This is just a quick update on Congress Forever. Before I begin, a few notes:

- We don’t have an estimate for when it will be released.

- We probably won’t have screenshots in the near future, as we use placeholder graphics until near the end.

What is Congress Forever going to contain?

It will contain the 2008 Congressional House elections to start, and an initial 2010 scenario (which will be updated as we get closer to 2010). It will not contain the Senate.

What is the game-play point of view?

You play the game as Chair of the national Congressional Committee – the DCCC if playing as the Democrats, the NRCC if as Republicans. For example, if playing as the Democrats in 2008, you would take the role of Chair Rep. Chris van Hollen. Your actions would be the ones the DCCC would be able to take, which include national actions as well as district-by-district ones.

There is no “leader”, however, like in President Forever 2008 + Primaries, or as in the Prime Minister Forever games. The reason is obvious: there is no correlate to a Presidential or Prime Ministerial candidate in the Congressional elections.

House Majority and Minority Leaders, among other major national figures in the Congressional elections, are instead encapsulated as Crusaders.

What are the game dynamics?

As the game focuses on the Committee’s abilities, instead of a “leader’s” abilities, attributes and actions are different.

Instead of Leadership, Charisma, and so on, your party has certain levels in Command Strength, Spin Strength, Ads Strength, Polling Strength, GOTV Strength, and so on.

Unlike President Forever 2008 + Primaries, or even the Prime Minister Forever series, the game focuses mostly at either the national level, or the district level. For example, you can create a national advertising campaign, or create an ad for a specific Congressional nominee.

I’ll be posting more stuff here as development continues.

Check it out!

The difference, of course, is that political board games are limited in the complexity of the world they can simulate much more so than computer political games – and it’s difficult to create playable players without other humans around in a board game. In a sense, then, games like President Forever 2008 + Primaries are really sophisticated, hyper-board games.

December 19th, 2003: President Forever 2004. The game that really started it all. ‘Nuff said.

June, 2004: Prime Minister Forever – Canada 2004. Our first parliamentary simulation game, this featured the ability to target ridings (the equivalent of districts, constituencies, or divisions in other political systems).

September, 2004: Prime Minister Forever – Australia 2004. Our first foray into politics in the southern hemisphere. First game to feature Australia’s Two Party Preference system (curious what that means? try it out!). Just as Australia’s animals are a little different, so are their politics.

April, 2005: Prime Minister Forever – British Version. Renamed from U.K. due to an unfortunate acronym. This game engine could accommodate the most districts yet, with Britain having over 600.

April, 2005: Premier Forever – British Columbia. A little provincial game. Fun.

August, 2005: Chancellor Forever. Our first non-English speaking version was released simultaneously (Kanzler Forever), it also featured the pretty neat German electoral system. (You can try it out here, or if you sprechen die Deutsche, here).

January, 2006: Prime Minister Forever – Canada 2006. Our first sequel within the parliamentary games. Expanded game engine. We never know when Canada will have another election, so this series keeps us on our toes.

October, 2006: President Forever 2008 + Primaries. Added primaries functionality, and a host of other features. This was our biggest single project ever, and much of the changes were ‘under the hood’ (that is, you can’t tell by looking at the game how much it actually has changed – hopefully, we’ll be able to demonstrate this more later).

June, 2007: Campaigns Forever for President Forever 2008 + Primaries. This was the first full campaign editor, made for the American game. It is what we use to make the official campaigns, but now anyone can make their own.

October, 2007: Prime Minister Forever – Australia 2007. Retained the 2004 game engine, but added a new 2007 scenario.

Next will be another important add-on for President Forever 2008 + Primaries, Multiplayer, which we will be announcing more details of very soon (right here).

I have just finished playing President Forever 2008 + Primaries Multiplayer. It changes everything.

Playing a game against computer players in P4E8 is fun, but it isn’t exactly the most challenging experience anymore for me. It was like trying to rack up yet another really high high-score on Civilization II … “What, only 300% this time? Let’s try for 350% …”

We have recently completed 2-human-player multiplayer games for President Forever 2008 + Primaries Multiplayer (soon to be unlimited human players), and now everything has changed. Just adding 1 human opponent makes everything much more difficult. Your opponents are no longer predictable. Thought you could bank on dominating New Hampshire? Think again, as your human opponent maneuvers to slip in and steal it from you. You strain to determine your opponents’ strategies, trying to figure out what they’re focusing on and what they’re ignoring. Endorsements suddenly become an exercise in nerve-calming. “Okay, I’m almost there … almost have the endorsement … What? They plowed 5 PIPs at the last moment! Ugh!” And so on.

Probably the nicest new feature that comes in handy for multiplayer is the timing feature. Now the game host can decide how long each turn lasts. This makes for adrenalin-pounding turns, as you frenetically attempt to make those ads, get a good read on the latest polls and momentum numbers, create strategic footsoldiers, get in barnstorming, AND … What?! Next turn. Much more like the heat of a real campaign, where your decisions almost always are in the context of limited time.

Next up is seeing what it’s like playing with more than 2 human players … Will report back soon.

Washington Post’s Campaign Tracker

Here’s a screen capture of part of the Campaign Tracker:

By clicking the “Previous Day” and “Next Day” links on the tool, you can get political-event-by-political-event tracking for all the major candidates from both parties for the 2008 US Presidential election. It gets even better – you can click the “2007″ link just below “Campaign Tracker” (or the “Date” link to the right of “Campaign Tracker”) and it will show you a calendar with all political events from January 2007 all the way to (scheduled) December 2007. It even lists which candidates ‘Rested’, to use the President Forever game term.

There’s more. Lots more. Continued …

You can browse political events by “Candidate,” for example, and then look easily at how often a candidate has gone to any given state. Here, for example, is an image of the map with Mitt Romney’s movements:

Quite quickly, you can see that he’s had 130 events in Iowa (second place is New Hampshire with 85), and by clicking on the “Most Recent Visit” tab you can also see that he went to both of those states within the last week. You can even see how much he raised by state in the most important political game – the money game – for the 3Q by clicking the “Money Raised” tab. Neat.

There are lots here for any political geek to play around with. Have fun!

Here is a screenshot from an Australia 2007 game in progress:

(click here to see the full-size image)

The game scenario starts on October 17th. If you’re interested in understanding Australian election politics better, a good place to start is Prime Minister Forever – Australia 2007.

From the 2007 scenario description: “After more than a decade of the Howard Government, a young and untested Labor leader – Kevin Rudd – has risen on the national scene. Is it time for a change, or will Australians elect John Howard to a fifth consecutive Liberal government?”

John Howard’s description: “Having tempted fate – yet again – by contesting one more election, John Howard finds himself facing dismal election chances, against a fresh-faced Labour party leader. Will his political prowess enable Howard to steady the rudder of his foundering Liberal ship, focusing on his economic successes and experience, or will Election 2007 go down in the history books – finally – as Howard’s End?”

(click here to see the full-size image)

Kevin Rudd’s description: “Kevin Rudd has led the Labor party to stratospheric heights, and every poll shows him accomplishing the impossible – achieving a massive 16 seat swing to form government. But he’s facing the best campaigner of his generation in Prime Minister John Howard. With 39 days to go, will he become the next Prime Minister of Australia?”

(click here to see the full-size image)

Good gaming!

Here it is:

As you can see, with ‘Poll’ selected (a USA Today poll) (and the default options on the right), the top three candidates are all Republicans. 1. Mitt Romney (Gov., Massachusetts) 2. Mike Huckabee (Gov., Arkansas), and 3. Duncan Hunter (Rep., California). This sort of visual representational scheme also can give you an idea quite quickly of where to look for major weaknesses or strengths in candidates. A nice touch is how the candidates rise up after you answer each question. Kudos to USA Today on the visual design of this Presidential election ‘game’!

In President Forever 2008 + Primaries (our far more involved game), in the 2008 Beta scenario (soon to be the official scenario), interestingly enough Romney and Huckabee are the most centrist of the Republican candidates. Hunter, however, is the farthest to the right of all the candidates. (You can look at this by going to the Platform screen on a turn, and then clicking on an issue icon. The Political Spectrum screen will then come up. Then click the ‘All’ button. Voila.)

In the US election game 2008 scenario, we are about to release a new version using the actual October 1st data from the real world. It’s interesting to note the changes in the primaries standings between the two versions. Here is a picture of the Republicans’ state of affair from the version released in June:

(click here to see the full-size image)

This is what it looks like now, with the latest October 1st polling data:

(click here to see the full-size image)

What has changed in the 2008 game scenario? The most visual difference is the swath of central-western states that have moved from McCain to Tie. This is a result of two factors: 1. McCain’s national percentages have fallen significantly. In fact, he has moved into 3rd place, behind Fred Thompson. 2. Giuliani, like Clinton, has continued to increase his lead in national percentages. So what makes the Republican contest different from the Democrats? The answer is 3. Romney is now leading in Iowa and New Hampshire, and tied for first in Nevada and Michigan – the first 4 crucial states in the game and real world primaries or caucuses. Combine that with 4. Fred Thompson is leading in many southern states. This makes the Republican primaries much more interesting at this point.

All these political shifts are reflected in the candidates’ estimated delegates totals. Giuliani’s delegates in the game has risen from 996 (a plurality) to 1371 (an absolute majority) – enough to take the nomination outright. McCain has plummeted from 454 to 53. Thompson has increased from 250 to 322. Romney, meanwhile, has gone from 79 to 144.

(click here to see the full-size image)

This is what it looks like now, with the latest October 1st polling data:

(click here to see the full-size image)

What are the interesting trends? Well, first, every state still has the same leader, with three exceptions. Texas and Wyoming go from Tie to Leaning Clinton, and Virginia goes from Edwards to Tie. Even though Iowa now has Clinton leading in most polls, whereas back in June it was Edwards, it is still close enough that the state is white (tied) in the game.

The second big trend is Clinton’s consolidation of her lead. While she has risen in national polls, both Obama and Edwards have fallen, and this is reflected in the new game scenario. Her estimated delegates in the game has risen from 2572 to 2783. Obama’s delegates take has slumped from 1273 to 724. Edwards has managed to keep about the same number of delegates – 310 to 306.

Next will be the Republicans, which is a little more interesting.