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• Step 1: Create a popular webcomic. Step 2: Translate that humor into a card game. Step 3: Profit! The folks behind "Cyanide and Happiness" have stepped onto KS with Joking Hazard, their answer to the unprecedented success of Exploding Kittens. Mechanically, it's little more than a rehash of the Apples-to-Apples-after-dark formula popularized by Cards Against Humanity. (In fact, CAH co-designer Max Temkin himself provided a ringing endorsement that is displayed prominently on the KS page.) This is yet more proof that fanbases are willing to follow their favorite creators across mediums. Your move, xkcd. (KS link)
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• Tower defense is a genre that lends itself to cooperative play, but Gingerdead House breaks that mold. This game from designer Jonny Rivera and publisher Zafty Games draws inspiration from Plants vs. Zombies, but sets all the action in a world populated by creatures from Grimm's fairy tales. Punny humor is interleaved throughout (e.g., "get off my lawn, witches"), and the rulebook features a photo of the game devs looking for all the world like a punk band. (KS link)
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• The game is afoot, dear readers, in Mythos Tales (née Arkham Investigator) from designers Hal Eccles and Will Kenyon and publisher 8th Summit. Their design — which the BGG community has been print-and-playing since 2013 — draws heavily on the mechanisms of Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective, but drops the players in Lovecraft's Arkham to solve a series of mysteries involving the elder gods. Competitive, cooperative, and solo modes are all present here. Time to don your deerstalker caps and set to work! (KS link)
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• Grey Gnome Games is bringing the post-apocalypse to your tabletop with Siege of Sunfall from designer Jonathan Bouthilet. The wasteland art direction is awash with nods to Ralph Bakshi's 1977 cult-hit cartoon Wizards. The game arose out of The Game Crafter's challenge to make a fun game with the dreaded player elimination mechanism. Bouthilet's design, which went on to win the challenge, takes a soft approach as players can be bumped from the action for the duration of a round but never completely axed from the game. (KS link)
• The customizable-but-not-collectible card game is a hot genre right now, and designer David Sirlin of Sirlin Games is making his mark on the scene with Codex: Card-Time Strategy, a game set in the Fantasy Strike universe shared by most of his designs. Sirlin describes this as his "biggest and most ambitious work". Like many of its peers, Codex has a multi-level release plan, with a small "starter set" for cautious buyers, a larger "core set" for players who want to get serious about the game, and a KS-only "deluxe set" for jump-in-with-both-feet types. (KS link)
• Like many of the B movies that it spoofs, Zombie Tower 3D has a name that's rather on the nose. This game from designers Ryo Kawakami and Kiya Miyano is already on the market in Japan, but this is the first title in a push from publisher cosaic to become a conduit of Japanese designs — both their own and possibly others — to the U.S. and other markets. The foot-tall cardboard tower that makes up the game board is certain to draw attention at game night, as 3D components are wont to do. (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
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