We had a great social last night – a talk about repair and conservation in museums (bridgetharvey.co.uk/writing), and a board games hacking workshop (www.beesness.games/).
We learned about the components of mechanics, dynamics and aesthetics in games. Me and Panda hacked the mechanics of Surakarta (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surakarta_(game)) to turn it into a game of cooperation and swapping, rather than a game of battle and capture. We only had chance to play it once with the new rules, but it worked surprisingly well and induced more high-fiving than the original (which induced none.)