Jumanji

This board game was created for my second year Games Design course. The prompt was to combine a digital aspect into a game. I chose to make a movie-accurate copy of Jumanji, and use technology to replicate the curse on the game. This was my first time ever carving wood, but I was excited for the challenge and to pay tribute to a movie I love... and I think it turned out pretty damn cool looking.

Mechanics: The game is handmade to the measurements of the original movie prop. The "magic" was made through a Raspberry Pi and coding in Python. A screen was wired into the Pi, and sprite-sheets were used to replicate the riddles in the game. When a button on the side of the box is pressed, a new riddle would rise up from the green smoke in the middle. There are hidden power buttons on the side hooked up to the Pi which turn the machine on, as well as trigger the drum sound effect from the movie. This way as you open the box, the sound of drums fades in the same way it does in the movie, and the Jumanji start screen comes up automatically.

Box Production:

After finding the measurements of the original prop online, I was able to design the Jumanji box to still look the same on the outside, but have a different interior. I designed a hidden shelf under the box to allow access to the inside, and allow the mechanical bits to line up against the centre glass, and the hidden power buttons.

the lid and leaf designs i drew as vector images, which i then used in a CNC machine to cut out the base shapes. this gave me the guidelines i needed to hand carve the rest of the box, and smooth and shape the details. the box was carved out of dark cherry wood, and after the base carvings were done the wood grain looked so nice i decided to preserve it and just stain over the top, rather then do the acrylic paint wash that is shown in the film. this i polished off with natural beeswax sealant, so the wood smells wonderful every time you open the box and the color is sealed in.

My goal is to eventually make Jumanji a fully playable game. If anyone remembers as far back as the 90s, there was an absolutely horrible boardgame made based off of the movie Jumanji. I wanted to make an actual fun, playable game for adults. while this didn't fit into the time constraints for the project, i have the fully finished game idea ready to go, and I've turned it into one of my ongoing pet projects to model the pieces, draw the needed cards, and get the game rules polished to have Jumanji be a fun game to actually play, rather then a pretty decoration for my shelf (though my, how pretty that shelf is)