Nomic-likes

Apart from the rules-morphing game Nomic, the games I am thinking of are principally 1000 Blank White Cards and Dvorak, both of which I do think are make-as-you-play games, but there is a significant axis where they will get judged lower on the scale with the way I now think of the genre to which this blog is dedicated.

All four of those categories, along with the starting principles and the desire to have a score > 0 get you make-as-you-play status, is what informs the new axes I have designed for my own use … and for your amusement if you have gotten this far. I can’t guarantee you’ll “get it” but the other designers I know working intentionally within the definition of make-as-you-play do “get it” at least at a visceral level, [2] but I am hoping this is the most solid entry yet that goes past gut reaction.

The SPICE Score

Much like before, the new SPICE acronym translates to an equation. In this case, the equation is as follows:

SPICE = S * P * (1 + C + E)

But what are each of these terms?

S: the Specificity Axis

This axis intends to cover the spirit of this principle:
:star: You make almost all the content yourself staying within the bounds of the rules

Inheriting from what I called “Making” before, I want to clarify this is really intended to demonstrate my contention that games that are more prescriptive (or specific) on the rules for “making things” are more in line with make-as-you-play. The idea is that the more precise we are about what is being made, the more this fits the idea of creating the game objects within the bounds of the rules.

This is not to say that free form creation has no place, but I think it’s at the lower end. Therefore, I propose these values:

0 – None

. No game objects are permanently made during play

1 – Open

. The players are told to make something during play

2 – Prompted

. The players are given ideas to inform making during play

3 – Procedural

. The players are given a specific algorithm to follow for making during play

Maybe it’s redundant to express “during play” in those descriptions but I am trying to avoid the countless games where game objects are made “outside of play” like painting miniatures or building terrain.

Additionally, I’d like to propose that the “content” being made here really constitutes game objects: authored artifacts that the rules operate on after the fact, such as cards, maps, or other things that are used in ongoing play). This allows us to veer away from elements that are not game objects like score sheets or campaign logs or even entries in printed worksheets. Game objects participate directly in play, while records merely describe play or serve as memory aids. This narrows make-as-you-play games to those where players are expected to manufacture significant and enduring parts of the game.

To ground these points on the S-axis by way of examples…

Oath is a great game, right? You know what it does not have? Rules for permanently making content during play. It does suggest you let the winner journal after a game, but I’m going to set that outside the boundary of gameplay in the space of “activity” … even the “constellation drawing” in the new expansion would still be outside the game. So, S=0. Again, most games land right here, so I just picked a game I like a lot.

Dvorak is an interesting case. Originally, I gave it a higher score on this axis, but its actual rules for making cards are quite freeform, so I would judge it in the same place as 1000 Blank White Cards, at a S=1.

Remember when I brought up 1000 Year Old Vampire? Well, the prompt-based making of micro-journal entries (and importantly the varied assets, scars, etc.) seems to me to be exactly what is meant by S=2. Seems odd to me that this scores higher than the two previously discussed games, but this isn’t the only axis after all.

Two Thousand Years and The Cradle are two of those intentionally designed make-as-you-play games I mentioned earlier, and you can really tell they have the right spirit because each of them gets S=3 based on their making rules and expectations of the player vs the designer. They will also score high on the other most significant axis, which is …

P: the Provisioning Axis

The P-axis emerges from this principle:
:star: You start with some rules and minimal materials, where these materials can either be purchased cheaply or taken from a wide variety of other games

Akin to what I once called “Stuff,” the P-axis is representative of who is “provisioning” the materials required to play the game. At the highest end are games played entirely on a player provided surface with only the procedures suggested by the designer (as in a rulebook). At the low end are games you buy at a store or print out on your printer.

In between is where it is interesting, the degrees representing a spectrum of the kinds of player-brought materials that will be altered during the game (well, presumably... if it's going to end up a make-as-you-play game). All parts of that statement are important because it will forcibly exclude a variety of things, but I’ll get into examples below the axis increments, which are:

0 – Creator.

The game creator provisions all materials or specifications

1 – Mixed

. The game creator provisions some materials; players provision some materials

2 – Specified

. The game creator provisions templates or specifications; players provision some materials

3 – Player

. Players provision all materials

OK, so jargon time again! The word “materials” is doing some heavy lifting here. By that term, I mean that materials are the physical objects that constitute the game and can persist between sessions. So… generic play aids are not considered “materials.” I get this might be controversial, but maybe it can be solved by shifting the terminology later on. For now, let’s list some things excluded by this:

This does not include dice… unless you are altering the dice and making them into some specific kind of game object, that is. Similarly, you can remove other functional elements like pencils that do the altering.

This does not include score sheets generally (as also excluded in the S-axis defintions), as these are tracking a log of the game or record the state of play and are not part of play themselves. [3]

This does not include anything prepared outside the game, like painting miniatures or building terrain.

This does not include anything you get in a store-bought legacy game, because the designer and publisher have provided it.

Perhaps most controversially, this does not include designer-authored templates or specifications, such as a printed map or worksheet supplied by the game. Although the player may print and alter these, the game creator has already provisioned the game object by specifying its form. Player-provisioned materials are those whose form is chosen by the player, such as blank cards, playing cards, or blank paper. This is what should remove a good number of PNP games from make-as-you-play messiness.

But, but, but … what about Deep Future? It has a map you print out! Well, yeah, it does. And if that game only had that barebones hex map plus tracks then I would claim it isn’t a make-as-you-play game. Deep Future receives P=2 because players provision blank cards while the game creator (me!) provisions the printable map specification.

By way of a few examples for each value…

Blank is a hybrid of Uno and 1000 Blank White Cards, but importantly, its materials are all self-contained in a purchased product. As such I would give it P=0. To be fair, almost every game out there is going to be P=0. I mean, is there a game in the BGG top 100 that isn't P=0? Even most print-and-play games would fall into this area, I would contend.

The Quiet Year is a good example of a P=1, where there are definite creator provisioned components but you a largely focused on a game object that is created during play, namely the map that emerges on the blank sheet.

Deep Future, as I said above, is P=2, but so are most of my games, like Star Charter or Shard Harvest where you have printed sheets you need to play but you supplement them with some blank white cards.

Racetrack is an interesting little older game that was called to my attention in the Make-as-You-Play guild, and it is a good example of a simple, straightforward P=3 instance that also has a strong shot of being a legitimate make-as-you-play game. But perhaps the most iconic P=3 choice is 1000 Blank White Cards, where all you need are some index cards as the surface for play and you can have at it. Or if you want a game I designed that is at this spot on the axis: Hack Comics!

Now, it's kind of interesting to consider games that definitely are NOT make-as-you-play games in my estimation. Let's say normal Poker... which should score well on P, most obviously being assigned a P=3. However, my hope is that it and its ilk that survive this axis are caught in the zero values on the S-axis.

Now we get into the optional axes. But first...

I: The ONE

The inclusion of a 1 in the equation is to ensure a non-zero score can be had even if a game possesses a zero score in the following two axes, which I view as “degrees” of make-as-you-play-ness but not absolutely required to be given the label.

While this is debatable, I think generally, the S-axis and P-axis are required and these can let games sneak in even if they have a zero in one or both of the C-axis or E-axis. Speaking of which...

C: the Campaign Axis

The C-axis derives from this principle:
:star: You can continue to play each new game in a campaign using ALL the content from the previous games you played, so the game continues to grow indefinitely

You can call it Legacy or Inheritance or Transfer… I had a lot of letters thrown at this axis, but ultimately it means how much of what you made in the previous game carries forward into the next game and matters for gameplay. This separates it from a lot of pure journaling, where you will never reuse the journaled prose again mechanically. [4] The expectation here is there’s a degree of mechanical permanence introduced that enforces a campaign structure.

But not all games that build on the last are built to last. Some have a definitive end. And that’s where we get our C-axis spectrum:

0 – None

. Games do not inherit from previous games

1 – Fixed

. Games end after a fixed length campaign

2 – Renewable

. Games can end after a fixed length campaign or continue with a new campaign

3 – Endless

. Games can continue endlessly, inheriting from previous game states

Maybe this is the most intuitive of the axes, but some examples…

Heading back to The Quiet Year, this is one of those journaling / map-making games that has big-time make-as-you-play elements, but it is a one-shot technically and thus is C=0.

Two Thousand Years and The Cradle make a return appearance as games that are intended to have a fixed run and reach a campaign conclusion, so they are C=1.

Hark! Vengeance is my beat-em-up emulator that runs for a set number of cards, but you can easily shuffle in another 50 to extend the campaign to a new one and do this as many times as you like, so C=2.

Vast Cosmos is my potentially endless space exploration and journaling game that has ways of recursively nesting new places in the sectors you visit if you are so inclined, making it technically C=3 (the best kind of C=3, of course). Or even more technically, Dice Bloodline, which is my family tree making variant of Yacht (or Yahtzee) where it can let one game lead into the next, but it is not required. Actually, this is a weird edge case, but I have played it this way so I am going to say it’s a C=3 despite largely holding together as a one-shot.

Then finally we have the other optional, but important axis ….

E: The Expression Axis

The E-axis emerged from this principle:
:star: You use your imagination to supplement these rules—either in writing stories or naming content

Not all these games are going to make you use your creative juices, but it is a common expectation that you can or should be doing this, namely expressing yourself. I like measuring this one by how much “work” the creativity imposes on the player, because we ought to reward hard work somewhere. So here goes…

0 – None

. No creative effort required to play (no story, narrative games, or largely emergent gameplay)

1 – Occasional

. Concise and occasional creative effort (i.e. naming components intermittently)

2 – Regular

. Concise and regular creative effort (i.e. naming components or writing single sentences per turn)

3 – Extensive

. Considerable creative effort (drawing, writing short stories, journaling)

This is perhaps a tad subjective, but I think it should match most people’s intuition about the expressive effort required on each point on the axis. By way of examples…

Cult Poker is the make-as-you-play game I know best that I can say without question requires no expressive effort to play. You simply operate the mechanisms of the game and discover what it has to offer by doing this, so E=0.

Many more examples are in the E=1 range, where you are naming components as part of the game. Deep Future, obviously, but also games that are not make-as-you-play can get scores here, like Risk Legacy and SeaFall.

Vast Cosmos and 1000 Year Old Vampire are exemplars of E=2, with their micro journaling requirements. Also Hark! Vengeance as you name the encounters in short blurbs of what you are going around and repeatedly walloping.

Hack Comics! and 1000 Blank White Cards are games where there’s some meatier demands on the player for expressive effort, namely drawing and doodling representational images. I guess you can get by with just scribbling on the cards, but that really defeats the point of such E=3 games. I even have an in-progress game I would give E=3 from a writing point-of-view, but it’s taking its time to evolve into its final form…

SPICE: A Score so Perfect it Can Never Be Challenged and Will Stand the Test of Time

So, SPICE is my best scoring effort so far, but I doubt it is perfect. Even writing out the above, I discovered some shortcomings. And I can think of several games that are “edge cases” for these axes. Maybe it's hopeless to try...

Anyway, presently, the top scoring make-as-you-play games using this SPICE criteria are Last Haiku, which has a SPICE score of 54 with S=3, P=3, C=3, and E=2, and Hack Comics!, which has a SPICE score of 54 with S=3, P=3, C=2, and E=3.

I know I pointed out this about Last Haiku with the earlier score. The goal wasn’t to make this remain at the top of the heap. It just reflects that it probably is the game that is closest in the spirit to what I was thinking with the term, BUT the SPICE score still has not been maxed out yet! There’s room for someone to make the most make-as-you-play game ever.

If you are interested in seeing the list of all the games I know about (or at least bothered to consider) that get a non-zero score for SPICE, you can look at them and my assessments on this GeekList:
:star: Make-as-You-Play Games 2026 Edition

If you think of some I missed, go ahead and add them, but just mind I will likely give my own interpretation of how they do on SPICE. After all, this is a criteria I have mainly invented to clarify the genre for myself.

I am also interested in "failure cases" where I overlooked something that sneaks into the definition. I went through two previous iterations that had such fatal flaws, and it's a good bet there's one lurking here too that I just don't see. Maybe you will? Although... If there's interest, I could do a follow-up where I walk through some of the edge case interpretations of my own score that make me groan.

Until next time!

End Notes

[1] Actually, it’s almost not even Rob Daviau’s first legacy game if you consider Viking Funeral!

[2] I mean… y’all let me know if I am wrong about that and if you disagree with the new score.

[3] I can see this being debated. Visions of counterexamples dance in my head.

[4] I can see this also being debated!

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