Donald Duck Holiday Game: A Numerical Analysis of a Game of the Goose Role-Playing Variant

The paper examines the 1996 Donald Duck Holiday Game, a role-playing variant of the historical Game of the Goose, using a Monte Carlo simulation of 10,000 games for each player count from two to five. Its central aim is to assess whether the game's duration and character balance are acceptable, and whether its richer narrative compensates for length. The analysis draws on game-property criteria adapted from prior work on drama in goose-like games, focusing on duration, win balance, lead dynamics, and idleness.

The simulations show average game lengths ranging from 69 rounds with five players to 123 with two, with a substantial right tail: over 25% of games exceed one hour of estimated human play, and lengthy outliers reach several hundred rounds. Character balance is the clearest deficiency, as the bus and car characters (Goofy and Donald) win roughly 30% more often than the others, a difference attributed mainly to fewer random event cards, which are predominantly negative and disproportionately affect walking, bicycle, and motorcycle characters. Lead and idleness metrics are generally reasonable, though idleness approaches a quarter of turns in four- and five-player games.

The author attributes the game's longevity partly to its micro-narratives and recognizable characters, while noting that repeated high-impact events erode credibility. Proposed modifications, such as removing certain weather cards and capping the repeatable "forgotten item" events, substantially reduce both average duration and extremes while producing a more even distribution of wins. The study concludes that simple simulation can reveal balance problems in role-playing game variants that are otherwise difficult to anticipate.