Recently, Czech Games interviewed “Deal with the Devil” designer Matúš Kotry. When asked about his childhood, Matúš shared that he started off as a child who loved playing video games. Eventually, he started not only playing them, but also creating and designing them just for fun
A Video Game Developer Turned Board Game Wizz
This eventually led to the decision to major in computer science in Brno in order to become a video game developer. While studying there, he discovered a board game club, where he got introduced to the awesomeness of modern board games. Even as an introvert who didn’t enjoy social events, he ended up loving the social aspect of them – meeting new people in a way that is comfortable for him.
This eventually led to him competing in an amateur board game design tournament by CBG (Czech Board Games), and even though he didn’t win it, he instead got motivated and continued to improve. This, in turn, led to the development and release of his debut game “Alchemists” and now – to “Deal with the Devil”.
In his words, “Deal with the Devil” is a strategic game for four players, where you build a medieval town. To do that, you need to trade resources with one another. Each player takes a secret role (so no one knows who the other player is) – there are two mortals, the Devil and the cultist. The mortals have three soul pieces, but are very poor in terms of resources.
The Devil has an abundance of resources, but no soul. He needs a soul to be able to defend himself from the Inquisition. The Cultist takes on a balancing role – he can sell his own soul to the Devil, but he can also tempt the Mortals and take their souls, which he can then trade.
Players are encouraged to engage in trading, but if you don’t want the Devil to win, you need to carefully consider how much of your soul are you willing to trade for those valuable resources.
Corruption in Politics Inspires “Deal with the Devil”
When asked for the game’s inspiration, Matúš shares that it is rooted in the dark side of politics – bribes, but felt the theme wasn’t interesting enough. One day, while driving home from the Essen game convention in Germany, he and his friends were passed by a red car with a license plate ending in “666”, which eventually inspired the devilish and medieval theme. He is then asked for the similarities to “Alchemists”, where he answers that both games are very thematic and very “heavy” – there is a lot of thinking and planning involved.
In the interview, we also understand that the game will also require an app to be played. While the game was not going to have an app originally, it was added in the very last year of development, simply because Matúš wanted to make the trading process a lot smoother. He gave continued praise to David Cochard, the same artist behind “Alchemists”.
In the words of Matúš – “Deal with the Devil” is suitable for people who like a strong theme and a strong strategic element. It certainly looks promising and definitely worth a check!