So, the things I learned over this two campaign process. The first pass at this was my first KS ever as a creator. It was a learning journey and I learned that it's not my strong point. Mostly because it requires a LOT of attention getting the word our and growing a crowd requires constant care and feeding. This means…
What is it In this Shop Talk I want to discuss Action / Movement Programming in games. Action / Movement Programming (or programming) is a core concept of games like RoboRally. The core idea is that all players select the actions or moves that you want to do, usually in secret. These actions or moves are then locked in. You…
Shop Talk Movement Patterns for board games. In this Shop Talk I want to talk about Movement Patterns in board games. In all games where the pieces move from one point to another to represent the piece actually traversing the space, there are some kind of movement rules. The play surface is used in a way to represent that movement. I've…
I’ve been working on a pirate themed game that uses probability to determine damage inflicted by cannons. When it came to dice I wanted to know if re-rolling or rolling more was more preferable. Now before you just say Ameritrash and discount the inclusion of skill let me set the context. In this case it’s a game about the Golden…
One of the things I've noticed is that many of us tend to start down a career path, or even a role in a career and fall into a groove. This has been mentioned so many times that it's a cliche now. 'In a rut'. Recently though, I realized that I can reset many things in my life. I can…
It's clear that the world is moving to online commerce. I'm not suggesting we should abandon the Friendly Local Game stores (FLGS) because after all you can't play the games on Amazon but you may be planning to sell on Amazon. That being said, it can be hard to get your games into the FLGS. They buy from distributors. They…
One of the things that people often take for granted when it comes to games and toys is the fact that it was tested to be safe for children before they bought it. Board games are no exception. In fact for anything to have an age rating of 3+ or 8+ or anything less than 14 years old, it has…
I've just returned home from GenCon 50. It was amazing. The first time GenCon has sold out. Yes there were a lot of people there but to be honest it didn't feel as crowded as I expected. The previous times I've done it always seemed like you were shoulder to shoulder in the dealer hall. This time there was some…
One of the interesting things we face with game publishing in Australia is lack of local market and local support. It's not like we don’t have a great board game community, we definitely do, but even if everyone in Australia were avid board gamers, that still amounts to a fraction of the market of France, Germany and the USA. This…
One of the things that every game needs, at least to attract the eye is good game art. Good game art doesn't just pop into existence, there is an art progression. When you are starting on a concept and you want to see if the theme and mechanics work, or if the game has legs, this can be words on…