There are many types of hooks, but I think thematic hooks are important to pay attention to, if only because it is so easy to go overboard when talking about a game's setting while also never really saying anything exciting.
I hope we have all moved past the idea that "boring" themes don't sell.
Life Lesson: Raising emotional stakes is great for creative projects; lowering emotional stakes is good for conflict resolution. Some things are not worth getting upset over.
The idea of adding conflict to a theme sounds problematic in the era of cozy and "conflict-free" games. But I stand by my belief that games require goals and obstacles definitionally (feel free to argue with me about this though), and OBSTACLES ARE CONFLICT. Conflict =/= violence. Conflict is when something stands in the way of a goal.
If you want to know how not to increase conflict, read about TV shows that jump the shark.
Re: adding urgency. Board games have defined limits on play sessions, typically. So that short window into the world of the game almost always benefits from a reason why players are taking action now (in the theme) as opposed to earlier or later. Urgency does not need to mean the world is doomed, it can mean some simple event kicked off the reasons for gameplay.
I missed this in the episode, but I'm really talking about reframing the theme you have to strengthen the hook. So, you don't necessarily need to change anything in the game, so much as express some of the "why's" more clearly and using language that will drive player investment by creating a sense of drama.
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