Pulp

Pulp is a cooperative game which helps you use paper-protoyping to explore and refine your initial ideas for a digital project.

In Pulp you win or lose as a team, and even if you decide that you've lost you'll probably decide that you've learned enough to make the game more than worthwhile.

Setup

What do we need?

• Time
  • You can play your first game in a set time of 1.5 hours and expect to discover some useful things.
• Space
  • For each team you'll need a table to work at. If it is smaller then A1 size you'll probably feel cramped.
• Company
  • You can play Pulp solo, but it is much more fun as a team. For the best fun have more than one team playing at the same time! Three is a very useful team size in Pulp games.
  • It is best to have a mix of folk. Anyone can get involved. It is useful if they've looked through How to be a good Pulp player
• Stationery & Tools
  • Pulp games use a lot of stationery. For each team you'll need at least:
    • 1 sheet of A2 card
    • 5 sheets of A4 card
    • A set of printed parts
    • A set of printed 'Pulp' rules
    • A pair of scissors
    • A black marker pen
    • Some sticky-tack
  • More and more diverse stationery and tools can really add to the creativity and fun in a game of Pulp. Please see Stationery Powerups for some favorites (warning: may contain brand names).
• A Problem to Explore

How to Play

A game of Pulp is played over one or more rounds and each round has the same four phases so you'll always know where you are.

Phase 1. Defining

Each team should fill out a problem sheet or reassess their problem sheet from the previous round (it is totally normal in Pulp to realise that the problem you're working on is, in some way, the wrong problem).

Phase 2. Solutionizing

Each team should use a combination of ready-made parts, and custom parts they create themselves, to build a paper-protoype of their solution to the problem. If this is your first time using paper-prototypes you might want to check out Why Paper?.

Phase 3. Testing

Each team should all take on roles and responsibilities from the Testing a Paper Protoype sheet, then they should play through the testing minigame. This is the moment when having more than one team in the game really helps.

Phase 4. Iterating

Each team should discuss the results of the testing phase and try to make changes to the prototype to incorporate the things they discovered.

Phase 5. Game End

A game ends for one of 3 reasons:

• The players decide they've solved their problem - A WIN!
• The players decide they'll never solve the problem - A LOSE!
• You reach the end of a prearranged time or number of rounds without solving the problem - A DRAW!

If you've checked these three things, and none of them has happened it is time to start a new round!

You might be worried that a game of Pulp will be a big effort and might not result in a win for your team... Try not to worry. Good things almost always come out of a Pulp game, win or lose. Take a look at Win by Losing for tips about how to find the positives.