Board Game News

Academy Games Takes Us One Small Step to Team-Based Worker Placement Awesomeness

Academy Games has a solid reputation for tastefully blending entertainment and education to deliver engaging historical games, such as its area-control hit 1775: Rebellion from its Birth of...

Designer Diary: The Long Road to Kitara

In 2010, my game design career was just starting to take off. A new game company, Sandstorm LLC, had bought the rights to my games Cambria and Hibernia and seemed interested in seeing more work...

Escape a Flailing Octopus, Unknown Disasters, and Lethal Goddesses

• Tokyo Game Market is currently scheduled to take place Nov. 14-15, 2020, but perhaps due to the COVID-19 situation that will allow for few people outside of Japan to travel to the show,...

Core Worlds Finds a New Home at Quixotic Games

In July 2018, Stephen Buonocore of Stronghold Games tweeted about the "(not-officially-announced) 'Core Worlds: The Board Game'".In December 2018, I posted about the...

Shining a Light on Stefan Feld's Bonfire

Starting on Oct. 22, 2020, BGG will livestream game demos for four days to cover dozens of new titles being featured at SPIEL.digital 2020 — you can check out BGG's broadcast schedule here —...

Designer Diary: The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game

I'm sure I'm not alone here, but I love The Princess Bride. It is easily one of my all-time favorite movies, a timeless classic that I've watched countless times. Heck, I even played Westley in...

Influence Who Runs the Supreme Court for the First Monday in October

The composition of the U.S. Supreme Court following the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is a topic that's received lots of airtime over the past couple of weeks — well, as much airtime as...

Watch Game Demos from SPIEL.digital 2020 on BGG.CONline

The next BGG.CONline game demo livestream will take place on October 22-25, 2020, from 12 p.m. - 9 p.m. EDT (UTC-4).(Want to know when this is in your time zone? Here's a time zone converter...

Rediscover Martian Languages and Regift Horrible Presents

• On October 9-10, 2020, German publisher Spielworxx will host ConWorxx — an online streaming event in English to highlight its late 2020 releases and to give a sneak peek at its 2021...

Use Words to Fight Ghosts, and Avoid Falling Prey to The Thing

• Italian publisher Pendragon Game Studio is running a Kickstarter campaign (link) to fund publication of The Thing: The Boardgame, this being a Giuseppe Cicero and Andrea Crespi design for 1-8...

Earn Fame & Fortune, Explore Islands, & Build More Pyramids with Dice Workers

The Voyages of Marco Polo was the first dice worker placement game I played, about three months down my "new gamer" rabbit hole. While it's definitely not the first of its kind, it was new to me...

G.I. Joe, Transformers, and My Little Pony for The Last of Us

• Following the release of Bloodborne: The Card Game in 2016 and God of War: The Card Game in 2019, CMON Limited has announced a new title resulting from its partnership with Sony Interactive...

More Words, Concepts, and Great Old Ones for Your Table

• Belgian publisher Repos Production will release Just One: Neue Begriffe in September 2020, with this expansion for the 2019 Spiel des Jahres winning Just One coming packed with more than five...

Designer Diary: The Grand Carnival, or From Museums to Midways

The Grand Carnival has been in some form of design since 2016 and has finally been published. From a sketch in a notebook to a full-fledged board game, The Grand Carnival lurched from stage to...

Prepare to Dance Through Grand Austria Hotel

German publisher Lookout Games is preparing to launch its first Kickstarter campaign (preview page) on October 22, 2020 — the day that SPIEL.digital opens — with the featured game being Grand...

Keep the Fire Burning Through the Looking Glass on Groundhog Day

• German publisher Dachshund Games has released the 1-4 player co-operative game Wolkenbruch ("Downpour") from designers and company owners Sabrina and Hanno von Contzen, with the game...

Fresh-Looking Hunters and Gatherers For Sale

• In addition to Peter Rustemeyer's Paleo, which I somewhat previewed in February 2020, German publisher Hans im Glück is spiffing up two of its older titles for release in late 2020.One of...

Interview: Gemma Newton on Eco-conscious Gaming and Drawing Inspiration from the Natural World

[Editor's note: This interview was first published on Diagonal Move on September 9, 2020. All images were provided by Gemma Newton. —WEM]DM: Hi, Gemma, thank you for joining us. Please can you...

Stack Your Decks with Outcasts, Merchants, and New Adventurers

• After recently finishing Clank! Legacy and being a fan of all things Clank!, I think it's great to see that Renegade Games released Evan Lorentz's Clank! Adventuring Party, an expansion that...

More Missions for The Crew, and Ra Returns Again

• Grey Fox Games has picked up Campaign Trail — first Kickstarted in 2016 by designers David, Nathan, and Jeff Cornelius for release through Cosmic Wombat Games — for release in a new...

Change the World with Macarons and Great Leaders from History

 • World Changers is a card game for 1-4 players from Japanese designer THEKI and publisher Korea Boardgames that seems to have been born from the "deserted island" conversation that...

Bring Spiders, Werewolves, and a Coyote to Your Table

• On September 23-24, 2020, BGG will host another game demonstration livestream — broadcast schedule here — and U.S. publisher Bézier Games is one of the publishers taking part, with...

Supercharge Potatoes, and Use Triangles to Rebuild Nature

• In July 2019, I wrote about The Dietz Foundation, a non-profit organization founded by Jim Dietz of Jolly Roger Games and Ultra PRO "to produce games which enhance critical thinking, the use...

Game Alone (or Not) with Florence, Gate, and Votes for Women

Draft cover• In June 2020, I wrote about Tory Brown's Votes for Women, which is being published by Fort Circle Games. That title is being Kickstarted (link) through September 24, 2020 ahead of...

Interview: Volko Ruhnke, Creator of the COIN series

[Editor's note: This interview was first published on Diagonal Move. —WEM]This week, Volko Ruhnke, designer of Nevsky and Labyrinth: The War on Terror and creator of the COIN series, joins Neil...

Geoff Engelstein Sure Makes a Mean Pinball...Roll & Write

I have fond childhood memories of going to the shore and the Poconos with my family, hitting arcades with my older brother. We always played skeeball and pinball, and of course, Streets of Rage....

Designer Diary: Influentia, or The Art of Losing the Best Trick

In 2015, I published my first game, and my head was full of new ideas that I wanted to develop.One of my goals was to take a classic game and add a twist that would give the game a completely...

Lava Flows in Tobago, Complicating Your Search for Treasure

• German publisher Zoch Verlag has announced its releases for the second half of 2020, with a highly unexpected title leading the billing — Tobago: Volcano, this being an expansion for Bruce...

Designer Diary: Ugly Christmas Sweaters, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Theme

My partner Kym and I launched Ugly Christmas Sweaters on Kickstarter (link) in November 2019. Being so personally tied to both the game and the campaign has spurred this "self-evaluation" of...

The Crew Wins the 2020 Deutscher Spielepreis

The co-operative trick-taking game The Crew from Thomas Sing and KOSMOS has won yet another award — the 2020 Deutscher Spielepreis.The DSP is determined by the votes of gamers, who rate their...