DESCRIPTION & INSPIRATION

Highline is a board game designed for NYUAD students, simulating the experience of navigating through university life toward graduation. The game embodies the academic and social challenges encountered by students, represented through a journey across a game board that abstractly mirrors the Highline residential complex. As players make their way along the board, they accumulate credits, akin to completing courses, with the goal of reaching graduation, symbolized by arriving at D1. This concept explores the balance between strategic planning and the unpredictability of college life.

In designing the system, we aimed to convey this interpretation by integrating key elements that capture the essence of the university journey:

Academic and Social Challenges: The game cleverly integrates the academic and social hurdles that students face. This blend of elements ensures that players must balance their strategies to advance academically while also maintaining their well-being and social connections.

Credits as a Measure of Progress: Credits serve as a tangible measure of progress, akin to completing courses in real life. Players must strategize on how to efficiently accumulate these credits, reflecting the real-world challenge of managing course loads, electives, and extracurricular activities. The game's credit system encourages players to think critically about their moves and the potential outcomes, just as students must carefully plan their academic careers.

Unpredictability and Strategic Planning: The game mirrors the unpredictability of college life through its gameplay mechanics. The roll of the dice dictates movement, introducing an element of chance that can change players' fortunes instantly, much like the unexpected challenges and opportunities that arise in university life.

However, strategic planning is crucial. Players must make decisions at various points, such as whether to take certain risks for more credits or play it safe, mirroring the strategic decisions students make regarding their academic paths and social engagements. The map itself is designed to allow different strategies with various paths. In addition to that, special places on the map, Faiza, Faizan, and Public Safety, are placed strategically to ensure that anything can happen to any player at any time. Besides, the contents of the Faiza and Faizan cards make the game totally unpredictable as players always have the ability to affect other players’ credits by making them lose or earn credits. These details make the game engrossing.