Game Preview: Pedal Power

By W. Eric Martin
July 7, 2007

Publisher: RS Design
Designer: Randy Schmucker
Players: 2-5
Playing Time: 45-90 minutes
Release Date: July 2007

At Origins 2007, Randy Schmucker unveiled his first published game—Pedal Power—from his own company, RS Design. Schmucker puts Pedal Power, a game based on bicycle touring, in the family game category, comparing its difficulty to Expedition and Ticket to Ride. “Pedal Power is the type of game that gamers can play with all types of people and still get enough to satisfy their appetite for games,” he says.

Pedal Power contains a mixture of set collection, hand management, planning, and puzzle-like analysis. Each player is a bicyclist trying to attend bicycling events around the country, and the player who collects the most Joy points wins the game.

Players start the game with six random Trip chips and one Tourist card. The engine driving the game requires you to hand in the right Trip chips so that you can attend a biking event and take Experience cubes, which come in five flavors: Winery, Tandem, Mountain Biking, Camping & Bed & Breakfast. If you have the right combination of experiences, you can exchange them for one of four face-up Experience cards, which earns you some Joy. On a turn, you can:

• Draw two Trip chips.
• Attend an event, with the cost to attend dependent on its distance and length; you can gain Joy and Misery cubes at the same time.
• Trade in Experience cubes for an Exp. card.
• Trade one Joy point for two Trip chips of your choice.
• Tell a story—that is, transmute your Joy and Misery (cubes) into Joy points. Yes, your pain enlightens others, thereby rewarding you as well. Any Misery still bogging your mind at the end of the game costs you points.

At the end of the game—which occurs when a player places his final pawn or a certain number of Experience cards are claimed—players reveal their Tourist cards to see who scores an endgame bonus. The bonuses go to the player who attends the most Tours, attends the most Expeditions, collects the most Experience cards, and tells the most stories.

“We have been avid bicyclists for many years and have been on organizing committees for large bicycle events,” says Schmucker about himself and his wife. “In addition, Connie has done marketing and publicity for several bicycle events both as a volunteer and through her work as executive director of a statewide bicycle advocacy organization.”

Schmucker is using these connections to cross-promote Pedal Power to a typically non-gaming audience, an effort that can lead to success for the budding designer and publisher of a niche game. “We plan to send a press release to some major national bicycle organizations and a major icycling magazine,” he says. “Connie recently started working for a local bike shop as advocacy director and is good friends with the owner of the store so she’s going to see if he’ll carry the game in his two stores in the near future. Once we see how much the demand is for it after these efforts, we may branch out to other bicycle retailers as well.”

Pictures - Click the picture for a larger version
	A bicyclist in motion tends to stay in motion
	The gameboard
	Tourist cards
	Experience cards

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