My First Game Experience in China

The first time I played a board game in China was in 1995. I was crashing at a friends house in Xiamen. It was during the Labor Day holiday. I was sitting on my friend’s wood sofa watching TV. (I distinctly remember that it was a movie staring the actor from Highlander, Christopher Lambert, where in he played sort of a brain-washed bomber/assassin). I was drinking beer and was a little drunk. My friend’s girlfriend and her friends set up a Monopoly set and started playing. As I was watching my show while the girlfriend and her friends played the most friendly game of Monopoly I ever saw. Their game went on for about an hour without anyone winning. No one was bargaining. I politely asked them if they would mind if I played with them and we start the game over. They agreed.

I sat down with them and started to play. By about 30 minutes into the game, they were cursing at each other, using the Chinese words for mother f**ker repeatedly. I just did my thing. “What!? If you trade him Baltic and New York for Kentucky and a railroad, he will win. Do you really want him to win? Because if that’s what you want, its OK.”

I lost that game because of bad rolls at the beginning. I’m not so into Monopoly because the game tends to be too luck-based. I am likely to win most games in which luck is not the primary element. But it was a very fun game. I think my friends had fun too. However, I don’t think Monopoly is an ideal board game for Chinese people. I don’t think that they actually like the idea of screwing over their friends through bargaining and property speculation. Screwing over strangers is OK though. And I think high-drama games can be a little too intense for Chinese people to really enjoy.

Chinese people like hexie-hemu (和谐和睦 ) This means basically that everyone should just get along. It connotes that its not good to “rock the boat”. It connotes that it is not so good to stand-out. Its not good to cause trouble. My old boss talks about hexie-hemu in very derogatory terms. “No one wants to confront this asshole trouble-maker. They just want hexie-hemu.” My last boss is a very un-harmonious man… like myself.

Chinese people do play traditional PK games; Chess and Weiqi (“Go” to Americans). However, “modern” PK games – like “Magic: The Gathering” – have done poorly in China. Our Chinese distributors tell us that when talking about “hobby” games and “modern” games, they tend to like games with these characteristics:
- No chance of getting knocked out of the game early
- Opportunity for multiple people to win at the same time, possibly through sanctioned alliances
- Flexible player limit so a group of 5+ people can play the game at the same time
- Not a whole lot of bloody conflict; less drama
- Chinese people MUST be familiar with the background story of the game.

Funny thing is, this describes most of the team-building games I developed and/or ran for corporate teams while I was a consultant. Always win-win games. Many people or few could play. And people were often loath to confront the group-leaders who didn’t perform well.