Since 2008, CIA Senior Collection Analyst David Clopper has created three board games designed to test the agency’s employees. Although they used to be a secret, the combination of a recent public showing and a Freedom of Information request led to the release of the games’ rules and paperwork. And Two Bats Gaming used this information (which included board game design and card graphics) to recreate one of the board games called Collection by creating the game’s assets from scratch.
Collection is a co-operative game that has players manage multiple international crisis and forces players to work together against these threats.
“This game is really about value of collaboration,” Clopper said. “We saw [game sessions] where people took the time to talk to one another, talk about your [individual] capability, how we can work together, or thought ahead, strategized, ‘I go first, you go next.’ They tended to win. The tables where someone would go on their own and do what they wanted, or do their own thing, or didn’t collaborate until too late, they couldn’t catch up to the crises. It was a simulation of what we do, but also teaching the importance of working together.”
Although the recreation of the game isn’t released to the public, Two Bats Gaming’s responses to gamers asking about a future release suggests that it’s on the way.
“We’ve been discussing the legalities with a number of relevant parties,” they said in one YoutTube comment. “We’ll be releasing an update on the release of the print & play files later this week. Hold tight, good news on the way!”
If the game does get released, it will probably include some changes to make it more accessible. After all, this is a game that was designed to test CIA employees, not to provide fun and entertainment.