Once I established the color scheme for the beat cards, I used it as a basis for the illustrations as well. The letter colors matched the colors I used for the outline and fill of the figures, while the gradient fill in the background matched.
A second round of testing ensued with the illustrations printed on the back of the cards. What I found this time was that there was still little interest in engaging with the mechanics of story structure without an immediate payoff. Turning over the cards to reveal the illustrations meant first going through all 102 cards to pick choices and laying them out, all before receiving a payoff.
In addition, the visual system using colors was not working. Once printed, the colors were gaudy and distracting, and the sheer number of different colors made it look random rather than systematic. There was also no way that players were going to memorize nine different colors in order, which made the intent of the color scheme a moot point.
