Board Game News

Manage Your Reputation at the Dog Park, Listen for Echoes, and Take Tricks Daily

• Lottie and Jack Hazell are the hosts of the "Board Games with My Wife" podcast, and in late 2021 they plan to move into publishing under the name Birdwood Games with the Kickstarter launch of...

Tulips and Canals from Uwe Rosenberg, Vector-Based Racing from Spartaco Albertarelli

• German publisher AMIGO has teased its game releases in the latter half of 2021, promising detailed information about the games on August 2, 2021. Since I somewhat know what the BGG audience...

Welcome Cats & Dogs to Your Fort, Enhance Your Defenders of the Realm, and Battle with Tanks in North Africa

• In 2020, Leder Games released the playful and uniquely-themed deck-builder Fort, a remarkable reimplementation of Grant Rodiek's 2018 hidden gem SPQF, featuring Kyle Ferrin's dope signature...

Return to Jamaica, Build Rail in Imperial Steam, and Struggle with The Queen's Dilemma

• French publisher Space Cowboys has announced a new edition of Jamaica, a racing-and-fighting game from Malcolm Braff, Bruno Cathala, and Sébastien Pauchon that first appeared in 2007 from...

Merge Islands in the Clouds, and Become One with Fernando Pessoa

BGG's SPIEL '21 Preview is coming along nicely, with 180+ titles listed as of July 13, more than three months ahead of the event taking place. Side note: This preview, along with all other...

Designer Diary: Brew, or Designing the Whimsical Wilds

I enjoy prototyping with circular colored stickers — the cheap kind you would use for a garage sale. The process is somewhat meditative and feels intuitive, creating a nice starting place for...

Game Overview: Cover Up to Win Dream Catcher and Rip Off

Today I'm covering two games that play similarly, games that challenge your visual perception and your ability to hide things from view.Dream Catcher from Laurent Escoffier, David Franck, and...

Struggle for Life in Nick Bentley's Meadow

I've already written about one 2021 game release titled Meadow in January, and now I'm going to cover another game with the same name — but this time the game features no adorable animals and...

Wonder Book to Pop Up on Tables in Q4 2021

At the annual Spielwarenmesse trade fair, BGG tries to record previews of as many games as possible, but in addition to seeing what publishers are ready to talk about publicly, we often get a...

Game Preview: Coalitions, or An Intriguing Game of Diplomatic Area Control

Prototype box and componentsUK-based publisher PHALANX launched a Kickstarter campaign in June 2021 for Coalitions, an interesting, diplomatic area-control game set during the French...

Restoration Games Brings Unmatched Crossbows and Catapults to Thunder Road

U.S. publisher Restoration Games has given updates for several previously released or announced titles, while also revealing several new titles that you'll see over the next 18-ish months.To...

Come to Machi Koro 2 to Rebuild The City Anew

Masao Suganuma's game Machi Koro has been a continuing success story for U.S. publisher Pandasaurus Games since the debut of its licensed version of the game in 2014. (For details on the...

Three New Houses Come to Dune: Imperium in Rise of Ix

Publisher Dire Wolf has announced an expansion for 2020's Dune: Imperium from designer Paul Dennen, with Rise of Ix due out in Q4 2021. Here's a teaser as to what you'll find in the...

Nikki Valens Wants You to Join the Artisans of Splendent Vale

Designer Nikki Valens hasn't released a standalone game since 2019's delightful Quirky Circuits, but apparently they've been doing a lot behind the scenes as today publisher Renegade Game Studios...

French Game Round-up: Ditch Zombie Cards, Avoid Bad Hits, and Welcome Others to the Moon

• Benoit Turpin's flip-and-write game Welcome To... in which you develop a neighborhood of houses was a huge success in 2018, spawning multiple expansions and the spin-off title Welcome to New...

Designer Diary: World Changers, or From Tropes to Treasured Historical Figures

[Editor's note: Korea Boardgames' Leon Scheuber has translated and submitted this designer diary on behalf of game author THEKI. —WEM]World Changers, which I designed, is a card game for 1-4...

Game Overview: The Key: Murder at the Oakdale Club, or Piling Up the Evidence

In BGG's wiki page for game criteria to determine what can be added to the database, we note that "Any (solitaire) puzzle can be turned into a competitive game by using multiple copies and seeing...

Build a Happy City, Mix Qwixx Colors, and Identify Who's on Your Secret Squad

To follow up on my preview of Phil Walker-Harding's flip-and-write game Super Mega Lucky Box from Gamewright, I thought I'd highlight other titles coming in 2021 from this U.S. publisher.• Part...

Links: Narrative and Exposition, Exclusive Games, and Graphic Excellence in Games

• Dan Thurot does excellent work in his reviews and essays on Space-Biff!, and I wanted to highlight his most recent long essay: "Talking About Games: Narrative & Exposition".Although I'm...

Voting Opens for the 2020 Charles S. Roberts Awards

In June 2020, I announced the exciting return of the Charles S. Roberts Awards thanks to director Tim Tow and his team bringing them back after seven years of no activity. I'm happy to announce...

Exit Middle-earth, Build Treetops, and Puzzle Out How to Build CATAN

Let's follow up my post of late 2021 game releases from German publisher KOSMOS with a few more titles on its schedule, including one that's akin to the announcement of Ticket to Ride: Track...

Game Preview: Super Mega Lucky Box, or Fill the Schoolhouse Blocks

I try to be on top of as many game releases as possible, but sometimes I don't learn about a game until it shows up in the mail, as was the case with Super Mega Lucky Box, a 1-6 player game from...

Expedition Leaders Are Coming to Lost Ruins of Arnak

Lost Ruins of Arnak from designers Elwen and Mín and publisher Czech Games Edition has been one of the most loved games of 2020, and in October 2021 you'll be able to add more to the game thanks...

KOSMOS Invites You to Revisit Andor, Karak, and The Pillars of the Earth

German publisher KOSMOS has unveiled its late 2021 release schedule, with one of the headliner titles being an English/German version of Karak, a design from Roman Hladík and Petr Mikša for 2-5...

Game Overview: TransAmerica, or You Do the Work and I'll Take the Credit

Following the announcement of Friedemann Friese's Free Ride in late June 2021 and my brief mention of it sounding akin to Franz-Benno Delonge's TransAmerica, I thought I'd shine the spotlight on...

Manage Goods in Thailand, Cross Japanese Streets in Chinese, and Watch Georgians Dance

I reach out to as many publishers as possible for information for BoardGameGeek's new game release previews and convention previews. Sometimes publishers ask, "Do you really want to know about...

Interview: The Ups and Downs of Independent Publishing with Tranquility publisher, Peter Hazlewood

Editor's note: This interview was first published on Diagonal Move in June 2021. —WEMThis month, Peter Hazlewood, founder of Board Game Hub, joins Neil Bunker of Diagonal Move to discuss the...

The Manhattan Project Returns, and Teasers from Bombyx and Alley Cat Games

• In April 2021, Grail Games announced that it had acquired The Manhattan Project family of games originally published by Minion Games, and its first order of business for the game line is...

Play Dixit Anew, and Take to the Stars for The Artemis Odyssey

• French publisher Libellud has announced a very Dixit-like game for release at the end of 2021, with the subtitle of the game making that connection clear — Stella: Dixit Universe.Here's an...

Friedemann Friese and Rio Grande Games to Offer Players Free Ride in Q3 2021

German publisher 2F-Spiele has announced its next release, and you might notice a familiar (non-2F) logo on the lower-right corner of the English-only edition of the game.Yes, 2F-Spiele is once...