Shasn
| SHASN The Political Strategy Board Game | |
|---|---|
| Designer(s) | Zain Memon |
| Publisher(s) | Memesys Culture Lab |
| Genre(s) | Role-playing, Politics, Area Control, Social Strategy, Resource Management |
| Language(s) | English |
| Players | 3 - 5 |
| Playing time | 90 to 120 minutes |
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SHASN is a competitive political strategy board game for 3-5 players designed by Zain Memon, and published by Memesys Culture Lab. In SHASN, each player is a politician contesting elections, and is required to take a stand on various political and ethical issues.[1] The game was released via Kickstarter on 16 July 2019, and raised $339,045 from 4,209 backers, exceeding its initial target of $25,000.[2]
SHASN comes with a dual-layered game board, player mats, resource tokens, and voter pegs (to register votes), and vote bank cards, among other components. [3] The game was inspired by the documentary An Insignificant Man, about the rise of the Aam Aadmi Party in Indian politics.[4] The inaugural SHASN Invitational Cup was held on August 2015, 2019, which included 64 participants from cities across India.
Gameplay
SHASN's gameplay consists of area control, resource management and social strategy.
The objective of the game is to influence the maximum number of majority voters in the 9 zones (or constituencies) on the game board. Voters are influenced via combinations of resources such as Media, Clout, Trust, and Funds. These resources are gained by answering questions on the ideology cards which are about real-world political, social, and ethical issues. Each ideology card has two possible answers, representing two different ideologies. Players take turns answering the ideology cards, and the answer they pick determines the resources they gain. [5] The game ends when one player attains a majority of voter support on the board.
There are 9 zones or constituencies in the game, each of which has a volatile zone within it. Placing a voter in the volatile zone triggers a Headline card, which could either have a positive or negative effect for the player that placed the voter. [5]
Resources in the game can be traded in for voters. Once the voters are 'influenced', the player places a specified number of voter pegs within the boundaries of one of the electorates on the board. These pegs can later be moved via a process within the game known as Gerrymandering. If a player has more votes in a zone than any of their opponents, they can influence neighboring zones by moving its voters to other constituencies. The player can also gerrymander their own voters to other neighboring zones.[6]
There are 4 ideologies in the game - The Supremo, The Capitalist, The Idealist, and The Showman. Players gain ideology cards by answering questions.[7] The type of ideology card players gain depends on which ideology their chosen answer falls under. Within the game, The Supremo has fascistic tendencies, The Capitalist focuses on free trade, The Showman focuses on being outrageous, and The Idealist focuses on making the world a better place. If the players gain 2, 4, or 6 cards of one ideology, they gain powers specific to that ideology. [8]
Players can use their resources to buy Conspiracy cards which may be held for use at any time during the game. These can be used against opponents to foil their strategies. [6] Players can also negotiate and trade resources with other players.
Release and Reception
The game was released via Kickstarter on 16 July 2019, and raised $339,045 from 4,209 backers, exceeding its initial target of $25,000.[2] The game has received mostly positive reviews.
Dan Thurot of Space Biff called it "an unexpected but welcome surprise, both irreverent and relevant, and at times both deeply humorous and strangely unsettling."[9] Stephen Gulik of Everything Board Games said that "SHASN is the best thing to come out of American politics in a very long time."[10] Game designer Elan Lee called it a "Really clever strategy game entrenched in a surprising political battleground."[11] Based on community scoring, SHASN currently holds a rating of 8.7/10 on the Board Game Geek website.[12]
Campaigns
The initial game release will include 5 campaigns.[13] Each of these campaigns has a different deck of ideology cards, and is based in a different geographic and/or historical setting. The campaigns announced so far are -
- United States 2020 Campaign - A campaign based on modern American Politics.
- India 2020 Campaign - A campaign that focuses on present day Indian politics.
- Brexit Campaign - A campaign about Brexit, the United Kingdom, and the European Union.
- The Future of Humanity: Earth 2040 - A futuristic simulation of the year 2040.
- Fall of the Republic: Rome 40 BCE - A campaign based on the politics of ancient Rome.
- ↑ "Makers of AAP documentary launch board game simulating politics". The Week. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "SHASN - The Political Strategy Board Game". Kickstarter. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ Tanwar, Sangeeta. "A board game, inspired by a film on Arvind Kejriwal, offers a close look at Indian politics". Quartz India. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ "Taking Indian politics to board games: How 'Shasn' and 'The Poll' place players in the shoes of politicians". Firstpost. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Winters, Brian (2019-07-16). "Shasn Preview". Board Game Quest. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Winters, Brian (2019-07-16). "Shasn Preview". Board Game Quest. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ Shetye, Archit (16 July 2019). "Shasn – The Indian Board Game That Makes You Think Like A Politician". Quartz India. Homegrown Media. Retrieved 30 July 2019.
- ↑ Winters, Brian (2019-07-16). "Shasn Preview". Board Game Quest. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ "False Equivalence: A Look at Shasn". SPACE-BIFF!. 2019-07-15. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ "SHASN: Ready to play politics?". www.platform-mag.com. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ "Filmmaker Anand Gandhi Is Out With A New Release - This Time, It's A Game! - Bollyy". Dailyhunt. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ "SHASN". BoardGameGeek. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
- ↑ "A new political strategy game is trying to make politics and policy-making trendy for the apolitical". The Indian Express. 2019-07-24. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
Category:Election campaigning Category:Indian board games
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