Designing in a Vacuum

Time for a little change of pace.  Over the past year I've spent a lot of timing doing something a little different; trying to design board games.  A few years ago I had a game design in progress which had a fun concept, but ultimately I was unable to execute successfully.  I took a break from designing for a while, but I'm a creative person and it wasn't too long before ideas were cooking in my head and I just couldn't shut them up.

I decided to write a little bit about my design process, what I've learned, and the story so far. I hope you enjoy.

Adventures on the Tabletop (an interview with Doug Morse)

Board game publishing is a fascinating beast, and--like traditional publishing--it can be a hard area to break into. An interesting project currently on Kickstarter is Adventures on the Tabletop, a documentary that details the board game design process, from prototyping and pitching, through development and the publishing process, and into the finished product. We spoke with Doug Morse, the filmmaker behind Adventures on the Tabletop, to discover more about his project.

New Birth of Freedom (an Interview with John Poniske)

John Poniske is a life-long gamer and has been designing his own games for almost fifteen years, with a wide variety of titles published, available on VASSAL, slated for preorder systems, or still in the works. Perhaps his most recognizable family game is Leaping Lemmings, and he also has published a children’s game, Hugs. The bulk of his production is in war gaming, with an eclectic mix of both familiar and unique subjects; from Civil War battles to Native American-Colonial conflicts to the Haitian slave revolts. As a teacher, John sees gaming as not only an engaging hobby, but as an opportunity to teach and educate. His reprint of Hearts and Minds: Vietnam 1965-1975 (Worthington Games) just successfully funded on Kickstarter. Currently his card-driven, politically minded, strategic Civil War game Lincoln’s War (Multi-Man Publishing) is on Kickstarter and is almost 70% funded with 22 days remaining. We asked John a few questions about this title, which has been long in the making, and he was gracious enough to talk with us.

The Farmer At the End of the World

An interview with Grant Rodiek, designer of the upcoming aggressive farming card game, Farmageddon.

We recently had a chance to sit down with Grant to talk a little bit about Farmageddon, Kickstarter, and board games in general. Enjoy his responses below, edited for length, and look for our preview of Farmageddon coming on Wednesday!