Moby-Dick...The Card Game

The creators are interviewed on the Awl.

From the piece...

You spent a lot of time trying to be faithful to the text and spirit of the book. Are you worried that will keep people who haven't read it away?

Joel: Absolutely. Everything gets checked against the book at every step. We would have rule conversations and there would be an impasse where I would say, "it cannot be this way [because it wouldn't make sense in the Moby Dick universe]." Some rules make the game so esoteric, and people who haven't read the book will ask why.

Tavit: We worry that it won't be applicable to people who haven't read the book, but I'm learning that the fundamentals of the game create a space for exploring the concepts in the book. Reading it is always going to be the best way to take it in, but the game can help. This is a bit of an apples to oranges comparison, but when Guitar Hero came out as a video game, people connected with the songs that were in the video games in a very different way because it was interactive. I was listening to music out of the game that I wouldn't have if I hadn't jammed on it in the game. In that same way, we're hoping that with this project, those weird esoteric rules become questions in peoples' minds and pull them closer to the text.