Board Game News

Designer Diary: From Edo to Yedo

Hello, everyone! Since we now know that our game Yedo will be at Spiel 2012 (and the rules are available on BGG), I want to give you a little insight on how the game came to be. It was a great...

New Game Round-up: Two Titles from Steffen-Spiele, Rules from Eggertspiele and IELLO & Richard Garfield Gives You Power

• French publisher IELLO has unveiled a sweet promotional item for the debut of Richard Garfield's King of Tokyo: Power Up! at Spiel 2012 in October. Garfield will be at the IELLO booth (9-74)...

Ticket to Ride Lays Rails in Africa for Map Collection #3

Days of Wonder has announced its third release in the Ticket to Ride Map Collection: The Heart of Africa, from designer Alan R. Moon. Here's an overview of what distinguishes this expansion from...

Designer Diary: Revolver 2 ~ Last Stand at Malpaso - or - Well, it's the real article! Genuine, double-rectified bust head. Aged in the keg.

"The jig is up!" somebody shouts.The cathouse parlour then lights up the like the Fourth of July. Next to you, "Spider" pulls his pistol and works his way from one target to the next, holding...

Crowdfunding Round-up: Vineyards, River Boats, Werewolves & a Kickstarter Decree

• Viticulture, from Alan Stone and Jamey Stegmaier and Stonemaier Games, is another take on the "players as vineyard owners" genre that emerged a couple of years ago with Grand Cru and Vinhos....

Designer Diary: The Doge Ship

It may seem impossible, but the design of The Doge Ship took a very long time, probably longer than would be spent by the carpenters physically building the ship.However, let us start from the...

Designer’s Diary: 1984: Animal Farm, or Fascist Pigs from Outer Space

I'll be honest with you – I don't remember when exactly we came up with the idea of 1984: Animal Farm, although I think it might have been during some game of Cosmic Encounter. CE is one of the...

New Game Round-up: Galaxy Trucking Once Again, Taking Cash for Cultures & Writing Articles and Pub Hopping for Points

• Z-Man Games has opened preorders for both the English and the French versions of Christian Marcussen's Clash of Cultures – but only for pick-up at Spiel 2012 in Essen, Germany. Preorders...

Designer Diary: Fly Me to the Moon and Let Me Play Among the Stars

It's funny how some things end up coming to life – especially when you look at how they started and how they ended. One such case is the creation of Among the Stars, due out in late 2012 from...

New Game Round-up: Dice-Building in Middle-earth, Desperadoes in the Wild West & 10 Days in Germany

• German publisher Argentum Verlag has announced its release for Spiel 2012: Florian Racky's Desperados, which is a mostly cooperative game in which most players are outlaws trying to rob...

Links: Village Wins the 2012 Deutscher Spiele Preis, Quarto Keeps Selling & Award Nominees in Spain

• Is game design a genetic trait that passes from generation to generation? No, it's not, but you'd be forgiven for thinking so after viewing the winners of the 2012 Deutscher Spiele Preis. The...

Designer Diary: Phantom, or the Frightening Yet Funny Tale Behind the Game

Foreword: This article was first published in 2010 on my print-and-play webpage in the Hantise folder and is now revised for publication on BoardGameGeek in a shorter version. Below I refer to...

New Game Round-up: Release Dates from Mayfair Games & French Publishers Who Want You to Steal

• Italian publisher Ghenos Games presented a board game based on Arsène Lupin at Spiel 2011, and now French publisher Bombyx has its own take on the Lupin character and how to represent him in...

New Game Round-up: The Lost Legion Joins Mage Knight, Become a Garbage-Cleaning Robot & Knizia Gets Round the Table

• U.S. publisher WizKids has announced a December 2012 release date for Mage Knight Board Game: The Lost Legion, an expansion for Mage Knight Board Game from designer Vlaada Chvátil. Here's a...

Designer diary: Vampire Empire, or the Cylon which Became a Vampire

It's said that the best things arise from love, whether it's romantic love for another person, fascination with some artwork or story, or simply the human passion of loving what you're doing. So...

Links: Munchkin Keeps on Selling, Fundex Doesn't Sell Enough & Amateurs Have High Hopes for Sales

• In its Sept. 5, 2012 Daily Illuminator, Andrew Hackard at U.S. publisher Steve Jackson Games says that the company is blowing through the 23rd printing of Munchkin – 100,000 copies – much...

Crowdfunding Round-up: Medieval Mastery, Wild Fun West, Exodus: Proxima Centauri & More

• U.S. publisher Mayday Games announced a deluxe version of Dave Chalker's Get Bit! in August 2011 – with the new graphics and packaging come from French licensee Bombyx – and the funding...

Developer Diary: How Meeptropolis Became Suburbia, with a Bonus Game Preview Video

In the boardgaming world, a game is represented by two separate yet equally important groups: the designers, who come up with a good idea, and the developers, who make those ideas work. These are...

PAX Prime: Hot Rod Creeps, Story Realms, Sheepland, and More...

Hi, everyone,I had the chance to attend PAX Prime, held August 31-September 2, 2012, and capture several board game demos, which are posted below.If you'd like to view iOS and video game-focused...

Illustrated Report from Gen Con 2012

Gen Con Indy was held at the Indiana Convention Center in Indianapolis, Indiana, August 16-19, 2012. This marked the 45th anniversary of the nation's largest annual consumer hobby,...

Designer Diary: Pyramidion

Greatly influenced by collectible card games like Magic: The Gathering, Doom Trooper, Guardians and many others, I started very young creating my own card games. All of my ideas had one thing in...

Game Overviews at Gen Con 2012: Crude: The Oil Game, Legacy: Gears of Time, Four Taverns, Aztlán & Fantasy Flight Games

• Anton Torres, marketing operations manager for Fantasy Flight Games, gives an overview of what this U.S. publisher plans to release over the next 6-9 months, highlighting many titles...

Designer Diary: Atlantis Rising, or How Atlantis Rose from the Depths of Unpublished Games

Hello, fellow BGGers! My name is Galen Ciscell. By way of introduction, I am a Ph.D. candidate in Sociology and an avid gamer of all types (role-playing, video, board, and physical), though board...

New Game Round-up: Lost Valley Rediscovered, Bauza Shows His Goods & Goblins Go Badaboom

• Swedish publisher Gigantoskop will debut a new version of its card game Badaboom at Spiel 2012 in October, with this game carrying the name Big Badaboom and coming packaged in a ye olde...

A Quartet of Games from DEINKO: Skinny Racers, Racing RPS, Spice Stocks & Rainbow Rummy

Korean publisher DEINKO has released four games in mid-2012 that it plans to bring to Spiel 2012 in October, and since I've already added these titles to the database and the Spiel 2012 Preview...

Designer Diary: Even Olde New York Was Once Nieuw Amsterdam

It's difficult to believe that a city as renowned throughout the modern world as New York City started out with a completely different name. All the changes that the original colony – New...

Links: Hasbro's Hiring, Spiel 2012 Warm-up & Twilight Struggle and Chance Narratives

• On The New Inquiry, in an article titled "No Accidents, Comrade", Jeremy Antley approaches Matthews and Gupta's Twilight Struggle from an interesting academic angle. The opening...

Lamonts Promise to Have Players Spellbound for Spiel 2012

Since 2004, Fraser and Gordon Lamont have published one game annually through Fragor Games, starting with Leapfrog and going through the 2011 release Poseidon's Kingdom, which had all 900...

Designer Diary: The Battle of Red Cliffs, or a Portable Take on Mahjong Inspired by an Unusual Source

Note: Original text from designer Ta-Te Wu; posted by E.R. Burgess with a postscript from same.After the first edition of Tien Zi Que (TZQ) was published in Taiwan in 2009, people were asking for...

Game Overview: Seasons

Before being rushed away for emergency medical care, I give a rundown of Régis Bonnessée's Seasons from Libellud – what players are trying to do, the flow of the game, particular elements...