SIGNUM
A fast-paced party game of hidden signals and shifting allegiances
Signum is a fast-paced party game of hidden signals and shifting allegiances. In it, players are dealt small hands of sign cards with particular features (Hand, Eye, Mouth, Nose, and Eyebrow) and are secretly assigned teams. They must then take turns looking at and swapping cards around the table until they have found a teammate with a matching sign card. Only then can they secretly signal which card should be used to eliminate a player on the other team and win the game.
From the very beginning, the goal of our project was to make a party game that featured a core mechanic that encouraged players to be creative, like the questions players ask in Spyfall, the descriptions made by players in Charades, or the discussions in One Night Ultimate Werewolf and Avalon. These were the moments we enjoyed during those games, and we wanted to make a game that allowed players to have these experiences while also being unique in its own right. After many many prototypes we, at last, came back to how we were using body gestures. It seemed like we had tied the tells to players identities too much, which hamstrung our designs. After this realization we developed a new prototype that would separate players’ identities and tells. The focus on gestures was a challenge and there were a few times when we considered scrapping the whole thing but we persevered. Signum is not what we thought it would be, but we are proud of it and the process through which it came into being.
An IndieCade 2015 Official Selection: Table Games
Worked as game designer
with Rohan Flinn, Benjamin Poland, Emma Wang and Bengang Qi
in May 2015