Board Game News

Explore and Escape, Writhe and Spy, Quest and Kill in Eight WizKids Releases in Early 2018

• In 2018, U.S. publisher WizKids plans to continue its policy of releasing a new game every time we have a third quarter moon, thanks to the efforts of game finder Zev Shlasinger.In addition...

Designer Diary: Bug — Perceptual Binding, Identity, and Meaning in a New Sort of Polyomino Game

This post is about a game I've invented called Bug, a two-player game on a hexagonal board in which you build shapes that then eat each other. The shapes that survive grow into different, larger...

Frosted Games Teases Uwe Rosenberg's Reykholt for SPIEL '18

SPIEL '17 ended six weeks ago, so it's time to start looking ahead to what's debuting at SPIEL '18, right? Nusfjord is old news, yes? So let's move on to what's next from designer Uwe Rosenberg,...

Remember SPIEL '17? We're Still Posting Videos From That Show

Yes, six weeks after SPIEL '17 ended, we're still posting game demonstration videos that we recorded during that convention. Our SPIEL '17 playlist on YouTube boasts more than 170 videos so far,...

Links: Tokyo Game Market Attendance, Games in the Media, and a Neurosis-Inducing Neural Network

• Tokyo Game Market took place on Dec. 2-3, 2017, and this was the first time that the event lasted two days. Some exhibitors rented booth space on both days, and some were present only on one...

New Game Round-up: Steal Buttons, Assemble Cats, Compile Pages, and Color Pyramids

• In addition to the Viking-themed game Raids, which I covered in mid-November 2017, designers Brett J. Gilbert and Matthew Dunstan have a second title coming in 2018 from IELLO: the...

Designer Diary: Zombie Slam, or Two Brains Are Better Than None

Welcome to the Bamboozle Brothers' designer diary for their latest release Zombie Slam, published by Mercury Games. What terrifying twists and turns did this ghoulish game of quick reaction take...

In 2018, Bruno Cathala Brings Giants to Kingdomino, Leviathans to Abyss, and Sweet Dreams to Imaginarium

Not the cover!You will likely see Bruno Cathala's welcoming smile at many conventions and on many videos in 2018 as he once again has a huge number of releases in the pipeline from multiple...

New Game Round-up: Contests, Capers, Civilizations, and Crooks

• Upper Deck Entertainment has already released two games that make use of the myriad characters in the Marvel Comics universe, and come mid-2018 that number will increase by one thanks to the...

Designer Diary: A Big (Bang) Challenge, and a New Hope for Antimatter!

Physics Laws as Game RulesWhen I design games, I am always driven by a theme. In fact, when anything catches my interest (book, movie, visit, discussion...), I find myself thinking about what...

Crowdfunding Round-up: Book Space for Commie Hives in Montana

• Let's lead off this week's round-up with an unusual project: Book of Dragons from Robert Burke Games, with designer credit for this item going to Robert Burke (unsurprisingly), Martin...

Designer Diary: There and Not Back Again — The Lost Expedition to the City of Z

Normally I don't know exactly where my ideas come from, but in this case it's easy to pinpoint: David Grann's book The Lost City of Z. In this book, he retraces (sometimes literally) the steps of...

Still Waiting: An Update on Mayfair Games and Lookout Games

For those waiting for an update on the Mayfair Games situation, we're in a holding pattern at this point. As I noted in early November 2017, a number of Mayfair Games employees — Alex Yeager,...

Tokyo Game Market Preview for December 2017

I've created convention previews for Tokyo Game Market since November 2015, often because I was going to the show and wanted to create a list of what I should check out, a list I would then make...

Designer Diary: Flip Ships

The Beginnings of an IdeaSometimes mindless boredom is a good thing. In October 2015, I was attending a Protospiel event in my hometown of Madison, Wisconsin. I wasn't planning to go until...

Judge Dredd Revisits the Cursed Earth in 2018, Courtesy of Osprey Games

Non-final coverThe character Judge Dredd celebrated his 40th birthday in 2017, probably by running over a few scofflaws with his bike, and in 2018 Dredd will appear in Judge Dredd: The Cursed...

CMON Limited & Steve Jackson Games Announce Munchkin Partnership

On November 29, 2017, CMON Limited and Steve Jackson Games announced a multi-year partnership deal in which CMON will publish board games based on SJG's Munchkin franchise, starting in Q4 2018...

Latin American New Game Round-up: Tossing Dice, Seeds, and Hearts

It's been a while since I last gave an overview of new games from Latin America, but more and more interesting releases are coming from that part of the world. Here is another small collection of...

In 2018, Matagot and Surfin' Meeple Welcome Ants, Dragons, Fighters, Princesses, and More

• At BGG.CON 2017 in November, I mostly goofed off and played a few games, but I did check out the games forthcoming from one publisher and one distributor on site, those being Matagot and...

Designer Diary: Escape Room In A Box: The Werewolf Experiment

Escape Room In A Box: The Werewolf Experiment is a 60-90 minute cooperative game in which 2-8 players solve puzzles, crack codes, and find hidden clues to thwart a mad scientist's plot to turn...

Crowdfunding Round-up: Rush for Apocalyptic Battle in a Living Unicorn Museum After D-Day

• Holy Grail Games has been showing Eric Dubus and Olivier Melison's Museum at conventions since at least Gen Con 2016, and now the game is on Kickstarter to collect your dollars so that you...

Designer Diary: Ali Baba, or When the Sealed Cave Magically Opens

It All Starts with an Idea…We are Martino Chiacchiera and Remo Conzadori, two Italian game designers who met nine years ago on Inventori di Giochi.it, an Italian game designer website created...

Publisher Listings Tweaked on Game Pages

We make lots of small changes in the structure and function of the BGG database, many of them invisible to most people because either the changes aren't showy or most people won't care about...

On the Diamant/Incan Gold Merge

In March 2017, I sent out a note to many BGG users indicating that I was going to merge the game pages for Diamant and Incan Gold. Anyone who had rated either game or who had either game listed...

Game Preview: Decrypto, or Tricky Clues for the Clueless

Sometimes a game is more challenging to explain than it is to play. When learning such a game, you hear the explanation and all the words make sense, but you can't understand what you're supposed...

Betrayal Legacy Coming from Rob Daviau and Avalon Hill in 2018

At PAX Unplugged today, designer Rob Daviau and Wizards of the Coast president Chris Cocks announced the forthcoming release of Betrayal Legacy from WotC's Avalon Hill brand.As you might guess,...

Designer Diary: Calimala

Calimala is a Euro-style game in which players are members of the guild of merchants in foreign cloth, in Florence, around the 13th century.The game has a few twists on the classic worker...

New Game Round-up: Omens for Elder Signs, New Cases for Sherlock Holmes, and a Return Journey for Wrath of Demons

• Elder Sign, which debuted in 2011, has a new expansion due out in early 2018 from Fantasy Flight Games: Omens of the Pharaoh, which as you can tell from the cover are not good, but that...

WizKids to Publish Magic: The Gathering Board Game and Miniatures

WizKids has partnered with Wizards of the Coast to produce a handful of Dungeons & Dragons-related games, such as the D&D: Attack Wing miniatures game, the various D&D Dice Masters dice games,...

New Game Round-up: Ants Invade Micropolis, Gangs Ravage Necromunda: Underhive, and Patience Rewards Agricola Fans

• Designer buddies Bruno Cathala and Charles Chevallier (Abyss, Kanagawa) have a new title scheduled to debut in early 2018, most likely at the game festival in Cannes, France at the end of...