TreeFall is a dexterity based team game where you race another organization to grow your section of the Amazon Rainforest to the investor’s demands! Grow as fast as possible or take the time to Grow trees to withstand the elements, but your competitors will have ways to mess with your forest!
TreeFall was created as a solo project for an introductory game design class. The art, box, rules, materials, playtesting, documentation, and gameplay was all created within the span of three weeks. TreeFall went through 13 documented playtests. I created TreeFall with the goal of making the players feel stressed. I achieved this through a variety of factors, but primarily through the gameplay. Many games create a feeling of stress as the players get closer to the end of the game, so I knew I wanted to create a negative feedback loop to keep the players close together so one team doesn’t just pull ahead. In order to achieve this negative feedback loop, I first made the game a best-of-three so that a team that falls behind has a good chance to catch up. Furthermore, I created “Weather Cards”.
These “Weather Cards” allow one team to mess with the opponent’s forest to set them back a bit. These increase tension by themselves as they are hidden from the opponent with certain conditions that must be met. As such, not knowing when the opponent uses their Card increases the tension. Furthermore, the team that lost is given an additional Weather Card in the second round, making it more likely that they win the second round and bring it to a final game.
Additionally, the team-based competitiveness of the game also increases the tension, as actually manipulating the wooden blocks is awkward, and the players must use their non-dominant hand, leading to less stable trees.
TreeFall includes: 52 Stained wooden blocks, 2 Plots of land, 8 Weather Cards, 8 Ideal Forest Cards, and a Rule Booklet.
TreeFall would go on to become Tiny Trees.
Click here to read the rulebooklet.
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