I recall the moment Hounded had become the game I’d been designing it to be. While playtesting as the Master of Hounds, I’d perfectly set myself up to corner the Fox in three turns and win the match — but only if the Fox made one easy-to-overlook mistake. There really is no other way of saying it: I was giddy with excitement! Wearing a nervous grin, I watched as my opponent desperately worked through every possible scenario, trying to discover what had me so unabashedly eager. Then she saw it! The one move she could make to thwart my victory! We both gave off adrenaline-driven laughter, and I continued the hunt knowing full well that my emotions had betrayed me. That feeling of excitement, induced by true two-player strategy — all within a few minutes of playing — is exactly what Hounded is about. Hounded was inspired by a beautifully written chapter on boar hunting found within T.H. White's The Once and Future King. In chapter sixteen of the Arthurian book, Wart (a young King Arthur), along with Merlin and King Pellinore, join Sir Ector and his Master of Hounds on a deadly boar hunt. T.H. White goes into great detail on the hunt's preparations, giving insight into how the Master of Hounds builds out a proper pack of hunting dogs. As I learned, each dog is bred and selected for a specific function, and many times multiple breeds must work together to successfully capture their prey. Much like drafting players to build a winning sports team, the Master of Hounds must draft a pack of dogs to win the hunt. I found myself wanting to be a part of that hunt, stepping side-by-side through the thickets with Wart, boar-spears held high and senses acute. Hounded was designed to let players experience the fearful anticipation and blood-pumping excitement of a hunt with hounds — pitting two players against each other in a game of life and death. Before any playtesting took place, I researched the historical ceremony of the hunt and studied its many distinct dog breeds. Through exploration and understanding of the material it became obvious that the experience I wanted to create would be focused on movement. All of the elements that make up Hounded are designed with movement in mind. It took more than a year of playtesting to develop and balance the player movement within the game — constantly modifying the number of tiles, their revealed effects, and the default movement patterns of the game pieces. Even the abstract 49-tile game board was designed as uncharted territory for the fox and the hunting party to explore. The final result is a game whose simple concepts and learning curve mask a much deeper balance which grants the players a fast, suspenseful hunting experience. One of the more difficult tasks in creating Hounded was narrowing down which dog breeds I wanted to include in the game — choosing breeds which were both visually and mechanically unique. As a dog lover and someone who grew up with dogs, it was difficult to set aside my own bias towards dachshunds and Jack Russell terriers! The final list of characters includes: the Fox, Master of Hounds, Foxhound, Bulldog, and Terrier. The Fox is the quickest and most agile piece on the gameboard. The Master of Hounds is the deadliest game piece. The Foxhounds are quick and able to cut-off the Fox’s escape. If the Bulldog can get close enough, it can grab and slow down the Fox. And finally, the Terrier can sniff out and bury fox dens. The game’s unique geometric and expressive art style was also something that I put a lot of consideration into. I wanted the game to have an eye-catching presence on the store shelf, a visual style that Hounded could own, and one that could be both modern and timeless. Given the violent and brutal nature of foxhunting, a historic sport now banned in many countries, it was equally as important that the game’s illustrations balance out its dark influence. The simplicity of Hounded’s art style allows the players to fill in the details they wish to remember, letting the play-by-play visuals of the hunt take place within their imagination as well as the gameboard. From its novel meeples to its tin packaging, I’m pleased with the design decisions and overall presentation you’ll discover within Hounded. I feel like it has reached my goals of portability, being easy to learn yet challenging to master, and — most importantly — giving me that giddy excitement when victory is close at hand!
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