June 2021: moving, playtesting, and lots of new games!
Yeah, yeah, I know, I missed May. It's been a busy little while - playtesting, designing, working with a client to help develop their game, LOTS of new ideas...
Where is Chris now?
Chris is in Sofia, Bulgaria - and summer kicked in just after we arrived!
What games are you playtesting?
Several newer games have gotten to the table this month (and to any publishers reading this, most of these are looking for publishers - please reach out if interested!)
Downward Facing Panda - a game about teaching pandas to do yoga. Dice-driven game, kept simple by the fact that you're either playing a pose card into a pile or passing to get a resource and potentially another card.
Sneakerheads - a gateway/mass-market game about buying and selling sneakers and finding grails. It's pretty stable at the moment, though I'm mainly testing out a few rule changes here and there when I can.
Transylvanian Lottery - a game about rigging a lottery in your favor. This one's the result of a bit of an internet rabbit hole, and is an actual mathematical term. The gameplay has shifted quite a bit in the last couple of iterations, mainly to lean into the theme a bit more...
Travelers: Tokyo - some near-final playtesting to try out a few things.
Underwater Basket Weaving: The Game - hoping to be the One Game to Enter Them All!* A co-op, dice-rolling, set-collection game where players are, you guessed it, weaving baskets underwater.
* There are several board game contests this summer, and my thought was to try and make one game that A: complied with all of the contest's requirements and B: was seriously fun. Most of the contests are for a 'small-box' game (meaning minimal components to physically fit inside a fairly small box) and at least two are for co-op games.
What's happening behind the scenes?
I participated in the Break My Game game jam, which asked designers to make a game that had Chaining, Press Your Luck, and a Market of some kind. Ended up with a game called Space Mappers - players are placing buoys in squares to map that sector, then selling the data from those buoys to buy upgrades or to score points. Not sure what I'll do with it from here, but it's a solid idea that'll be worth pursuing.
I also participated in Nonecon's Button Shy game jam, which asked players to make an 18-card game about, and I quote, 'SPAAAAACE'. There were a couple of restrictions - namely, no 3x3 card grid, and that the cards must be played horizontally. I came up with a game called Stargazers, where players align cards of stars to make constellations. Make the right patterns to score your constellation. It's not bad for a game jam game, but I'm shelving it for now to focus on other games.
I participated in the Pecha Kucha Kon, where participants were asked to make a video teaching something related to board game design using the Pecha Kucha format - 20 slides, 20 seconds per slide. The format encourages brevity, as you might guess.
Here was my entry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImC6PcNEVNo
I'm still working with a client to develop their game - building scenarios and establishing the elements of the story.
What's the next big thing?
Pitching! Lots of sell sheets have been updated and lots of videos have been made.
While I had planned to go to UKGE (the UK Games Expo, the biggest con in UK and the second biggest in Europe) at the end of July, the entry requirements require multiple tests and a quarantine - an expensive and redundant proposition as we're both fully vaccinated against COVID. While we're still both very much interested in going, we'll be watching and (hopefully) waiting for the rules to change.
Sofia's game shops / cafes have at least partially re-opened, and I've printed off a couple of games that are better played in-person than virtually. Hopefully I'll be able to get those to a table soon!