What are forum games?
“A forum game is a text-based multiplayer game played on an Internet forum. Simple examples include word association, hangman, "Count to a Million …” At least that’s what Google defines a forum game as.
Forum games are text-based games you play over the forums. While pictures and graphics can be involved, it’s fundamentally based off posts made by users.
What are the different types of forum games?
There isn’t any official list of forum games out there, but there are certain types of games that you might see popping up in the forum commonly. These include:
Mafia - In a mafia game, there are two teams. The first group is usually the “mafia”, while the other group is often called the “townspeople” (Note: many of these games will have different labels for the group). The Mafia is generally a smaller group, but unlike the townspeople who are fundamentally clueless, people in the mafia know who everybody in their group is. Meanwhile, the townspeople only know there are a certain amount of people in the mafia, but not who is in which group.
The game is usually set in days in nights. During the nights, the mafia people choose somebody to kill, while at day the townspeople attempt to figure out who is part of the mafia, who they will ultimately vote to kill.
Werewolf - “Werewolf” forum games are a variant of Mafia games. Instead of their being a team of mafia, there is one werewolf. Like in other mafia games, the “townspeople” try to figure out who the werewolf is, while the werewolf kills off townspeople one by one.
Question/Trivia - Question or Trivia games are what they sound like. The set-up is that a person/people ask questions, and the people answering the questions get points for answering them. There are many ways this can be done; asking about images, certain topics ect.
Role-Playing (RP) - In a role-playing forum games, you do exactly what it says: You play a role. Generally in a role-playing forum games or ‘RP’ (you’ll more commonly see it written this way) you play as a specific character with others, and battle in a made up world that the original poster has created. It also often follows some sort of storyline provided by the thread creator, and moved along by game participants.
King of The Hill - A king of the hill game is generally more simple and casual. Instead of having to follow too many rules, the simple purpose of the game is too think a creative way to get somebody off a fictional hill, so you can claim it your own.
Competition/Tournament - In this game multiple people compete by completing certain challenges to advance to the next game. These games often involve flash games, though not exclusively.
Remember:
Use common sense and good judgement when making a game. We do close games that aren't much of games such as "Count to a million", "Rate the.....", etc. Remember, the best way to keep your game open is to keep smart when making it.
Keep your games manageable. Over reaching with unrealistic ideas or not organizing your game enough may cause it to fail. This isn't to say that it should be sadly simple, but remember what you're capable of.
Also note that many games in the games in this forum aren't going to fit exclusively into one of these categories. There will be many game that mix these up, and many others that are something new completely. If you aren't clear how a game works, ask the creator on what you're unclear about.
What does ____ mean?
If you’re wondering what something in a game means, but you’re too embarrassed to ask, this might help you. Here’s a list of some popular terms used in forum games:
Godmoding - When somebody has the ability to modify the game a decide the fate of other players. Usually only game creators are allowed to godmode.
Day/Night - When a game title includes something like “Day 1” or “Night 3”, it’s usually a mafia game. Days and nights are different phases in the game where something happens, depending on the game.
Role - A role is the character you play in a game, usually an RP or mafia. Often the original poster will include the different roles.
Role revealing - This is when somebody reveals the role of themselves or somebody else, usually in a mafia game. This is generally against the rules.
Sign-ups - Threads with a [sign-ups] tag on it are for getting a certain amount of people in their game. If you see one of these, the game is interesting, and you think you can commit to it, go ahead and join!
Replacements - These are people who replace users who sign-up but are inactive.
FGF Short for Forum Games forum, which is where we are right now.
Is there any additional info I should know?
There isn’t anything else worth covering at the time, but if you have any suggestion, make sure send one of the forum mods (Marh, Gevock, Frogmanex or arcaneCoder) a whisper and we’ll see what we can do.
Here are some additional pages you might want to read:
Forum Games Forums Guidelines
FGF Directory
Forum Game - Wikipedia
Game Tips
