Board Game News

Glory to Rome Beautification Project Now Live on Kickstarter

For all those who have complained about the "graphic uniqueness" present in Carl Chudyk's Glory to Rome, now's your chance to put your money where your mouth is as Cambridge Games Factory has...

New Spiel from Abacusspiele for Spiel 2011; Plus, More Airlines & More Promos

German publisher Abacusspiele has unveiled its plans for Spiel 2011 in October, starting with a new version of Reinhold Wittig's Spiel.While "Spiel" means "game", the word also means "play" (the...

Lessons for Game Publishers – Practice Parallelism

Since BGG News kicked off in January 2011, I've been reprinting articles, previews and columns from Boardgame News. Sometimes the reprinted piece ties into current news (such as my 2007 interview...

Rumors about the Demise of NG International & Nexus Games

I've been approached with reports that Italian publisher NG International, which publishes games under the Nexus Games brand, is in trouble and liqudating stock. My request for information from...

New Game Round-up: Gen Con Demos, Upgraded Paperclips & Pergamemnon from Irongames

• Dice Hate Me Games has announced a third release for 2012 – VivaJava: The Coffee Game from T.C. Petty III – and the game description sounds pitch-perfect for a Starbucks advertisement,...

Amigo Line-up for Spiel 2011: Lehmann's City, Moyersoen's Shaky Bridge & Knizia's Qwirkle

German publisher AMIGO-Spiel has unveiled the titles it will feature at Spiel 2011, and while details are sketchy on most of these games, I've created listings for them all so that folks can add...

Designer Diary: It's Grave Business from Start to Finish

Where to start?Some games start with a mechanism, others with the theme. Grave Business is one that started with the core mechanism, but I think the end product feels like it started with the...

Looney Labs: 2011 Releases, ICE Awards, & Future Fun

We have three items related to Looney Labs: the company's remaining game releases in 2011: Star Fluxx and IceDice, the 2011 ICE Award sponsored by the Looney Pyramids community; and a look at...

New Game Round-up: Fresh Omens from Small Box, New Hamsters & A Black Secret Revealed

• John Clowdus at Small Box Games has announced an expansion for Omen: A Reign of War titled Shattered Aegis that includes twenty new units that can be used in the standard game, the draft...

Publisher Profile from 2007: Cambridge Games Factory

As noted in this July 2011 news item, Cambridge Games Factory has sent a cease-and-desist to French publisher IELLO over that publisher's impending release of Carl Chudyk's...

Links: No Glory for IELLO?, Wurm Win & a New Game of Thrones

• U.S. publisher Cambridge Games Factory has sent a cease-and-desist letter to French publisher IELLO over that publisher's impending release of Carl Chudyk's Uchronia, which CGF's Ed Carter...

Designer Diary: The Ares Project - A Father-Son Perspective

First, thoughts from the son:I have been a gamer my entire life. I have been through Euros, wargames, minis, cards, tabletop RPGs, and computer games over my career, and every kind of game played...

Ludo Fact Tour: How Games Are Made

Editor's note: This article first ran on BoardgameNews.com on Feb. 11, 2009. —WEMHave you ever wondered how board games are made? This article will give you a glimpse into the making of many...

New Game Round-up – Sackson x2 from Gryphon, Reverse Connection in Talpa & Slacking Quakers

• Grpyhon Games has announced an October 2011 release date for its new edition of Sid Sackson's BuyWord, with the game being packaged in a bag Bananagrams-style instead of the hydrogen bomb...

Designer Diary: From Berlin to the Heartland

Eine Frage der Ähre is a game that most certainly started with the theme: farming in the Midwest of America where I grew up, and where the one-mile-square fields of different crops look like a...

Links: Looking for Game Pics, Gavan Brown Talks Twice & Physics Meets Word Game

• The fourth edition of the International Boardgame Photography Award contest is underway, with a top prize of €500 "for the best photo about games, people playing, or anything related to...

Gigantic Gigamic Releases for Mid-2011

French publisher Gigamic has released a number of new games and new editions of old games in mid-2011, enough to merit a call-out post of its own. Here's a summary of what's hit the market, in...

White Goblin Games Bringing Six Titles to Spiel 2011

Dutch publisher White Goblin Games has announced a half-dozen titles that will debut at Spiel 2011 in Essen, Germany in October. While one of these titles is a reprint and a few others have...

Designer Diary: Space Maze - why annoying others is so much fun

The first prototype I made for Space Maze was way back in 1997. I had seen the movie Cube and was intrigued by the concept of rooms with trap doors that needed different skills to get through. I...

New Game Round-up: Fashion Combat, Really Can't Stop & Eklund Offers Brain Mapping

• Prêt-à-Porter, a 2010 release from designer Ignacy Trzewiczek and Portal Publishing and a nominee for Poland's Game of the Year award, will be Portal's Spiel 2011 release. This English...

Blood Bowl: Team Manager Finally on the Play Schedule

A year after announcing Blood Bowl: Team Manager in the middle of 2010, Fantasy Flight Games has finally put a release date on the game – October 2011 – and provided more information in the...

2011 Releases from Lookout Games

No, German publisher Lookout Games is not releasing 2,011 games this year – although you might get that sensation when you check out all that is coming, both from Lookout Games itself and from...

New Tools for Werewolves, and More Roles for the Night

Designer Ted Alspach is debuting two expansions for his Ultimate Werewolf: Ultimate Edition at Spiel 2011 in October through his own Bézier Games.First is Ultimate Werewolf Artifacts, which...

Stronghold Games to Release Panic Station in North America

Stronghold Games has announced that it will release David Ausloos' Panic Station in North America in cooperation with White Goblin Games. Officially Panic Station will be the first title in...

Designer Diary: The Making of Stronghold I

[This designer diary, possibly the most requested for reprinting, first appeared in Polish on Games Fanatic.pl, then in English as a thirteen-part series on BoardgameNews.com from July 4 to...

Designer Diary: The Making of Stronghold II

[Part two of Trzewik's massive designer diary for Stronghold, originally published in thirteen parts on BGN and divided into two on BGG only due to the size limit on blog posts. Check out the...

Links: Awards, Further Pandemic & the Personality of Gamers

• Nominees for Juego del Año Tico 2011 – the Costa Rican game of the year – were announced in late June 2011, and they are 7 Wonders, Baltimore & Ohio, Caylus, Chaos in the Old World and...

Smirk & Dagger Presents High-Rising Dice, Fresh Candy & More Cavernous Adventures

Curt Covert at Smirk & Dagger Games has passed along the publisher's plans for the next few months.August 2011 will see two release from S&D, the first being Sutakku, a push-your-luck dice game...

New Game Round-up: Bonus Quarriors, Incoming Snow and More Defenders, Wonders & Demons

 • Asmodee has posted a page for Claustrophobia: De Profundis in English and French noting a mid-October 2011 release date due to effort of getting the painted miniatures to look the way...

Designer Diary: Medieval Mastery

I have spent the last 18 months working on, playing and developing my games Brave the Elements and Medieval Mastery along with my colleague and good friend David Inker. We created Chaos...