Words by David C. Obenour
“I confess that in 1901, I said to my brother Orville that man would not fly for 50 years,” Wilbur Wright.
The dawn of the 20th century proved to be the culmination for man’s long held fascination in reaching the skies. Ages of study and record could finally be matched with modern craftsmanship, ingenuity, and design. Aviation pioneers from all backgrounds and corners of the globe theorized, constructed, and ultimately manned their own treacherous tests in pursuit of being first.
Setting players at the desks of these historic figures and the helms of their creations, Matthew O’Malley and Ben Rosset’s First in Flight plays out over four years of monumental experiences, developments, repairs, upgrades, test flights, and recoveries.
Off Shelf: Can you talk about your own interest with flight? Did you have any previous interest in the early days of its invention?
Ben Rosset: I’m a bit of a history buff generally. I volunteer at my local county history museum, for instance. So when Genius Games was starting a new line about scientific history, Matthew [O’Malley, First in Flight’s co-designer] and I knew we wanted to be a part of it. We considered a few different themes. This one was the one that grabbed us the hardest.
OS: You included a number of pages at the back of the rulebook with biographies for many of the personalities. How did you research the game? Were there any books or sources that you found valuable to inform the historical content?
BR: Before starting the design, I read two books about the Wright Brothers. The one that was most helpful to informing the design was The Wright Brothers by David McCollough.
OS: Did anything about your research surprise you? Were there any fun stories in history that you discovered?
BR: I think the thing that most surprised me was how much research they did before even attempting powered flight. For a couple of years they just built and refined gliders, before they even tried to put an engine on one of them. I was impressed with their patience! It’s a good lesson for game designers. [laughs]
OS: Gaming can be such an unique approach to learning – especially with history. Can you talk about how you think play gives us a different insight and perspective?
BR: I love how gaming gives you the opportunity to explore how different strategies lead to different outcomes. You can play a game, make some decisions, and see what happens. And then in five minutes you can reset the game, play again, make new decisions, and compare the outcome to the last game. In that way, games are like a set of rules for a science experiment!
OS: I’m based out of Dayton, so don’t let it influence you, but does Ohio or North Carolina get to claim to be home of flight? Defend your answer or your non-answer!
BR: Way to put me in a no-win situation! [laughs] I think I’ll just go ahead and make everybody mad at me and say France, since that’s where the Wright Brothers’ first public demonstration took place.
OS: First in Flight is such a well thought out marriage of mechanics and theme. At its inception, knowing one idea had to come first, did you think of how the game mechanics worked together or the theme of the game? Can you talk about how one led into the other?
BR: Thank you for the kind words! This was definitely a theme first design. We wanted to make a game about the Wright Brothers and then went about figuring out how to marry the mechanics to the theme. I think the biggest eureka moment for me was when I recognized the inherent risk that early aviators assumed by taking to the sky. I knew we had to give the players that sense of risk, and push your luck felt like the way to do it. That’s what led to the main deck building push-your-luck mechanic.
OS: Were there any other elements of the history you wanted to include for First in Flight that didn’t quite end up working with your desired gameplay?
BR: Can’t say that there were. I guess we could’ve found a way to integrate a bicycle shop into the game, since that was the Wright Brothers original business, but I think we were able to get the main parts of the story that were important to us into the game.
OS: So much of the experience of a game is informed by the art and components. Can you talk about Tomasz and Amelia’s controbitutions?
BR: I absolutely love the box cover and the character art. They give me that feeling of a 19th or early 20th century world’s fair poster, which I think immediately puts you into the correct timeframe – and frame of mind – of the game. I imagine that’s not an easy task for an artist, and we are so appreciative of Tomasz’ and Amelia’s work on the game!