Board Game News

Designer Diary: Chai Garam

While India slept through the boardgaming wave that swept across many parts of the world in the early 21st century, recently that wave has started to gain traction.Back in 2019, I had...

Lead a Nation to Peace or WWI, Compete Against the Entente Powers, and Simulate the Battles of Ypres and Caporetto

• In July 2022, Academy Games announced Western Twilight, a pre-World War I, influence-placing rondel game designed by Edward Castronova and Gunter Eickert, due out in 2023. In Western...

How Puerto Rico 1897 Came to Be: An Interview with Jason Perez

The strategy game Puerto Rico from designer Andreas Seyfarth and publisher alea, a brand within Ravensburger, debuted in 2002 and rose in the BGG rankings to be the #1 ranked game from sometime...

Survive the Rising Waters in Mississippi, and Fly Again with Leviathans

• Rising Waters is a 2-4 player co-operative game from designer Scout Blum and publishers Central Michigan University Press and Center for Learning Through Games and Simulations that will...

Game Overview: Sanssouci, or Garden Plot

Michael Kiesling's Sanssouci debuted in 2013 from Ravensburger, was followed by (among other titles) Azul in 2017 and Miyabi in 2019, and now Sanssouci is back in print in a new edition from...

Designer Diary: The Spill

I love dice towers. Ever since I discovered these magical structures that randomize dice, then deposit them at their base with a truly random number, I've bought three of my own made of varying...

SPIEL '22 Preview Now Live

SPIEL — the annual game convention in Essen, Germany that hosts publishers, designers, and game players from around the world — next takes place on October 6-9, 2022, which is 2-3 three weeks...

Crowdfunding Comes to BackerKit with Gloomhaven Miniatures, Spirit Island: Nature Incarnate, and More

I sometimes tweet about things on BGG's Twitter account, then forget to post about them in this space. One recent such thing was BackerKit announcing in June 2022 that it would start hosting...

For SPIEL '22, Practice Precognition, Surround a Totem, and Investigate Critically

The SPIEL '22 Preview will launch on Monday, July 4, 2022 — just over three months ahead of SPIEL '22's opening date of October 6 — and here are three of the nearly two hundred titles...

Gamegenic Signs Partnership with BoardGameGeek

Since the following deal involves BoardGameGeek itself and I stay out of such activities, I'll let this press release stand on its own:Quote:Gamegenic is proud to announce a new cooperation with...

Teasers for Puerto Rico 1897, Wingspan: Asia Expansion, and Clever 4Ever

Today's post is filled with teasers for various forthcoming games, starting with a brief look at (yet another) new version of Puerto Rico from designer Andreas Seyfarth and publisher...

Defend Vienna, Battle Through Snow and Mud, and Revisit the Trenches of the Great War

• In late June 2022, Capstone Games announced a double feature pre-order of exciting new games available in October 2022, including Terra Nova, the previously announced streamlined version of...

Asger Harding Granerud, Daniel Skjold Pedersen, and Days of Wonder Bring the Heat

French publisher Days of Wonder has announced its first standalone game outside the Ticket to Ride and Small World lines since 2019 when it released Corinth and Deep Blue. In what is perhaps not...

Take Pics in Yosemite, Bet on Mechs, and Dive in a Bargain Basement Bathysphere

Every day I get a few updates for the Gen Con 2022 Preview that relate to shipping delays: this title will be available for demo, not for sale, and that title won't be present at all. Maybe...

Ghost Galaxy Acquires KeyForge from Asmodee

In September 2021, Fantasy Flight Games announced that new releases of Richard Garfield's game KeyForge — in particular, KeyForge: Winds of Exchange, the sixth set in the line, which was...

Make Some Noise for Clank! Catacombs

U.S. publisher Dire Wolf has announced an estimated October 2022 release date for a new standalone Clank! game from designer Paul Dennen: Clank! Catacombs.Here's an overview of this 2-4 player...

Designer Diary: Kittens, Beasts, and Boats Come to The Isle of Cats

The Isle of Cats was first released via Kickstarter in June 2019 and was a huge success, gaining over 8,000 backers. Thousands of extra copies of the game were ordered in the months that...

Recreate the 10th U.S. Election in Corrupt Bargain

Corrupt Bargain: The 1824 Presidential Election is a unique and accessible, political, area influence game from designer Alex Berry (High Treason: The Trial of Louis Riel), published by Decision...

Game Overview: Cascadia, or Playing God in Northwest North America

I finally got Cascadia to the table, and this design from Randy Flynn and Flatout Games does exactly what it promises to do: Gives you and your fellow players "a puzzly tile-laying and...

Gather Mushrooms, Arrange Rings, and Avoid Barracuda with Helvetiq

Swiss publisher Helvetiq specializes in quick-playing games, and here's a trio of them being released in 2022:• In March, the card game Kinoko appeared from Tim Rogasch, who has previously...

Find Treasures in the Shifting Sands of Morgan's Magic Map, Then Ride Twisty Tracks

U.S. publisher Rio Grande Games has announced three titles for the second half of 2022, one new and two revised.• Following the release of Glory Islands in March 2022, the company is giving you...

Prepare for a Galactic Renaissance, and Make Your Mark in Copan: Dying City

• Designer Christian Martinez's biggest success to date has been Inis, which debuted in 2016, and now publisher has announced what it's calling "the second installment of the Political Trilogy"...

Houdini and The Genie Get Unmatched, and Leo Colovini Challenges You to Escape

• Restoration Games has unveiled the cover of the next title in its Unmatched line: Houdini vs The Genie, with design from Sam Crane, Rob Daviau, Adil M. Geresu, and Justin D. Jacobson.I don't...

Tokyo Game Market 2022 Spring: Report from Table Games in the World

Editor's note: Game Market took place in Tokyo on April 23-24, 2022, and Saigo — who translates game rules between Japanese and English and who tweets about new JP games — has translated...

Reinforcements Arrive and Evolve the Undaunted Series

David Thompson and Trevor Benjamin’s Undaunted series from Osprey Games kicked off in 2019 with the release of Undaunted: Normandy, a hooky, 2-player deck-building game that places you and your...

Game Overview: Walkie Talkie, or Orange Is the New Black

At GAMA Expo 2022 I played a demo game of Walkie Talkie — a co-operative card game by Shei S. and Isra C. that's part of Devir's new small game line — but surprisingly a game-related event...

Zauberberg Wins 2022 Kinderspiel des Jahres

Zauberberg from designers Jens-Peter Schliemann and Bernhard Weber and publisher AMIGO has won the 2022 Kinderspiel des Jahres, Germany's children's game of the year, beating out Auch schon...

Designer Diary: Creating Animalia: Preventing Extinction

Only the sound of our footsteps was audible, each crunch of snow shattering the silence of the blanketed Baltic forest. We had been tracking the Eurasian lynx for hours already, collecting urine,...

Bring the Village Together in a Big Box

Just two weeks after announcing Great Western Trail: Argentina, publisher Plan B Games has announced another eggertspiele release, albeit one that won't be released until early 2023, and that...

Designer Maureen Hiron Has Passed Away

Game designer Maureen Hiron has passed away at age 80.Hiron started designing games in 1982 when the idea for Continuo came to her "in about two seconds", as she told Deej Johnson in a 2019...