Ameritrash, Eurostyle, and Asiancore games are popular around the world. Each philosophy has fundamental concepts that reflect how random chance is addressed, either worked with, worked around, or mitigated. So what are they, what makes them different, and why is it important? This is good to know so that money is not wasted on a game that may not scratch your itch.
Ameritrash, originally a pejorative term, has been adopted by many to describe games with wide swing capability, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat, winning through random chance, and player elimination. Typical Ameritrash games involve lots of options for random chance success. This is not to say that strategy doesn’t play apart, its just not as big a part as some would think.
Consider the quintessential Ameritrash game, Monopoly. A game with a series of random encounters where the players try to capitalizes on the opportunity rolled. The outcomes are built by a series of random dice roles and players are eliminated because of a lack of funds. There is a strategy to this game, though it is not apparent, or possible until the initial monopoly is achieved.
It requires the game to be played per the rules as written and stems from the limited amount of house resources. Building houses, and not buying hotels to replace them, removes them from the bank. As the houses are consumed it reduces the ability for the other players to acquire them. Turning the long slog of random dice rolls into an excruciating grind.
In Monopoly the players are ground down and eliminated one at a time. Bad decisions can affect the game in early rounds, and early monopolies can clinch success. It really comes down to the dice rolls by the players that randomly provide opportunities. Once the opportunities are seized, the end can almost be determined. However, the random nature of the game also allows for the leading player to fail hard.
Should the lead player roll badly their lead can collapse. A random draw of the Chance card can drive them in to bankruptcy. Or if they have financially over extended themselves before landing on an opponent’s improved properties they are forced to dismantle their empire. Monopoly is not an “end the game now” set up as many modern Ameritrash games are, though it still fits within the concept that random chance is the primary driver, good fortune is better than skill, and player elimination is key to success.
Eurostyle started after World War 2 in Germany, though the term did not gain prominence until after 1995. This was a shift away from direct war or conflict based games to more family based, co-operative or semi co-operative, and indirectly competitive games. Eurostyle games have a mitigating factor for random chance. Player agency and minimal random influences allow for a sense of control over the flow of the game. Decisions made throughout the course game affect the outcome more than random rolls of the dice. The game Settlers of Catan embodies the concepts of Eurostyle.
In Settlers there are multiple balancing activities that players must consider before determining their actions. The game starts with a placement process that mitigates the advantage of going first and incentivizes placing last. With multiple paths to acquire specific resources, either by direct trades with other players or through any of the other three trading methods, players almost always have options.
To prevent an overwhelming single turn land slide win, and the bank running out of resources, the balancing function is the most common roll of two six-sided dice, a “7”. When a “7” is rolled all players with more than seven cards must discard half of their hand, rounding up for hands with odd numbers of cards. The next balance is the robber / thief used to slow the progress of other players without providing an overwhelming benefit.
With each player potentially doing something on every turn, even if the turn is not theirs, participation is high. No going to the kitchen for a snack during this game. There is minimal direct adversarial activity, and what there is constitutes more of a slight than an outright attack. With multiple methods to achieve victory players can track the progress of other participants and almost gauge how close someone is to winning. Though there is a little random chance that can affect this, it is not game defining.
Eurostyle games have a given default win condition for all players. Be it victory points, or hidden win condition, or goals reached through tasks of ever increasing difficulty, the finish of a Eurostyle game inevitably comes down to a competitive final score. No huge end of the game swings in a Eurostyle game.
Relatively new to the jargon of the modern gaming scene is Asiancore. It is a trend in modern games from Japan, Singapore, China, and Taiwan. They tend to incorporate compact productions, efficient rule sets, have minimal components, and include decision making consequences. Additionally they are generally designed in such a manner that language is not an impeding factor and the presentation is visually appealing . In Asiancore design, an error early on has a lasting effect through the entirety of the game.
Essentially these games expect the players to accept their losses as a result of their choices and actions rather than as a game design flaw, game imbalance, or a random chance. There are still small aspects of randomness though and they are strictly built into the rules.
The Kanagawa board game from IELLO (2016) is an excellent example of the Asiancore game design. With only 7 different types of game pieces; start tiles, painting tiles, award tiles, bamboo playmat, paint brush markers, and storm markers, the game requires very little space to play and no requirement for reading once the rules are learned.
The game play alternates who is first in a round consisting of 3 turns. It uses hidden tiles as a balance for known information. Players can make decisions early to gain an advantage in the award tiles, or hope that they will have a chance at the tiles they will need for a true master piece on a later turn. Once a player has created their painting using a predetermined number of painting tiles, the game ends and points are tallied.
There are aspects of strategy in this game of tile painting. A clever player my take a tile crucial to their opponent. Later they may lose out on having what they need when it comes to finishing their painting. In this case a situation of sabotage turns into a failure for the saboteur.
The simplicity of the game belies its depth of enjoyment. Aesthetically pleasing to look at, easy to play, and simple to teach, it finishes in just under an hour. There is a certain amount of calm and serenity to be had while playing this game. It is not a bombastic earth shattering win, or a strategic resource control success, it is a learning experience where the lessons learned are only understood fully at the end of the game.
To bring this full circle, all of the game design philosophies mentioned differ in one major mechanical way. How they deal with random chance. Ameritrash glorifies it, Eurostyle mitigates it, Asiancore works with it. All of these styles blend at the edges with one another in their, miniatures, parts, production values, and player bases. It is random chance and how it is handled that is the guiding difference between these three game design philosophies.
Knowing your preferred method of interacting with random chance will help you determine the design style you will enjoy.
– Dru
AI was one of the tools used in the creation of the logos for Ameritrash, Eurostyle, Asiancore, and the Wadi quote.
Dru's Den of Ill Repute 