"Architecture is the decisions that you wish you could get right early in a project." -- Ralph E. Johnson

Unless you can see into the future, getting those decisions right comes down to a collection of hard choices. But the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) of Carnegie Mellon University has turned those hard choices into a game. Literally.

According to the SEI website:

The Hard Choices game is a simulation of the software development cycle meant to communicate the concepts of uncertainty, risk, options, and technical debt. In the quest to become market leader, players race to release a quality product to the marketplace. By the end of the game, everyone has experienced the implications of investing effort to gain an advantage or of paying a price to take shortcuts, as they employ design strategies in the face of uncertainty.

Check it out for yourself:

• Download the Hard Choices Board Game
• Download the companion white paper: The Hard Choices Game Explained