Ryan Laukat, founder of Red Raven Games, discusses how to create a beautiful game that is also functional. Ryan does his own art for all of his games, so he has an incredible understanding of the tug of war a designer and artist can have when trying to make a game look great but also work well for the players.
We also talk about some best practices when hiring and working with an artist.
In this show, we talk about Tiny Epic Galaxies: Into the Black, Lotus, Me Want Cookies, Assault of Giants, RoboRally, and Villages of Valeria. We also hear a couple of tales, answer questions, have a pile of cool segments, and talk about the games that have had the biggest impact on us!
Hanamikoji is a brilliant 2 player card game. You are restaurateur, trying to hire talented geishas. The beauty of the game is its simplicity. Four simple actions combine in various ways to create surprising, challenging and fun decisions on every turn.
Shelley and I delve into our list of games released and played in 2016 now that we have most of the ones we needed to get to under our belts. Here are our lists, and listen to find out our reasoning behind our choices:
Shelley's List:
1) Scythe
2) Mystic Vale
3) Yokohama
4) Ulm
5) Round House
6) Lorenzo il Magnifico
7) Kanagawa
8) First Class: All Aboard the Orient Express
9) Terraforming Mars
9.5) Coal Baron: The Great Card Game
10) Cottage Garden
Honorable Mentions: Colony & Great Western Trail
Doug's List:
1) Scythe
2) Yokohama
3) Terraforming Mars
4) Colony
5) Great Western Trail
6) Cottage Garden
7) First Class: All Aboard the Orient Express
8) Ulm
9) Mystic Vale
10) X Nimmt!
11) Round House
Honorable Mentions: Castles of Burgundy Card Game & Honshu
Disappointing Releases:
Blood Rage - Hated this one...
Oracle of Delphi - I will play almost any other Feld over this one.
Ticket to Ride Map Collection 5: UK & Penn - Takes the joy out of the game IMO
Bohemian Villages - Just not fun after the GREAT Orleans
Adventure Land - Good to see HABA entering the family market, but this odd, plodding and just not fun game wasn't a good choice. Karuba, their other Essen 2015 family release IS worth your time.
TIME Stories - I see its appeal, but feel it's not worth the price of admission...
Ambie, Cassadi, and Crystal discuss Rebels Unite!, Happy Pigs, and Rex. We talk about games that have cold themes, and Crystal goes over the origins of the word "analysis."
Jerry Hawthorne, designer of Mice and Mystics, discusses the importance of story in games.
Jerry specializes in narrative driven games and has numerous games to his credit. He goes into why people enjoy story in games so much and how you can inject more story into your games. Finally, he gives great advice on what to do first when creating a story driven game.
My favorite idea from the interview: “Create a story. Not a series of incidents.”
We hope you left room for seconds, because there's also a reader mail that asks what games Matt and Quinns organised at their respective weddings last year, and we unseal the Pandora's Box of folk games played by school teachers. Maybe don't eat that last bit, it's profoundly poisonous.
The Founders are back for another episode chocked full of crazy gaming nonsense! Today the gang takes a look at Masmorra Dungeons and Arcadia from CMON Games. Then they take a look back at a very different game, Porta Nigra designed by legendary designers, Wolfgang Kramer and Michael Kiesling. After Tony T hooks you up with the best gaming news in the biz, the founders discuss what to do when you got a dirtbag in your gaming group, the music we listen to and Steve and Jamie's punk rock band days and we match up our dream designer and publisher combos.
It was over 100 episodes ago when our wives joined us on RDTN. It only took four years for them to forget about that experience and join us again beyond […]
In this show, we talk about New York Slice, Papa Paolo, Second Tide, Ave Roma, Ghostel, and Ta Yu. We hear a Battlestar Galactica Tale of Betrayal (although not the way you think), talk about snacks and lack of dice in games, and end the show with a fifteen year look back at 2002, and our favorite games from that year.
Stephen Buonocore, president of Stronghold Games, goes into all of the ins and outs of researching publishers, contacting publishers, and pitching your game. We talk in depth on how to do things the right way to give your game the best chance of being signed. Then, Stephen closes the conversation with a couple funny stories about some epic game pitch fails.
Opener: Mansions of Madness (2nd edition), TIME Stories, Terraforming Mars, Great Western Trail This is really a double-episode. In the second half we talk about more Essen titles, and the experience of my two guests who attended from England. However, these aren't just any two guests--they are collaborative game designers. Their big release at Essen 2016 was Armageddon, and they tell about the experiences designing, pitching, and launching the game. Along the way there are other stories about the collaborative design process, and how those designer-publisher pitch meetings go behind-the-scenes at Essen. It's a fascinating discussion.
Then I asked them to share just a handful of particular titles they acquired and enjoyed from the event. More good stuff.
Closer: The pitfalls of looking at BGG ratings without context; the Splendor app...and its achievement system; does a game become classic when people forget the rules? -Mark
Now that 2017 is off and running we decided it's time to talk about all the games that got us chomping at the bits to get at this year. Newsman Tony presents our list of 27 games that we're frothering at the mouth for in the coming year.
In this show, we talk about Hero Realms, Batman The Animated Series The Dice Game, When I Dream, Revenge of the dictators, Running with the Bulls, and Jump Drive. A host of contributors join us, talking about everything from randomness to Hare and Tortoise! We have a tale of Horror and Amazement, and end the show talking about our 2017 gaming resolutions. Again.
AnmeldenThe Secret Cabal
Rolling Dice and Taking Names
Board Game Design Lab
