Obama-McCain Election Game Coming Soon

According to a post by Zev Shlasinger, president of Z-Man Games, at BoardGameGeek.com, the designers of the brilliant 1960: The Making of the President are working on a new game focused on the 2008 U.S. presidential election between Barack Obama and John McCain. Shlasinger said the 2008 game will be self-contained; it will not be an expansion. 1960: The Making of the President was my pick as the best board game of 2007, so I'm very much looking forward to playing the new game.

In the same thread on BGG, game designer Jason Matthews said, "I think the McCain campaign had at least three significant decision points: the vice-presidential nomination, the debates, and the response to the [economic] meltdown. McCain flubbed all three, though [Sarah] Palin was the least immediately obvious. That's why he isn't our president. I don't think those were inevitable (well, maybe his debate performance -- but even there he fell for kind of a verbal jujitsu). Anyway, the players will have the chance to prove that Obama was beatable."

Later, in response to a request that players be allowed to choose from several possible vice-presidential nominees, Matthews said, "I've been thinking about this very carefully, and I am inclined to think the answer will be yes, as it's kind of a pivotal question in the campaign and should be an element of strategy. Does McCain need to shore up his base? Or can he afford a choice with more appeal to swing voters like [Joe] Lieberman?"

Matthews also emphasized that the 2008 game will not have the same gameplay mechanics as 1960: "The 2008 game will have almost nothing to do with 1960, other than the fact that Christian [Leonhard] and I will have designed both, and they are both about a presidential election. The similarities end there. However, the system that we are creating may more easily port to different elections, particularly those in the last 20 years. So, if this works, and people enjoy the system, I would not be surprised to see it ported to some of the other elections people have mentioned."