The White Box Prototyping Tool For Board Game Designers
Daybreak Overview in 7 Minutes
No small part of game design involves figuring out how to best explain your game. An old adage of software design was, "write the manual first" as this forces you to think about how the end user will experience your product. This carries over into game design as well: if, when writing the rules or teaching a game you find that you can't explain it, it's time to have a hard look at the underlying design.
Below you can see a 7-minute overview of the in-progress game, Daybreak that I shot yesterday for a group who will be playing this Friday.
The game continues to evolve, but it's exciting to see the changes get smaller and smaller with each iteration. Once that wraps up, we'll shift into product design and at some point, our videos won't feature so much shiny Scotch tape and awkward transitions. In the meantime, have a look and let me know in the comments below if you have any impressions.
If you found this interesting, you can follow our design process more closely in our design log. You can also sign up for exactly 1 email when Daybreak launches at daybreakgame.org.
Daybreak – A Cooperative Game About Climate Action
In August 2019 a climate scientist named Declan Finney emailed me, explaining in great detail the gravity of the climate crisis and offering to help re-theme Pandemic to fit the topic. The idea was to help people better understand the situation and what could be done by wrapping it up into a game. This was a bit of a kick in the pants for me. I'd been thinking about doing something similar for some time, but hadn't started on anything. I began researching. Months passed. I decided that the topic was deserving of its own game (not a re-theme of Pandemic) but it also felt enormous, daunting, and somewhat hopeless to me.
Then, in April 2020, I came across an article about learning from Pandemic during the Pandemic on Twitter, written by Matteo Menapace. I noticed from Matteo's bio that he was interested in games and climate and contacted him about the possibility of collaborating on a game about the climate crisis with me. We hit it off and we've been working together ever since.
Photo: Peter Prato for The New York Times
Here we are, one year later, and we have a design—Daybreak—that we've been putting through its paces, both on the table (with our families) and in Tabletopia (with everyone else).
Daybreak puts you in the role of a world power. Your goal is to decarbonize your economy while at the same time build up the resilience your people will need to survive climate-induced crises.
If you and the other players can collectively draw down emissions to net zero while ensuring that no single player has too many people in crisis, you all win the game. This is quite difficult—but crucially, possible.
If you'd like to learn more about the game, Matteo has written an overview of the design so far. We also did interviews with the New York Times, Wired, and Polygon.
This has been one of the most rewarding designs I've worked on to date: the problems we face with global warming are deep and complex. Turning them into game dynamics that are representative, balanced, and—perhaps most importantly—engaging and fun to play is a steep challenge. And we want to get it right. To that end, we're looking for critical reviewers. If you think you might be a good fit for this, have a look at what we're looking for and let us know.
I'm also happy to share that CMYK has come on board to publish the game. If you're interested, you can sign up to get exactly one email when the game launches.
And finally, happy Earth Day everyone! I hope you can find a meaningful way to observe this day, even it's as simple as taking a walk or hike outdoors.
Forbidden Island Now on Board Game Arena
If you're like me and isolating due to Covid, you've probably had to find new ways to play boardgames with friends. I've been playing boardgames online now with two groups of friends and one of our most frequent stops is Board Game Arena.
So I was happy to learn that Forbidden Island is now available to play on the platform, starting today. If you haven't checked out BGA, have a look. They have many games that are free to play; other games require a premium membership, which will run you about $2 per month for unlimited use and it allows you to host games for others who don't need to pay themselves.
I also found it fun to learn that Jeff DiCorpo implemented the game. Jeff's local to the San Francisco Bay Area, and we've been gaming together on and off for many years. Thanks Jeff!
The Game Designers – Clip Released
It's startling to revisit this excerpt from The Game Designers showing the Lucca and SPIEL game fairs with their massive crowds. SPIEL drew close to 200,000 attendees from around the world in 2019 and Lucca—the city—fills to the brim of its medieval walls with people, elbow-to-elbow. We were carried away by the crowds.
Seems like so long ago already.
This clip is from The Game Designers , a feature-length documentary, directed by Eric Rayl about professional and fledgling board game designers. Available on iTunes , Google Play , YouTube Movies , Amazon , and Vimeo .
Pandemic Survival Over Zoom! – Rules and Tips
The Pandemic Survival 2020 tournament season may have been canceled this year due to the need for physical distancing, but that doesn't mean that we all can't enjoy it together over Zoom! That's what Rodger van den Braak and thirteen other former contestants did last month. I hosted a tournament myself last weekend to try it out—and it worked so well that I've written up rules and tips for all of you to try out on your own!
Two-player teams compete to be the first team to find all four cures or the last team to survive.
Images: Sasha Shen Johfre
If you're not aware of the format, Pandemic Survival pits multiple teams, each composed of two players, against each other with the aim of being the first team to find all four cures or the last team left standing. Every team plays with the same roles, starting hands, player deck, and infection deck. It's then up to each team to decide how best to play with what they have. The game is typically played on the heroic level and each turn has a time limit of only 75 seconds.
Sound crazy? You are correct.
Up for giving it a try? If you have a copy of Pandemic in your home and access to friends over Zoom (that also have a copy) you have everything you need.
Here are the full rules . I've left comments on in the rules document—if you have a question, correction, or suggestion, feel free to note it down or contact me.
I hope this gives you a fun, new way to connect with people while you're distancing.
Now go wash your hands!
A screen snap of the seven-team tournament that I ran last Saturday. Special thanks to Siew, Alain, Donna, Colleen, Beth, John (hiding behind the whiteboard of doom), Phil, Leslie, Hannah, Sasha, Rich, Michelle, Ken, and Jos for participating. And congratulations to Hannah and Sasha for surviving!
Designing from the Inside Out
The keynote I gave at TableTop Network just went up today. If you're interested in the importance of emotion in game design and empathy as a design skill, check it out:
Quarterly Report: September 2019–February 2020
It's been longer than a quarter. Has it really been six months?! Here's a summary of what's been going on since I last posted.
In The News
As you might imagine, the Covid-19 outbreak has generated a lot of media interest in Pandemic. Here are a few interviews and articles that I participated in recently.
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The Washington Post ran a story on the popularity of games centering on the "proliferation of pathogens" including Plague Inc. and Pandemic: Virus games are going viral as the coronavirus spreads.
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The Chicago Tribune ran a story on Pandemic as well. (This one was actually queued up by the Tribune prior to the outbreak of Covid-19, but by the time the interview happened, the topic was unavoidable.) Q&A with the Chicago creator of Pandemic, the board game that has become all too real.
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Dicebreaker did an interview last February. "It's difficult to keep things fresh": Pandemic creator Matt Leacock on Legacy, co-ops and Lego which ranges over several topics including the game development process. (Not sure why they chose that headline as the article spends most of its time attempting to prove otherwise.)
Speaking of Covid-19, everyone please:
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Avoid close contact with people who are sick.
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Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth.
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Stay home when you are sick.
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Cover your cough or sneeze with a tissue, then throw the tissue in the trash.
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And here's a suggestion: let person who encourages everyone to wash their hands (for at least 20 seconds) before your game be the start player.
More advice on prevention at the CDC site.
The appropriately titled expansion to ERA: Medieval Age.
Coming Soon
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The ERA: Medieval Age Expansion is due at Gen Con this year. Eggertspiele released a short teaser video (20 seconds) which shows off some of the new pieces including rivers, roads, gates, bridges, and more.
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At long last, the third and final installment in the Pandemic Legacy series is coming later this year! Keep an eye out for announcements from Z-man.
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And look for one other soon-to-be-announced game—coming this summer!
Currently Working On
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A new dexterity game, co-designed with Josh Cappel. Josh and I worked together on the first edition of Pandemic over ten years ago and it's been fun to work together again. We've spent over two years on this game and I'm thrilled that we recently found a great home for it.
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The next game in the ERA series—which is coming together quite nicely if I do say so myself.
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A new, non-Pandemic, cooperative game that I'm working on with a first-time designer.
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A big box game that I've been developing for over two years with two established designers.
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And a few other unannounced projects in various stages of development.
The Game Designers
I appeared in the documentary, The Game Designers, which premiered last November. Directed by Eric Rayl and produced by Scott Alden (of BoardGameGeek fame), the documentary follows five different designers (Antoine Bauza, Kelly North Adams, Chris Faulkenberry, and Doug Schepers and myself) at various points in our careers, and gives an inside look at what it takes to design a boardgame.
Check out the trailer below.
You can find it on Amazon or stream it on demand via Vimeo.
Game Design Resources
So it turns out that I'll be working with John Brieger on one my upcoming games. I bring this up for several reasons:
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He's got a new company that specializes in game development. If you're looking for additional testing and development resources, check them out.
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He's written some great articles on playtesting and uses a process very similar to my own.
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He lives in my hometown! And I had never met him until last month! (How weird is that?)
If you're a local to the San Francisco Bay Area and are interested in doing some playtesting (your games or others') be sure to check out some of the Meetups that he's put together. I plan on regularly attending Friday playtesting at Game Kastle in Mountain View.
Missing GDC?
Check out the Boardgame Summit on March 17th in San Francisco. "Designers, developers, and publishers in the tabletop game (and tabletop game adjacent space) are gathering to share their planned talks from GDC, network, and talk board games. Publishers & industry service providers on hand for pitches and business meetings."
You can also check GDC's video archive for some great talks on design. Christina Wodtke sent me this talk by Alex Jaffe on "cursed design problems" which include the quarterbacking problem that rears its head in pure cooperative games. I thought this was a great framework for evaluating opposing forces in your game that may be irreconcilable.
TableTop Network
I gave the keynote talk at the TableTop Network in Dallas in November, and spoke about the importance of emotion and empathy in game design. [Update: the talk is now available.]
TTN is a gathering of board game designers talking shop, networking, and refining our craft, organized by game designer, Tim Fowers.
Unlike gatherings like Unpub and Protospiel, it focuses on talks and workshops and not on playtesting. It's a fairly new event, this being its second year. I was impressed with the quality of the talks and especially enjoyed the ones given by Elizabeth Hargrave (OMG, My Wife Loves Your Game) and Nikki Valens (Creating Representation for Marginalized Groups). They've also started a scholarship program to attract new voices to the industry.
I'll post videos or links to my talk and others when Tim opens them up to the public.
2020 Conference Schedule
I've taken this information down, pending information from the event organizers.
ERA: Medieval Age – Design Notes
ERA: Medieval Age was released this year at Gen Con and will hit stores later this August. The game has a long history, which started nearly twelve years ago. Here's a look at how the game came to be.
Origins of ERA
Back in October of 2007, my friends Chris and Kim Farrell threw down the gauntlet and challenged the members of our gaming group to a contest in the spirit of Nanowrimo—the National Novel Writing Month. Our mission was to each design a civilization-building dice game that was playable in 30–40 minutes, during the month of November. We were to go off into our corners and come back with our results at the end of the month.
I gave it my best shot. I saw the challenge as a great opportunity to boil down the experience from one of my favorite games—Francis Tresham's Civilization (1980)—into something that took far less time. (Civ was best with about five to seven people who could devote eight or more hours to play, and that was becoming increasingly hard to manage.)
I shared the results to the gaming group in early December. Encouraged by the results, I pitched it to publishers at a conference the following April. I got immediate interest and the game was picked up by Griffon Games as part of their bookshelf line. They published it as Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age in 2009. The game did well, garnering a nomination for the Spiel des Jahres in 2010.
The publisher saw an opportunity to ride on the game's success and encouraged me to design additional ages and soon after I designed a print-and play expansion. But my attempts at other ages felt dry and lifeless, and I abandoned them. After one failed start after another, Tom Lehmann finally stepped up to extend the line with a version that we dubbed Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age (2014).
After that, the game seemed to have run its course.
ERA: Medieval Age (2019). Cover art by Chris Quilliams.
Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age (2009). The challenge that my friends Chris and Kim threw down was to create a civilization-building dice game that could be played in 30–40 minutes.
A near-final prototype (version 23) of Roll Through the Ages from 11 years ago. The early prototypes were initially pitched as "Dice of the Ancients."
Opportunity
That is, until I was approached by Plan B Games in 2016. They were fans of the game and wanted to know if I'd be up for breathing new life into it and potentially turning it into a series. I promised to take another look.
During this exploration, I started thinking about an idea where players could develop a city, drawing its buildings, instead of creating another checklist game dominated by a technology tree. I've always been fascinated by the idea of games with a drawing component. I can trace that as far back to games like Empire Builder (1982) and Source of the Nile (1978). Even Knit Wit started out as a drawing game.
I did a bunch of reading on the Medieval period, sketched a lot, tinkered around. One key breakthrough was the idea to map the four classes of medieval society to different dice that represented their role. For example, peasants would provide labor and food, burghers would provide more trade goods, clergy could provide administration (allowing you to manipulate your dice) and nobles wouldn't produce anything, but could raise taxes and could rattle their swords to defend their domain or threaten their opponents. Soon, I had some early prototypes of a new Medieval Age.
May, 2017. Here you can see some concepts taking shape. I often start with a concept map of the key objects and actions in the game. Sometimes this works; other times you get a boring, stilted, lifeless games.
Early sketches of buildings and resources.
Medieval Age Takes Shape
This new Medieval Age used dice that were similar to the ones used in Roll Through the Ages: they had resources and skulls on them, and players rolled them three times in an attempt to optimize their turn. but the experience was nicely differentiated from the Bronze Age. When you were done, you could look at a unique city that you had illustrated over the course of play. I also came up with a new turn structure that reduced downtime considerably, and found a way to work that back into the original Bronze Age design.
After a solid year of development, the game was ready to turn over to the publisher. Contracts were signed and the game was well on its way to becoming a reality.
I spent about a year designing the roll-and-write version of ERA: Medieval Age. Players drew buildings on graph paper and drew walls segments on the lines that separated them. The game also used a reference card for building shapes and a simple pegboard to track resources.
One Question
The publisher liked the design. It was quite fun to play and fairly straightforward to manufacture. They did have one issue with it, however: it was really hard to see what your opponents were doing. (This is a bit of a classic problem with many roll-and-write games—they can feel a bit like group solitaire if you're only focused on your own board.) They pulled out a napkin sketch of a building made from a few wooden blocks and asked me: "what if it was in 3D? Would that work?"
Little did they know that I had just received my first laser cutter earlier that week. My answer was an excited, "let's find out." We'd have to defer the game's release at least another year, but hey, lasers.
I got to work.
I actually used craft foam for my first 3D version of the board, which was a direct translation of the roll-and-write shapes: buildings went on squares; walls went between them.
It looked promising. Testing soon showed, however, that players had a hard time figuring out how to place buildings on this grid.
I thought a laser-cut version with little white circles to help position your buildings might work. It didn't.
I had to abandon this system as it went against years of Lego training.
When I moved the walls onto the same grid as the buildings, the problem went away. The board also was significantly less noisy looking.
Roll and Build
Switching the game to a set of physical buildings opened up all sorts of possibilities. In addition to the wonderful, tactile feel, I could now work with a new dynamic: supply and demand. I modified the rules for walls so they'd come in different lengths, which introduced a strong push-your-luck element. Players now had to weigh the desire to defer buying walls (since they don't help you bootstrap at all) against the temptation to buy them early when longer lengths are available. And if players wait too long, the supply can run out, putting a huge number of points at risk.
Having a building supply also made for a more dynamic game end condition. Rather than playing until a single player built a certain number of buildings (which was tedious to track on the score sheets), I shifted the game end condition so the game finished when a certain number of buildings ran out. This added more tension to the game since it's harder to predict when this will happen.
All the laser-cut pieces for the buildings plus a few experimental bits and other odds-and-ends. I cut the buildings out of illustration board, glued them together using a special tacky glue, then painted them with acrylic.
A robust city at the end of a game. The buildings in the prototype had little "pips" etched into them so you could see how many points they were worth. The published version uses a more robust score sheet satisfies this requirement in a better way.
All the parts for two prototypes, painted and ready to go. Before I was done, I created six full prototypes.
A special shout out to Anthony Rubbo who worked tirelessly to convince me that the screens were worth trying out. He was right.
Other Innovations
The additional year of development brought other improvements as well. Most notable was the introduction of player screens that hide the results of each player's roll during the Roll step. I was hesitant to add these as I was convinced that players needed to see each others' dice while rolling in order to increase player interaction. Testing strongly showed otherwise, however—players welcomed the faster pace, the element of surprise, and the shorter play time that the screens afforded. They also made a great home for the information on the play aid.
Translating the Prototype into the Final Product
The Eggertspiele development team helped polish the remaining bits and pieces. Together we created the solitaire version and they helped refine the disasters, including increasing the number of scorched earth tiles that came with the game from what I specified. (Remind me to be wary of playing with them.)
The biggest change during production was to the player boards. These shifted from punchboard to molded plastic. While the icons are harder to read on the plastic boards—they're sculpted rather than printed—the boards are much more durable than punchboard and the plastic nicely "grips" the building components, keeping them firmly in place.
In the video below, you can get a good look at how everything turned out in the final game as I give a quick overview of the rules.
The Harbor and Great Hall along with the Baron, Bishop, and Merchant dice that come in Collector's Set #1.
Expansions Planned
If you purchase the game from the Eggertspiele web shop you can already pick up the first of several expansions planned for the game, Collector's Set #1. This mini expansion provides two new buildings and rules for upgrading your clergy, noble, and burgher dice into a bishop, baron, or merchant.
First of Three ERAs
Eggertspiele has already announced that ERA: Medieval Age is the first of three titles in the ERA series. For the second installment, it's likely that fans of Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age will be re-released in an updated and modernized version.
The third game in the series has not yet been hinted at. Which leads me to ask: if you had your wish, what ERA would you want? If you have an idea, leave a note in the comments!
Laser Cutting a Chariot Race
For some reason, I love pegboards. I think it has something to do with the satisfying way that a wooden peg bites into a wooden board—they feel great to handle. I was fascinated with cribbage boards as a kid and remember being disappointed when I learned that they were only glorified scoring tracks. My game, Chariot Race grew out of a desire to make a simple race game out of a similar pegboard.
That was part of the pitch anyway, when I signed the game with Pegasus back in 2014. Unfortunately, when we developed it, costs for doing the game in wood were prohibitive, and when the game came out in 2016 it never had the table presence that I'd hoped it would. (If you're curious, I've written up more on how the game evolved given those constraints.)
Enter the laser cutter. A few years ago, I helped crowd fund the Glowforge and it finally arrived last March. I had no idea I would use this thing so much. I'll write up another post on how I've been using it for prototyping extensively (everything from the ERA games to Pandemic Legacy: Season 3 and more), but to start, I thought I'd share my most recent creation.
After a couple rounds of prototyping in baltic birch, here are photos of the final result, crafted in maple, cherry, poplar, and walnut. The only thing I've kept from the Pegasus edition is the wooden dice.
The board sits on top of a box that holds the dice, six chariot boards, and a drawer that contains the pegs and caltrops for up to six players to play. It all packs up all nice and tight.
The drawer holds pegs for six players plus all the caltrops you'd ever need.
Everything tucked away
The chariot pegboards
The drawer and chariot boards all pull from the same side of the box.
On the reverse, the dice sit in their own compartment.
Pulling the walnut slider open grants access to the dice.
Each chariot pegboard has a unique combination of cherry, maple, and/or poplar. This is the cherry/poplar combination.
Here are the box pieces laid out. The interior is made of baltic birch and I used maple laminate for the top and each side. I inlaid cherry for the corners and starting spaces and used walnut for the caltrops and for the door to the dice compartment. The track itself is cut from basswood as I liked how uniform the color was and how easily it took the pegs and caltrops.
All the components
Top view of the track
I've finally scratched this itch now that I have my own wooden set. I just have to remind myself how much work this was every time I'm tempted to make another one. (I don't have any current plans on creating these for sale!) If you are a crafter though, and would like a copy of the .svg plans (for personal use only) drop me a line.
Here's my machine, right before I plugged it in for the first time last March.
Glowforge Plug
I can't say enough good things about the Glowforge. It's well designed and easy to use – to the point where it's nearly as simple as sending a job to your desktop printer. It sets up quickly and requires very little maintenance. Cutting components on it has become an integral part of my prototyping workflow. It's wonderful for anything round or irregular (think: round, chipboard tokens) and is precise enough that I can use it to cut stickers (but not the backing!) from sticker sheets with hairline precision.
They're not cheap, coming in between $2,400 (for the Basic) and $6,000 (for the Pro). I picked up the Plus which currently sells for about $4,000. I recommend it as a great midrange product.
If you do decide to take the plunge, you can save some cash ($100–$500) by using this referral link: https://glowforge.us/r/kUGE8V. (Disclosure: they'll kick back the same amount to me in credits that I can spend on materials.) The one thing that can be a bit tricky is that you have to vent them outside. They offer an air filter for another $1000 (so you don't need to vent) but the filters have been backordered for over a year now. I've been venting mine out the mail slot of my garage until my filter arrives.
In a future post, I'll share images of the ERA: Medieval Age prototype that I created on the machine. It's hard for me to imagine creating, developing, and testing the final version of that game without this cutter.
New Game Announcement — Era: Medieval Age
I'm excited to announce Era: Medieval Age, a new dice game coming this summer from Eggertspiele.
I've been working on this game and other games in the Era line for the last few years and am really excited to start sharing more about them with you.
Read all about it here, or catch the 2-minute video announcement below.
2019 Game Selection Guide
Looking for one of my games but don't know where to get started? This handy flowchart might help! Start in the circle in the upper-left corner and follow the arrows until you reach your perfect game. (Expansions not included.)
Click it for a larger view, or, if you'd like to print it out, the PDF version will save you a lot of ink.
With a nod to Mental Floss that shared their own chart (and cast a wider net) in 2015.
See my Games page for more information on all of these products and more.
Cooperative Game Growth Keeps Rising
Back in January of 2016, I posted an article on the growth of cooperative games. I wanted to check in to see what has happened in the last couple of years. Had things slowed down at all?
I hit one small snag – BGG searches cap out at 5,000 results and there were more than 5,000 products released in 2016 and 2017. So, I've had to re-do my queries based on the number of games (excluding expansions) instead of total products released each year.
With that in mind, results are in: the growth of the category continues to skyrocket.
Excludes expansions. Total games each year accurate to the nearest 50 games per year; total number of games with cooperative games are based on the total count of those games each year.
Given the time it took to design and publish a game at the time, it appears that 2008 was a category-proving year. Pandemic , Battlestar Galactica , Ghost Stories , and Space Alert were all released in 2008, perhaps proving the category to future designers and publishers.
Pandemic: Fall of Rome Announced
Happy to see that Z-man has announced the latest game in the Pandemic Survival Series, Pandemic: Fall of Rome!
In this game, you'll recruit legions and enlist barbarians with an ever-diminishing treasury (and increasing corruption) in your attempt to forge five alliances with invading tribes before the Empire falls.
This is a co-design with Paolo Mori and was a tremendous amount of fun to work on. And the artwork from Atha Kanaani and the Z-man team is top notch. Coming in Q4, 2018.
here's the Z-man announcement.
Gen Con
Headed to Gen Con? So am I! Here's what I'll be up to:
Forbidden Sky Demos
I'll be demoing Forbidden Sky and signing games at the Gamewright booth in the main exhibit hall.
Gamewright Booth
Thursday 2:00 PM
Friday 2:00 PM
Saturday 2:00 PM
Blank / Blankdemic Demos
I'll be demoing the game, Blank with a custom booster that my daughter and I designed. The event is ticketed, but feel free to swing by to have a look and say hello.
Hub Games Demo Tables
ICC : Hall C : Hub : HQ (Event Info)
Thursday 4:00 PM
Friday at 4:00 PM
Saturday at 12:00 PM
Playtesting
Rob Daviau and I will be running a private playtest session for an upcoming <cough>legacy game</cough> and are currently looking for some folks to help us out.
We're looking for a group who is…
- available for playtesting during evenings at the convention. We're planning on running the sessions on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday from about 7–11 PM (give or take).
- open to continuing to playtest at home with your group after the convention wraps up and willing to video record your home sessions. The entire campaign will run about 12–18 hours.
- willing to sign an NDA.
If the above sounds good to you, please contact me and indicate:
- How many people are in your group?
- Please confirm your availability during and after the convention.
- Tell us just a *little bit* about yourselves, for example what games you enjoy.
- Let us know if you've played Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 or Season 2. It's not necessary, but we may take that into account.
If you have questions, either drop a comment or email me using the contact page above.
Thanks! We couldn't make the games we do without your help.
UPDATE: We've filled our playtest slot. Thanks everyone!
Gamechangers, Round 2
This May, the second Village Boardgame Convention will be held in Uganda. It's hard to believe it's been nearly a year since their first convention was held.
If you're not familiar with it, the initiative is part of a UK charity (CYEN) which trains teenagers to be social entrepreneurs. It's a remarkable program that uses board games to teach about the outside world, build confidence, help with memory, planning, creative problem solving, teamwork, as well as many other skills.
They're looking to raise £1,000 to kick off this year's program. And each additional £500 will help them expand to the program to additional villages.
Similar to last year, I'll be raffling off prizes (see below) to two lucky people who make a donation. It's a great way to help people, spread the love of boardgames, and who knows, maybe you'll pick up a prize package.
Prizes!
I'll randomly select two winners from commenters who have made a donation on
3 May 2018 at 12:00pm PDT. Each winner will be able to select one package below.
The Forbidden Package
Forbidden Island +
Forbidden Desert +
Forbidden Sky (available this Summer)
Pandemic Legacy of Your Choice
Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 OR
Pandemic Legacy: Season 2 (your choice)
plus an extra, secret "Box 9"
Complete Thunderbirds Package
Thunderbirds +
Tracy Island Expansion +
Above and Beyond Expansion+
The Hood Expansion
For What Ails You Package
Pandemic: The Cure +
Pandemic: The Cure Experimental Meds
Pandemic Survival Bundle
Pandemic Iberia +
Pandemic: Rising Tide +
Pandemic: TBD (available in Q4, 2018)
I'll also cover shipping anywhere in the world and am happy sign or dedicate any of the above games should you happen to win.
Participate!
- Make a donation! Go to https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/uganda-village-board-game-convention. There you can read about the program and make a donation.
- Leave a comment below to serve as your entry.
If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment or contact me directly.
Update: Crowdfunder a Success and Winners Announced!
Thanks to everyone who helped make the event a reality. The organizers raised over £4,000 pounds (4 times their initial target) and the convention will be held later this May.
And congratulations to Kevin Rolph and Francinette Myth! Please get in touch with me so we can arrange delivery of your prize.
Thanks!
The Dutch Lesson
Jeroen Doumen dropped by the other day and was kind enough to give me a 2-minute Dutch lesson. Jeroen co-owns and design games at Splotter and co-designed Pandemic: Rising Tide.
If you'd like to try pronouncing a few of these for yourself, I've listed some of the more challenging titles below. I especially enjoyed watching our playtesters invent their own "house pronunciations" as we developed the game.
From the Event Cards and Objectives
- HOOGHEEMRAADSCHAPPEN
- ZUIDERZEEVEREENIGING
- STORMVLOEDSEINDIENST
- AFSLUITDIJK
Selected Regions
- VOORNE-PUTTEN
- GOEREE-OVERFLAKKEE
- SCHOUWEN-DUIVELAND
- ZUID-BEVELAND
- ZEEUWS-VLAANDEREN
- NOORDERZIJLVEST
- WIERINGERMEER
- VIJFHERENLANDEN
- PEEL EN MAASVALLEI
- HOEKSE WAARD
Learn more about Pandemic: Rising Tide.
Forbidden Sky…
Gamechanging in Uganda
The first time I went to Uganda was in September, 2001 with Donna. We had been married just over a year and were determined to see a bit of the world before starting a family. We traveled with my parents who had just started their non-profit, Computers for Africa. During our stay, we visited schools and helped set up computer labs in Masaka, Uganda and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Three generations of adventurers in our (then clean) tour van: Donna, Ruth, and Colleen Leacock
We returned to the country last year, this time with our two daughters, determined to show them a little more of the world. My parents and their good friend Herbert helped plan an itinerary that took us on a grand, counter-clockwise tour around the country. We visited schools, met with people in their homes, and visited the local sites: the source of the Nile, the equator, Sipi Falls, and the game park at Murchison Falls.
The countryside was beautiful, the animals abundant, and the people were very friendly and welcoming. But despite all the beauty and wonders all around us, we couldn't help but get in a few games:
- We introduced the sisters at Kalungu Girls' Training Centre in Masaka to Catan in 2001.
- We played a few games of Carcassonne on a ferry ride to Zanzibar on that trip.
- And last year, we tested Mole Rats in Space (in prototype form) with our guide Herbert and the girls while traveling in Gulu – appropriate, since Mole Rats are indigenous to East Africa.
Slim pickings: Twister and Cat & Mouse make up the total games available at this department store we visited.
Aside from the games we brought with us, however, modern boardgames are nowhere to be found in Uganda.
That's why I was so surprised to learn that there was a board game convention being held in Uganda last May – in Gulu – where we had just visited! And it wasn't just chess, checkers, and mancala – these kids were playing games like Codenames Pictures, Cosmic Encounter, RoboRally, and Legends of Andor!
The convention was sponsored by Chrysalis, which has been training children to be change makers and social entrepreneurs for the last seven years. They've been using modern boardgames to train kids "in a whole range of skills, from social to persuasion, planning to resource management, adaptability to tactics, and much more." They note that the games help the kids with self confidence, their ability to learn, and provide creative influence and inspiration.
Their first convention was a big success. Now they are working to expand their program into a new initiative called Gamechangers. Gamechangers will create more opportunities for children to play games between conventions and will focus on the following areas:
- Competitive and cooperative boardgames
- Drama, to teach the value of boardgames
- Art arena cooperation games
- Active and team-building games
- Story-collecting for new games and adventures
They're actively raising funds for this new program and could use your help. You can read all about how they'l be using the funds to train 16 young change makers to become social entrepreneurs on their Crowdfunder page:https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/gamechangers
If you do pledge, leave a comment below and let me know, because on Tuesday, August 15th at 12:00 noon PDT, I'll randomly select one of the commenters who has made a donation to the program (however large) and send them a personalized care package. It might include…
- a new, never-before seen prototype role card for Pandemic with your name on it
- or a game
- or a lenticular Forbidden Island postcard
- or a special, hand-made "Box 9" for Pandemic Legacy Season 2 that only YOU will ever know the contents of
- or all of the above … who knows?
Whatever it is, it'll be a surprise and I'll ship it anywhere in the world if you win.
Special thanks to Tony Boydell for this raffle idea that I'm brazenly stealing.
Update: We have a winner
Congratulations to Kurt Wils! You're the winner of the care package above. Please contact me at mleacock@mac.com to work out all the details.
Thanks to everyone who contributed! We blew away their initial goal and their stretch goal. As of this writing, they've raised £2,907!
The campaign wraps on 18 August 2017 if you've just arrived and would like to make a contribution.
Favorite Board Game Design Resources
Here are the game design resources that I've personally found most useful in my new day job. (Now I know where to go when I need to re-order something!)
Bits and Prototyping Materials
I buy nearly all my wooden bits from spielmaterial.de. They're a bit expensive and shipping from Germany takes awhile, but their selection and quality is hard to beat. They're my go-to for standard Euro-game fare: wooden cubes, pawns, meeples, and disks, among other things.
I buy more cribbage pegs than I ever thought reasonable from Casey's Wood Products. They also carry the usual craft line of unpainted blocks, beads, balls, eggs, golf tees, checkers, and so on. I picked up the buttons and spools for the Knit Wit prototypes from them.
After many years of experimentation I've found that card sleeves work the best for me for card prototyping purposes. I can print on regular paper stock, letting me iterate quickly. Plus, the sleeves come in a variety of colors and (perhaps most importantly) they're reusable. I've been buying UltraPro sleeves at full retail price – if anyone has a good source for sleeves in bulk, let me know in the comments.
For 3D components, I do a lot of rough prototyping in craft foam. Read more about this magical prototyping material in my article, Craft Foam: the Poor Man's 3D Printer. I've been doing a lot of laser cutting lately, but still find that sticker paper + craft foam makes a fast, cheap, first pass.
I find inkjet-friendly sticker paper indispensable and buy it in bulk from Label Outfitters. It's not as opaque as the nicer Avery version, but it's a lot cheaper. The letter-sized sheets can be had for less than 10 cents a sheet in bulk. Sticker sheets let you "print" on essentially anything whether it's foam, chipboard, wooden bits, dice, or your prototype box.
Of all the books on game design that I've read, the one that I found most useful is The Art of Game Design by Jesse Schell. The author approaches the craft through 100 different "lenses" or perspectives. These lenses are also available in a card format that I highly recommend.
Raph Koster's A Theory of Fun thoughtfully explores where the fun in games comes from. Koster embellishes nearly every spread with playful illustrations that help communicate his points.
Rules of Play by Katie Salen Tekinbaş and Eric Zimmerman is the textbook of game design and reads as one. This book is chock full of definitions and dry descriptions of the many elements involved in game design. While I found it interesting academically, I didn't find much in it that I could apply directly to my process.
One of the best ways to increase engagement in your game is to find ways to modulate your players emotions. This concept is explored in depth via "beat analysis" in Robin Laws' book, Hamlet's Hit Points . Laws describes a vocabulary of up and down beats, describes how they can be used for better storytelling and role playing, and deconstructs three stories using them to get you fully acquainted with the vocabulary.
Software
I use a pretty lean software kit these days and can do nearly everything I need to accomplish with Adobe Illustrator (prototype illustration), Google Drive (journaling, data tracking, playtest logs, punch lists, file sharing). Illustrator's a pain-in-the ass to learn and use, but after nearly (gulp) 30 years of use, I find it indispensible.
I use Skype and Sococo for communication, avoiding email as much as possible for sharing information that exceeds more than a few sentences. I favor Drive (for asynchronous stuff) since it synchronizes with other contributors and offers full history, and Sococo (for realtime communications) since it offers voice, video, chat, screen sharing and rich presence info.
Tools
I burned through a bunch of low-grade paper cutters before finding the Dahle 507 Personal Rolling Trimmer. If you need accuracy, it'll split a .5pt line (if you're cutting one page at a time). If not, you can cut up to about 8 pages of 20lb. stock in one go. Do yourself a favor and get a great cutter.
Blogs and Podcasts
Cardboard Edison compiles useful articles on game design from around the web. I found their industry reports particularly interesting.
I'm not an avid podcast listener or player of roleplaying games, but if I were, I'd be devoted to Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff. As it is, I pop in occasionally and always leave impressed with how literate, articulate, and just plain smart the hosts are about story construction and a whole host of other topics often tangentially related to board game design.
And if you're not following Board Game News on BoardGameGeek, you're missing out on what's happening on the scene. W. Eric Martin's been on the beat for years now and really knows the industry and the players.
Am I missing out on something truly great here? Let me know in the comments.
The Evolution of Chariot Race
The recent launch of the Chariot Race Kickstarter got me thinking about all the iterations the game has gone through. The earliest sketches I found were dated 2 October 2010, over six years before the game was released.
I typically keep older versions of a game as I work. Doing so helps me design in a more fearless manner – I can try stupid things knowing I can roll back if needed. I also take comfort when I look at these things before I start a new project, because they remind me that games don't start out pretty or balanced.
In this post, I've included some videos and photos of both Chariot Race and Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age. Flip through them to see how they evolved into their current forms.
Chariot Race started as a pub game with wooden boards and pegs. Watch here as the number of spaces on the board gradually shrinks and the chariot boards take on all sorts of different forms:
This is one of the "wood" prototypes (made from foam) alongside the board game version. Moving to more traditional materials cut the game's cost by more than half and opened up the possibility of including a double-sided board and variable chariots. The wood was fun but terribly expensive and the chariots (as cribbage pegs) weren't very thematic.
Here are some of the many pegboards I made out of foam and drilled for testing. Some of the boards were hollowed out underneath so you could keep your Fortuna coins secret from the other players. I used older boards to hold cribbage pegs while I painted them (bottom right). Not pictured are all the sets I sent out for blind-testing. I must have drilled about 5,000 holes over the course of the project.
Here are the reverse sides of the chariot boards showing the six different configurations. Chariots are either sturdy, normal, or flimsy; horses are either speedy, normal, or slow; and charioteers are either lucky, normal, or unlucky.
Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age saw even more iteration. Watch here as the list of developments gradually expands while I continued to experiment with the size and format of the score sheet:
One of the central tensions I needed to resolve in this game was how much information to communicate on the score sheet. I was strongly tempted to go with a minimalist design (so new players wouldn't be scared off by all the text) but it turned out the new players appreciated the reference information most of all. (The last frame here, "LBA," refers to The Late Bronze Age , a print-and-play expansion for the game.)
People often attribute the success of a product to the novelty of its underlying idea. The truth is, the idea (while clear in hindsight) is often only dimly visible when you start out and dozens of iterations are often required before you're able to clear away the fog and arrive at the "obvious" solution.
If you're designing a game of your own, keep this in mind. You'll rarely get it close to right the first time. Much of the quality of a good game comes from its execution – all the little details matter – and the best way to get those right is through continuous iteration.
Interested in the final result? Check out the Chariot Race Kickstarter page.
The White Box Prototyping Tool For Board Game Designers
Source: https://www.leacock.com/
Posted by: buntingaceis1940.blogspot.com
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