Crowdfunding Round-up: Mowing, Mining, Minis, Marriage, and Magic

• Kickstarter veterans Mayday Games are back with its latest offering, Mow Money, which was one of four finalists in a Protospiel design contest back in 2011. In this game from designer Matt Saunders, 1-6 players are running competing lawncare operations (how's that for an original theme!), bidding on jobs by trying to offer the most competitive price without pricing themselves right out of business — a reverse auction, in gamerspeak. Will you bring all the boys to the yard or wind up a sod? (KS link)

• In Get Off My Lawn, the legacy of the phrase popularized by David Letterman lives on. Designer Andrew WC Brown is self-publishing this small card game that lets you live out your curmudgeonly fantasies by trashing the lawns of your fellow suburbanites while transforming your own into the talk of the town. The cartoony art belies the take-that soul hidden underneath. I'm reminded of "A Vigilante Ripped My Sports Coat", that classic episode of The Dick Van Dyke Show in which crabgrass leads to violence. (KS link)

• Get your asteroid mining fix in Michael Eskue's Darkrock Ventures, a co-publication from Magic Meeple Games and Gamelyn Games, with the former handling KS campaign duties. The game features art from Naomi Robinson, who is building an impressive resumé in board game illustration. The volcanic eruption of worker placement games from the past several years has cooled, leaving space (heh) for this new entry in the genre. Fortunately, the asteroid has no indigenous lifeforms — Na'vi, necromorphs, or otherwise — to prevent the extraction of the mineral MacGuffins. (KS link)

• If you're really feeling the need for some hostile xenos, maybe take a look at Alien Labyrinth from designer Robert Huss. Originally available as a print-on-demand production from The Game Crafter, the game now has an all-new look (goodbye, sweet ambigram!) and a new publisher in Foam Brain Games. This is Foam Brain's first solo venture into publishing a board game, but they're not exactly KS greenhorns, having run a handful of campaigns for tabletop-related paraphernalia over the past several years. (KS link — update, Jul 19: Cancelled!)

• One-man operation Dr. Finn's Games is back foraging for funding on KS so that Steve Finn's latest design Foragers can see the light of day. Finn is well-known for his "fillers", but promises that this design breaks that mold, with heavier thematic integration and a 60-minute playing time. The food spoilage tracking mechanism is nifty; if that was around in the Paleolithic, I can't believe it's not standard issue for modern fridges! Certainly would have helped Tom Cruise in The Minority Report... (KS link)

• Some of the hottest products in geek culture right now are licensed vinyl figures. Funko is leading the charge in that department, but Chase and Sean Layman have their own line of indie vinyl toys and have now created a companion game for them called Rivals: Masters of the Deep, in which asymmetric forces battle for supremacy undersea. Given the theme and toy-like nature of the game, I'm instantly transported to the mid-1990s when LEGO produced its "Aquazone" theme. And no, I definitely did not just spend an hour nostalging on Brickipedia. (KS link)

• Although not as popular as that other zombie survival franchise, Zpocalypse from GreenBrier Games and Jeff Gracia has been successful in its own right. The newest addition to the product line, dubbed Zpocalypse 2: Defend the 'Burbs, is a co-operative tower defense game. If you're wondering for how much longer zombies will rule pop culture, read this Wall Street Journal article arguing that zombies are a manifestation of cultural unease and therefore "thrive during times of recession, epidemic and general unhappiness". So it might be a while! I say we go to the Winchester, have a nice cold pint, and wait for this whole thing to blow over. (KS link)

• The new Emma Expansion for Marrying Mr. Darcy is notably zombie-less, as long as you don't count some of the droller suitors. Designer and self-publisher Erika Svanoe has tapped into another of Jane Austen's classic works so that you can continue to roleplay genteel life in the British Regency era. Surely this game would be a sensible addition to your estate. That's what I'm going to call my board game collection now: my "estate". You see, I don't buy games for me; I'm building a family legacy. Yeah, that's it. Think of the children! (KS link)

• 100 Swords might be the next hit microgame from Samuel Strick and Clayton Grey of Laboratory Games, the publisher behind 2014's Province. To stay true to the "micro" label, the content in this deck-builder has been divided into two separate 54-card decks that will function as standalone products. The illustrations have an Adventure Time flavor that certainly won't hurt the game's mass-market appeal. Do the math (25 swords per deck) and you'll get a hint about their future plans for the game. That's right — I've got a mind like Valyrian steel. (KS link)

• As further proof that deck-building is not a dead-end genre, BATTALIA: The Creation is exhibit A. The game, developed by Bulgarian studio Fantasmagoria, is one of those kitchen-sink thematic designs, combining map construction, deck-building, and area control. Designers Alexandar Guerov and Ledha Guerova seem to be channeling Heroes of Might and Magic, and that probably tells you all you need to know about whether it's a game for you. If the glamour shot below is any indication, it's the kind of game you can play at the Winchester while having cold pints and waiting for the zombie apocalypse to blow over. (KS link)

Editor's note: Please don't post links to other Kickstarter projects in the comments section. Write to me via the email address in the header, and I'll consider them for inclusion in a future crowdfunding round-up. Thanks! —WEM