Board Game News

Command the Four Humours, and Push Bugs to Their Doom

• U.S. publisher BoardGameTables.com is closing out a Kickstarter (link) on Friday, Nov. 13, 2020 for Kabuto Sumo, a 2-4 player game from Tony Miller, a.k.a. Bearded Rogue on Twitter and a...

Designer Diary: Whistle Mountain, or How Beers and Pentomino Tiles Led to Dirigibles Saving Workers From Drowning

It was Thursday, March 9, 2017, and my pizza was getting cold. I was at the Round Table Pizza in San Jose for prototype night — except it wasn't a normal night for me or my co-designer Luke...

Dive Through Transparent Cards, and Smash Up Tiny Evergreen Goblins

• In Sept. 2020, I wrote about Rush Out!, a real-time game then due out in October 2020 from Belgian publisher Sit Down! That title, like so many others, has been delayed, with the new...

Explore Galapagos in Darwin's Journey, and Use a Llama to Deliver Dye

• Darwin's Journey is an involved Eurogame coming from Simone Luciani and Nestore Mangone (designers of Newton) and ThunderGryph Games, with a Kickstarter planned for January 2021.Here's an...

Designer Diary: Blue Skies

Game designs come from many places. Sometimes a designer will start with a mechanism and aim to build a game around that mechanism (and perhaps many others, as well). Often a designer will start...

Construct a Game Board Engine, Build Towers, and Split the Crowd in Half

• Let's look at a few more titles that will debut at Tokyo Game Market, which will take place on Nov. 14-15, 2020, starting with the debut title from designer shiobana and publisher LLC YS:...

Avoid Scandal, Complete Shared Goals, and Bend Spoons with Your Mind

• Tokyo Game Market is only one week away from the publication of this post, running over Nov. 14-15, 2020 with both an on-site physical presence and a streaming site, so let's check out a few...

Become the Roman Empire’s Next Medical Genius — or a Dominant Arthropod

In late October 2020, Ion Game Design and Sierra Madre Games launched a Kickstarter campaign for two new 2021 releases worth checking out: Harry-Pekka Kuusela's Galenus and Phil Eklund's Bios:...

Disable Bombs, Command Flying Squirrels, and Become Queen of Japan

Unlike some other parts of the world, Japan has done a decent job of keeping COVID-19 in check — 103K cases total vs. 100K new cases in the U.S. on Nov. 4, 2020 — so perhaps it's not...

Artist Diary: When Two Passions Collide

I have always loved board games, and I have always been drawn to art. (Get it? "Drawn" to art? Okay, yes, that was a bad pun. Keep reading, please.) However, I never would have thought that both...

Cast Spells, Create Quilts, and Lose Fingers in These Pre-2020 Games

In my non-stop quest for game announcements and information, I often run across older titles that might have received little to no coverage and think, "Well, that's neat. Too bad it was...

Designer Diary: Campaign Trail, or How to Hold an Election on Your Table

Happy U.S. Election Day everyone!Today is as good of a time as any to talk about my favorite election-themed game: Campaign Trail. I would like to give you some insight into what makes a good...

Build Temples, Catch Suspects, and Claim Land with Games from Iran

One of the benefits of the SPIEL.digital 2020 convention is that publishers from Iran could participate without needing to worry about having their visas denied or shipments of games halted, as...

Lucca Comics & Games 2018: Flamme Rouge and Cosplay

Yes, that's right — Lucca Comics & Games 2018! The 2020 event was originally scheduled to take place Oct. 28 through Nov. 1, but since I'm missing out, I thought I'd share yet another post that...

Links: Spielwarenmesse 2021 Gets Delayed, and Aleph Null Gets a Soundtrack

• In 2021, Spielwarenmesse — the annual toy and game fair that takes place during the intersection of January and February each year in Nürnberg, Germany — will instead be held July 20-24....

Dive into the World of Flotilla with Seastead

In August 2020, Eric Meyers from WizKids demoed a couple of its upcoming 2020 releases for me on Tabletop Simulator. I had the pleasure of playing a full game of Ian Cooper and Jan Gonzalez's...

Designer Diary: Beyond the Sun, or Beyond Tech Trees

Back in 2014, I was obsessed with Sid Meier's Civilization V, a 4X computer game in which players control a civilization from ancient through modern times. I was enamored of its technology tree,...

Critical Role Moves to Tabletop with Darrington Press; Warchief Gaming Prepares for Publication

Two new tabletop game publishers announced themselves in late October 2020, with both originating from existing gaming organizations.• The web series Critical Role has launched Darrington...

Travel Fjords, Botanic Gardens, Silicon Valley & More with Grail Games

During SPIEL.digital 2020, David Harding from Australian publisher Grail Games announced several new titles in its 2021 and 2022 line-up on top of Reiner Knizia's Whale Riders (which I covered in...

Seize the New Carpe Diem, and Deliver the Beatdown in Naruto: Ninja Arena

• During SPIEL.digital 2020, Ravensburger announced that its alea brand will now be led by André Maack following Stefan Brück's decision to leave the company in mid-2020. Maack has been with...

Author Diary: How to Host a Game Night

I love game nights.This is BoardGameGeek, so that comes as no surprise, right? Pretty much everyone here loves game nights.For me, a great game night (or game event) can be a quiet evening at...

Get Together for Descent: Legends of the Dark in Q2 2021

During its 2020 Gen Con Online In-Flight report, U.S. publisher Fantasy Flight Games teased a new take on its well-loved game Descent: Journeys in the Dark, which debuted in 2012.At the start of...

Designer Diary: Under Falling Skies

Game cover by Kwanchai MoryiaYou are facing an alien invasion. Hiding in a base below the city, you must defend yourself long enough to research a weapon and repel the enemy.Under Falling Skies...

Interview: Phil Walker-Harding Looks Back on His Career

[Editor's note: This interview was first published on Diagonal Move on September 25, 2020. —WEM]Phil Walker-Harding, designer of Sushi Go!, Bärenpark and Gizmos joins Neil Bunker from Diagonal...

Charles S. Roberts Awards Pending, Plus Wargames for Two from Worthington, Hollandspiele & GMT

• In June 2020, I posted an article announcing the exciting comeback of the Charles S. Roberts Awards for Excellence in Conflict Simulation after seven years of inactivity. Well, today I'm...

Game Preview: Switch & Signal, or Funneling Trains to Marseille

BGG.CONline — our game demo livestream — starts on Oct. 22 at 12:00 p.m. EDT (UTC-4) just 90 minutes from me writing these words, so let me invite you to join us on the stream to get...

Designer Diary: Gods Love Dinosaurs, or Making Mechanisms Mesh

I have never played the game Silk — but I heard Shut Up & Sit Down's review of the game, and they really liked the moments when the monster ate worms. ("Nom, nom, nom!")That made me want to...

Designer Diary: Praga Caput Regni

Starting PointFor only the second time in my game design history — Last Will was the first — theme was the starting point for the design process for my latest game: Praga Caput Regni in this...

Lookout Sows Fields to Produce Hallertau, More Agricola, and Patchworks Galore

• Uwe Rosenberg's two-player game Patchwork was a hit when it debuted in 2014, and it's continued to find new fans in the intervening years. (Here's a quick overview of the game if it's still...

Designer Diary: Lost Ruins of Arnak — The World, The Language, The Art

My husband Elwen and I work for Czech Games Edition, where we develop and playtest games and organize playtesting events for CGE's upcoming titles. This year is special for us as the game that we...