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By Tony Miller
The story of Kabuto Sumo began with my desire to create something for my son, Raphael. In early 2019 my excitement was at an all-time high as Fire in the Library, my first published game, lit up my social feed with people receiving their copies.
For those who don't know, Fire in the Library has a lot of text, especially for a six-year-old who is just learning to read. While it was "Daddy's game", it was not a game for Raphael. That uneasy feeling set my design brain to work on a game that we could play together. The next time a box with my name on it came home, I wanted to fully share the experience with him. It was important that my newest design would be "Raph's game".
I began looking for inspiration by listing everything I could think of that interested my son. I focused on activities rather than themes, which led me directly to his love of arcades. Raph's favorite games were redemption games; out of all of them, the undisputed champion was the coin pusher. The mad scientist laugh that emerged from his mouth any time a waterfall of coins clattered off the edge was (and possibly still is) the best noise on the planet.
Instead of prototyping big chunky wooden pieces, I took out a bunch of wooden discs from my copy of Catacombs. My initial ideas had players trying to knock discs off a board to score them. The pieces that were scored could then be risked in order to gain additional pushes, much like how coins knocked from the arcade machine allowed for additional plays. Raph found it amusing as an activity, and I knew that the actual action of pushing the pieces felt good, but it wasn't a game yet.
Other than gaming, professional wrestling is one of the things I am most passionate about in life. About two weeks after my initial brainstorming, I was watching New Japan Pro Wrestling's Dontaku event and inspiration struck like a bolt of lightning. The event opened with video of Japan in the spring, and amidst the cherry blossoms and torrential rain there was a shot of two beetles engaged in an epic shoving contest. I raced to Wikipedia to find out more about these beetles because their big round bodies pushing each other paralleled my big discs so closely in my mind. I learned Japanese rhinoceros beetles (kabutomushi or literally "helmet insect") emerge from the ground in the springtime and wrestle each other as part of their mating rituals.
"Raph's Game" immediately became Kabuto Sumo, and those big chonky beetle bois were going to be the stars.
Once the game had been reframed as a contest of beetle dominance, things quickly fell into place as my son and I played it every night. The board was now a Sumo ring, and pushing the opponent off the edge was the primary objective. Raph and I were having a blast pushing each other's beetle avatars around the ring, and we played well over one hundred times. I knew that I had succeeded in making a prototype that my son loved — but would anyone else like it?
I decided to bring it to the Stumptown Game Summit (SGS) here in Portland, Oregon. I got some very useful feedback and some pictures of it to post on social media, which ended up being critical to the future of the game. The initial curiosity and reception were incredibly positive, so I put it into my Origins luggage at the last minute.
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Origins was a whirlwind, and nothing prepared me for the reception that Kabuto Sumo received there. The Unpub room at Origins was an absolute gift to designers, and I spent most of the time that I was not working the convention floor in that room testing others' designs. It took me some time before I brought the game out because its short three-week design cycle had me doubting its readiness. Eventually I showed another designer who had seen the pictures from SGS.
Kabuto Sumo immediately started drawing a crowd, and without any prompting on my part, a twelve-person tournament had formed. By Sunday morning, word had gotten around, and I had people stopping me in the hallways to ask whether they could play.
I returned home with my head in the clouds. I was confident that if Kabuto Sumo made it to Gen Con, someone would want to sign it. I exploded with enthusiasm in the car home from the airport as I told Raph how many people loved his game. Even though I wasn't planning on attending Gen Con due to the cost of producing multiple prototypes of Kabuto Sumo in addition to travel and hotel expenses, I threw myself into preparing Kabuto Sumo for it wholeheartedly. It was at this point that I realized how unprepared I was to perform amateur board game manufacturing and reached out to the handiest person that I know, T. Caires. T. is one of the people in the industry who has always helped make it feel like home for me. Without them, I don't know whether I would be writing this designer's diary at all.
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Multiple Kabuto Sumo prototypes
The entire time I was working, I was assuming that these copies would still be going to Gen Con with someone else and just hoping the rough prototype would sell itself. Good fortune prevailed, though, as Carla of Weird Giraffe Games told me that if I could make it to Gen Con, I would have a place to stay as well as a badge. The dream was one step closer. Then Will Esgro entered the picture. I had met Will at Unpub during the initial promotional push for my first game, Fire in the Library. For me and Kabuto Sumo, he started a GoFundMe to raise money to get me to Gen Con; I have no idea what truly inspired this act of generosity, but he and sixteen other people contributed. I will never be able to thank them enough for this act of kindness. I cried from happiness as I bought the plane tickets, while Raph sat in my lap telling me that everything was going to be fine.
My trip to Gen Con turned out to be far beyond fine. An exciting meeting with Chad of BoardGameTables.com led to John Brieger and Michael Dunsmore leading the development, Kwanchai Moriya illustrating the game, a crazy Kickstarter, and ultimately Kabuto Sumo getting mass produced for over five thousand fans. This is the best game that I have ever designed, and the final version is incredibly beautiful and exciting.
So many people have been involved that it really feels the board game community willed this game into existence.
Kabuto Sumo will always be "Raph's Game", but if you bring it into your home, you have the opportunity to make it your game, too.
2. SIGNING
By Chad DeShon
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He started posting short videos of gameplay (like six seconds, a single turn really). Like everyone, I was instantly reminded of the coin pusher games at the carnival. I've always been enamored with watching them, but I've never really enjoyed playing them because you know it is rigged against you. Seriously. Watch some videos on YouTube. There is no way to win.
But how cool would it be to play a version of the coin pusher that isn't rigged against you? Even better, I'd have a real life human opponent.
I message Tony on Twitter, and we set up a meeting at Gen Con.
We had scheduled our meeting for something like 8:30 p.m., but even still we were both late getting there. Tony was coming off a celebration steak dinner for his previous game (Fire in the Library) being published, and I was coming from a similarly long dinner with my team unwinding from a day working in our booth.
The rules were exactly like how I guessed they would work from the short videos. We started playing in no time at all. That was a good sign. I really like games in which you can start playing quickly. We played twice, I think, then I asked to take the prototype with me so that I could play with some others from our group and get their reaction.
When looking to sign a game, it's not my job to evaluate the game and prototype I just played. It's my job to imagine what the game is going to look like after development, illustrations, and graphic design. I need to see that final product and decide whether that game is a compelling product. I loved the idea and had fun playing, but I had two main concerns:
• Regarding manufacturing, are we going to be able to make a ring and push platform that allows the pieces to slide smoothly? If the pieces catch and hang up while you are pushing, it can quickly zap the fun.
• Is it a game or a gimmick? I like a gimmick as much as the next guy, but we're interested in publishing only games that have some true strategy and hold up to repeated plays.
I quickly dismissed the first concern. We have an incredibly talented team. Anca has built 3D components for us before, and her husband (who helps us from time to time) is a 3D modeler. We have a great relationship with Panda Game Manufacturing, which has industry-leading ability and quality control. That group had already worked together to make the fantastic food tokens and anthill for Bites.
Tony and I had talked about adding another layer to the game — probably some odd-shaped pieces. I don't remember whether variable player powers were talked about then or whether they came up later. We weren't sure exactly how they would work, but thought those additions could keep every game fresh. I was confident that the developers I'd worked with before (on Loot of Lima) were up to the task.
Over the night, as I thought about the game, one thing kept coming back to me. As we played the prototype in the hotel lobby, it turned so many heads. Almost everyone who walked by wanted to see what we were doing. Many of them came over and asked us about it. I could literally see the universal appeal on real people's faces as they walked by.
First thing the next morning, I told Tony we wanted to sign it.
3. DEVELOPMENT
By John Brieger and Michael Dunsmore
Character Building
When we first talked to Chad and Tony about joining the development team for Kabuto Sumo, we could see pretty quickly that it was a special game. Just the core activity of sliding the pieces is incredibly satisfying — and even more exciting when you make your final move.
It’s called Kabuto Sumo. You play one of the 2 beetles (excuse the prototype pieces) & you are trying to push your opponent out of the circle using a coin dozer type mechanism like so: pic.twitter.com/awIknhDida
— Tony Miller (@beardedrogue) June 5, 2019
Original prototype from designer Tony Miller
Originally, the gameplay was much closer to a pure abstract. As developers, some of our goals were to add additional re-playability to the game and to give players unique personalities to play with. Thus the idea of having variable wrestlers was born. Inspired by board games like Santorini and video games like Super Smash Bros., we knew that bringing characters and personality to each player could really add to the investment and emotional connection players had with Kabuto Sumo.
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From left: Kabutomushi, Mukade, Wētā, Hercules beetle
There are millions of insect species in the world, most of which are incredibly interesting, so we researched and pulled a few real beetles, insects, and other creepy crawlies to find bugs that had real unique features that could inspire gameplay mechanisms. We created a list broken down by beetles and non-beetles. This list grew over the course of a couple weeks to roughly thirty bugs.
Early versions of the wrestlers' signature moves didn't yet include special pieces. We were just experimenting with how we could play with the systems of the game and give players variable incentives. Some of our very first ideas even made it into the final game.
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Borer the Explorer, a wood borer beetle, was ultimately cut, though this power made an appearance on The Pebble
Once we had the list of bugs, we cooperatively brainstormed and edited ideas. We assigned moves to wrestlers, tested and iterated on the moves, threw some out, moved them around, and slowly began to refine the move sets and themes. We paired insect behaviors with themes, puns, gameplay mechanisms, and special pieces. Some of you may even choose your Kabuto Sumo wrestler because of their real-life inspiration!
After we worked on these for about two months or so, developing core concepts, mechanical hooks, and selecting insects, it was time to bring back Tony for additional contributions on some theming.
Working with Tony was great — he's a huge wrestling fan and has a lot of knowledge on wrestling technique and traditions. For example, we have a bombardier beetle with its iconic boiling spray, which was the first stretch goal on the Kickstarter. At the time, it was called "Trebuchet". Tony mentioned that there was a heel technique used by wrestlers like the Great Muta and Great Kabuki called "Green Mist" — which led to the final theming of "The Great Metamorphosis".
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Kwanchai Moriya, the artist, took all these ideas and, using mood boards with tons of reference images, created the stunning artwork.
In the end, we trimmed our list of wrestlers down to the sixteen with the best gameplay and the most unique ideas.
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Making the Signature Moves
Part of what makes Kabuto Sumo so special is the complex physics of the wooden pieces pushing against each other. The different shapes, sizes, and weights all affect gameplay.
We ordered laser cut wood shapes of anything and everything we thought could behave differently or lean into the insect theme.
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The first piece order; to change pieces without ordering new laser cuts, we'd glue multiple smaller pieces together or add clay or tape to bulk out a shape, and to reduce the area, we'd sand or cut them down
One of our early discoveries was that some of our favorite pieces for gameplay have low or no rotational symmetry, which helps change their performance from a perfect circle. The Jewel Wasp's signature "jewel" piece, which began as a "Kite" shape, responds very differently depending on how you apply force to it. Its interactions continue to surprise us dozens of games later.
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The evolution of the Jewel piece, first prototype on left, near-final on right; as this piece developed, it got longer, increasing the amount of rotation applied from force near the end
We knew we wanted some of the shapes for thematic reasons, like the Stag Beetle's mandibles and the Giant Scorpion's tail. Getting those pieces working was more trial-and-error of figuring out the exact right sizes to get those pieces to work with the signature moves we envisioned. For example, it's important that the mandibles easily fit around a small disk but still allow space for your fingers to pick up the trapped piece.
A lot of pieces we tried didn't make the final cut, but testing a large variety was essential for understanding how the physics of the game worked and how different piece shapes could create surprising interactions.
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Some of the many prototype pieces that didn't make it into the final game. Who knows, maybe some of these could be in a future expansion?
After we had tested and refined signature pieces for every wrestler, the shapes were passed on to Anca, BoardGameTables.com's graphic designer. Not only did she clean up the rough shapes, but she had excellent ideas on how to make some of the pieces more thematic. For example, she saw the straight stick that was assigned to wrestler Teddy R. and transformed it into a more organic look.
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Development handoff pieces left, final pieces right. (Don't worry, we retested all the pieces after updates.)
The re-designed pieces were returned to us for final testing, and we were thrilled that each wrestler's signature piece is as interesting to play with as it is thematic.
Our hope is that as you discover the nuances of Kabuto Sumo's physics, you'll have fun exploring all the different interactions and find new strategies and techniques for each of the many wrestlers.
4. PRODUCTION
By Anca Gavril
Two of the first things Chad and I talked about for Kabuto Sumo was bringing Kwanchai as the artist and wanting players to have an exciting experience whenever pieces fall off the arena. This means the drama of a hanging piece and the noise of a piece falling off and rolling around the table. There should be "ooohs!" and "aaahhhs!" from everybody playing. It all meant that the arena and the pushing platform needed to be raised from the table as much as possible, but this idea was challenged by the fact that we had to fit all the assembled components inside our box. And importantly, in order to make the game affordable for everybody, we had to work with cardboard instead of wood. This was how the journey of sliding a piece between two elevated boards began.
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We added another wall to the pushing platform, hoping it would reduce the tilt, then we experimented with different shapes for the walls and smaller contact between the walls and the boards to see how they behave. These didn't work as the pieces would stop right in the margin of the arena when pushed from the platform and ruined all the fun. We realized that the boards desperately need a bevel that would smooth the sliding from the platform to the arena. We also moved the walls from the center of the boards to the perimeter and after testing and testing, we realized that this was it. The problem we encountered then was that we needed a perfect interlocking system that would allow players to manipulate the platform and the arena without everything falling apart and without applying glue.
This is where my husband, Filip Gavril, stepped in. With his passion and experience in creating his own wooden inserts for every single game we own, he designed the walls that interlock and assemble perfectly into the boards without any raised points along the boards. We tried everything at our local workshop, but were limited by the fact that we can't fold cardboard over there, and this was the main thing to test for both walls. Our collaborators from Panda were very helpful in sending us samples again and again with different interlocking systems and different heights for the walls just to make sure we tested and achieved the best solution.
And we're very happy that the process of die-cutting cardboard also involves a small bevel on the contour! Make sure you assemble these correctly, with the beveled margin on top for both the arena and the platform.
It was a long journey with a ton of testing and "what if's" but the final product looks impressive and works seamlessly. Both components fit inside the box without disassembling them after each game. You just place all the ammunition and the pushing platform inside the arena while the cards and everything else fit in the smaller compartment, near these. And just another hint from us: Don't apply too much force when sliding as it won't score you any bonus points. It's cardboard, after all.
We hope we did justice to Tony's design and Kwanchai's art; they are so special. It was a dream come true to work with them, as well as with John and Michael, who brought so much value and depth to the game.
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Draft of the Kabutomushi
By Kwanchai Moriya
As a friend of Tony's, I had a chance to play an early prototype of Kabuto Sumo and was immediately delighted by the game and felt a personal connection to its theme.
My favorite characters to illustrate were probably the Kabutomushi and the Giant Stag Beetle. They are very Japanese, and I've been on a sort of hunt to explore my own Japanese-ness as an adult. I'm half-Japanese and grew up in Chicago, visiting Japan only a few times. Once as a child, having spent a summer visiting my grandparents in rural Japan, I was given a wrestling beetle in a little plastic cage as a parting gift. Nothing could've been more exotic and fun for a midwestern kid from the suburbs.
Illustrating an Asian-themed project has been a unique experience. When my dad was a schoolboy, he'd play with these bugs, so it was rewarding to get his input on the project and have him help out by writing the Japanese lettering that is on the cover.
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