Board Game News

Japanese Game Round-up: Walk Corgis, Set Trends, and Rebuild the New World

Let me start this round-up of Japanese games with a shout-out to Jon Power (username: EYE of NiGHT), who since 2015 has been overseeing a Japanese-language game-submission form to encourage JP...

Inhabit Zen Gardens and Take Another Shot at Fresco, Thanks to Queen Games

• With the Spielwarenmesse 2020 trade fair opening in less than a week, let's check out the upcoming titles from another publisher we'll visit during that show, specifically Queen Games, which...

Meow at the Maharaja as You Leave the Mystery House to Create Golems

Let's check out the 2020 offerings of Cranio Creations, another publisher we'll be looking at in more detail when we attend the Spielwarenmesse 2020 trade fair, which takes place Jan. 29-Feb....

Revisit Clash of Cultures in a New Monumental Edition

In the mid-2010s, U.S. publisher Z-Man Games went through a period of releasing expansions in print runs that seemed to be swallowed up by their audience immediately, then removed from the...

Next Move Welcomes Killer Beez

Not killer bees, mind you, because that would be weird and self-destructive and bad for publicity.No, instead Canadian publisher Next Move Games is welcoming a new game titled Beez to its...

AEG in 2020: Race Dice, Arrange Chocolates, Treat Cats, and Split Your Time Between Atlantis and Santa Monica

In early January 2020, Eric shared the news of Elizabeth Hargrave's upcoming release, Mariposas, and I'm sure fans of Wingspan are thrilled. Fortunately, even more enticing games and expansions...

New Game Round-up: Become Part of the Deep State, Grab a Carriage in Paris, and Head to the Pacific

• A publisher contacted me after the Spielwarenmesse/NY Toy Fair 2020 Preview went live to let me know that one of their games wasn't on the list. I was not surprised given that I didn't know...

Prepare to Fight with Ian Malcolm, Sophia Petrillo, Aggretsuko, and Superstars from the WWE

• At the 2020 London Toy Fair, Funko Games revealed the next four titles for its Funkoverse Strategy Games, two of which are standalone games featuring characters from Jurassic Park — a...

Publisher Diary: Dungeon Alliance: A Webcomic Adventure, or Exploring Game Characters in a Whole New Way

Dungeon Alliance was always going to be a deeply personal project for me. Although the Quixotic Games team has been designing games for over fifteen years for other publishers, this was only our...

Collect Termites, Stack Blocks, and Change Your Species with Zoch Verlag in 2020

• German publisher Zoch Verlag has another quartet of animal-rich games coming your way in the first half of 2020, with the games all having a relatively low suggested player age, while...

Japanese Game Round-up: Two-Headed Cards, Generous Bidding, and Kaiju on the Earth

I thought I might finally get through all of the tweets about Japanese games that I sent myself in 2019, but I did not. Soon! Then I can get to those still waiting from 2018 — or not. We'll...

Mergers, Splits, and Distribution Deals: Unexpected Studios, Non-United States Playing Cards, and Ducky Distribution

I'm still emptying my inbox of messages that piled up during 2019, but I think this post can finish off topics that fall into the "industry business" category, with my delay allowing for timely...

Cruella de Vil, Pete, and Mother Gothel Are Perfectly Wretched in Disney Villainous

Is it time to be bad again already? Ravensburger has announced the next standalone game in the Disney Villainous line — Perfectly Wretched, a Prospero Hall design that will feature Cruella de...

New Game Round-up: Deploy Animals, Make Patterns, Collect Trophies, and Carry Stuff

• U.S. publisher Rather Dashing Games is releasing a standalone 2-4 player card game that also serves as an expansion for one of its earlier releases. That's a neat way to link your back...

Asmodee Acquires Just One More Publisher: Repos Production

Belgian publisher Repos Production, founded by Cédrick Caumont and Thomas Provoost in 2004, has been acquired by Asmodee, bringing the number of publishing studios in the Asmodee Group to...

Create Panoramic Gardens, Collect Fruit, and Examine Monster Teeth in 2020 Thanks to Korea Boardgames

 Korea Boardgames has revealed three titles for early 2020 release that feature a variety of themes and that all play in 45 minutes or less.• Four Gardens is an Asian-themed set collection...

Renegade Goes Exclusive with Alliance and ACD, Acquires Designer Matt Hyra

• U.S. publisher Renegade Game Studios has announced that effective immediately, its title will be available to hobby store retailers in the U.S. solely through Alliance Game Distributors and...

New Game Round-up: Prevent Psychic Espionage, Collect Curios, and Sketch Weirdos

• Off the Page Games is a new game publisher founded by designer Jay Cormier that's "dedicated to making games based off of creator-owned comic books". Interesting guideline!For its first...

Cosmic Encounter Duel Gives Aliens a New Way to Compete

Playing Cosmic Encounter has always been a chaotic experience, with players butting heads constantly to form partnerships, sneak onto planets, and dump those former partners in favor of new ones....

New Game Round-up: Drafting Through the Ages in Genesia, and Fighting Bosses in Paris 1889

• In March 2019, I gave brief descriptions of two future releases from French publisher Super Meeple. One of those titles, Reiner Knizia's Tajuto, debuted at SPIEL '19, and I've posted a...

Designer Diary: Race for the Chinese Zodiac

It has been more than five years since we shared our thoughts in a designer diary for Three Kingdoms Redux, and now we are back to discuss our second game design, Race for the Chinese Zodiac. In...

Game Overview: Imhotep: The Duel, or Tombs to the Left of Me, Obelisks to the Right

Egypt: The land of intense staringI'm gearing up for previews of 2020 game releases, but we're in kind of a lull at the moment, so I thought I'd highlight a fine design that seemed to come and go...

Bring Vikings to Valhalla and Create Targets for Dice with Schmidt Spiele

• I've received a first pass at information on titles due out in early 2020 from German publisher Schmidt Spiele, so let's highlight a few of them in this post, starting with Die Wikinger Saga,...

Japanese Game Round-up: Following Yellow Threads to Maid School, Card-Painting Classes, and a Lesson on Zen

Whenever I research a Japanese game that isn't yet in the BGG database, I inevitably discover a half-dozen more such games along the way, sometimes because the publisher of that game has other...

Links: A History of Catan, A Dissertation on Gaming and Resilience, and A Suggestion for Game Designers

• In January 2020, German publisher KOSMOS, in co-operation with book publisher Langenmüller, will release Klaus Teuber: Mein Weg nach Catan, a 300-page autobiography of sorts by the game...

Pull Up to the Bar with Lloyd, Tony, and More in The Shining

The Prospero Hall design team has created games from a lot of licensed properties in recent years — Jaws, Horrified, Disney Villainous, Choose Your Own Adventure, Kenny G: Keepin' It Saxy all...

New Game Round-up: Harvest Interstellar Remains, Put Pets on Pillows, and Satiate Immortal Frogs

• The description of Afternova, a game by Jeff Chin and Andrew Nerger that's due out in March 2020 from Road to Infamy Games, is less detailed than it could be to show how it differs from...

New Game Round-up: Monsters Fetch Coffee, Toucans Grab Mosquitoes, and Mayors Manage Mines

• Gold River is a revamped version of Boomtown / La Fièvre de l'Or from designers Bruno Faidutti and Bruno Cathala and publisher Lumberjacks Studio, which is launching a new "Coffee Break"...

Fantasy Flight Interactive To Close; FFG RPG Staff Let Go

Fantasy Flight Interactive (FFI) is closing shop according to Timothy Gerritsen, Head of Studio, who posted the following on LinkedIn on January 6, 2020:Quote:It's with great sadness that I have...

Oath: Another Banger from Root Designer Cole Wehrle?!

[Editor's note: Given that the number of games being released isn't slowing anytime soon, I've been looking for folks who are interested in writing about upcoming games for BGG News. Candice...