Corry Damey, designer of Seasons of Rice and winner of the BGDL Design Challenge, discusses how he’s managed to win 3 design competitions.

The post How to Win a Design Competition with Corry Damey appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Bez Shahriari, designer of Yogi, discusses the ins and outs of creating a game made specifically for families.

We go into why family games are so good for helping kids as they grow up, and we talk about a lot of things to consider when making these types of games.

The post Designing Family Games with Bez Shahriari appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Dr. Corey Butler, social psychologist and avid gamer, has been conducting research on gamers for a while and has some really interesting information on player psychology based on both his formal training and his research.

And check out all the really cool articles and research findings on Corey’s blog HERE.

The post Player Psychology with Dr. Corey Butler appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Greg Loring-Albright is back on the show, and we’re talking about games that don’t exist on a board or even at a table.

Greg has been designing games that pervade into spaces much bigger than your dining room table, and he has some really interesting insight on how and why these games work.

The post Pervasive Games with Greg Loring-Albright appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Kirk Dennison of Piecekeeper Games is back on the show, and we’re talking about the various uses of 3D printing in game design.

Kirk got into the world of 3D printing a while back and has found a lot of ways to put it to good use in his designs and for his company.

And check out Kirk’s latest game, Rurik: Dawn of Kiev, which is on Kickstarter now. It’s got some really cool minis.

Notes from the show:

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Coming to you from Dice Tower Con 2018, Eric Lang had a free 20 minutes and agreed to answer some questions, so we found a not so quiet side room to chat.

Eric gives his best advice on several design topics, and he provides incredible insight that all designers need to pay attention to.

The post Eric Lang’s Best Advice appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

BGDL founder, Gabe Barrett, talks about many of the really cool and helpful creativity/productivity hacks he’s been learning about recently.

He discusses some rather interesting findings that have come from researching some of the best in the world in different fields. There are also a lot of things that you’ll hopefully find encouraging.

The end of this episode has an exciting announcement in which Gabe talks about the new BGDL Patreon page. Please check out the page and consider supporting it HERE.​​

The post Hacking Creativity to Become the Best in the World with Gabe Barrett appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Adrienne Ezell, professional board game artist and art director, discusses how to work effectively with artists.

Adrienne has been a pro artist for 15 years and now works full time in the board game industry. We talk communication, contracts, timelines, costs, and everything in between.

Link to the 3d box maker we discussed: https://www.boxshot.com/

The post How to Work with Artists with Adrienne Ezell appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Ted Alspach, designer Suburbia of and founder of Bezier Games, discusses city building games.

Suburbia is ranked 94th on Board Game Geek and is easily on the Mount Rushmore of city building games, so Ted really knows what he’s talking about when it comes to designing one of these types of games.

The post City Building Games with Ted Alspach appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Nolan Nasser, illustrator and founder of Deep Water Games, discusses art direction in board games.

Nolan has a ton of experience in directing art for well known games and shares a great deal of what he’s learned over the years.

The post Art Direction in Games with Nolan Nasser appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Cody Stevens, the designer of Dino Dunk, discusses dexterity games.

We talk about lots of different dexterity style games, how they work, and what makes them good.

The post Designing Dexterity Games with Cody Stevens appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Joseph Z Chen discusses catch-up mechanisms.

Joseph is a designer and indie publisher who did a fairly in-depth analysis on ways different games keep players involved until the end. We talk about several popular games and their catch-up mechanisms as well as Joseph’s personal experiences.

And don’t forget to check out Joseph’s game, Fantastic Factories, on Kickstarter HERE.

The post Catch-Up Mechanisms with Joseph Z. Chen appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Erin Dean, author of For the Love of Board Games, discusses her book and what she learned from the designers she interviewed.

You can check out Erin’s documentary, The Board Game Boom, here.

The post For the Love of Board Games – A Book by Erin Dean appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Matt Holden discusses the Indie Game Alliance.

Matt started the IGA four years ago to help small publishers and designers get their games demoed at conventions and game stores, and it’s grown into a robust organization that offers quite a few services.

The post The Indie Game Alliance with Matt Holden appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Brad Talton, designer of BattleCon and Pixel Tactics, discusses dueling games. 

Brad has been creating dueling combat games for years and has found incredible success with his company, Level 99 Games.

The post Dueling Games with Brad Talton appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

I’ve got some exciting announcements for the BGDL:

1) I’m starting a new thing that will hopefully lead to an even greater sense of community. Today, with the incredible help of Chris Perea, a BGDL Discord server has launched which will offer you another way to interact with others in the community and will lead to…

2) BGDL Game Nights. I want to provide opportunities for people (especially those in more isolated locations) to be able to get together and play games. Both published games and prototypes. So, the BGDL is going to start hosting regular game nights through Discord and Tabletop Simulator. The first game night will be May 12th.

3) Giveaway. We’re giving away 2 copies of Tabletop Simulator. All you have to do is fill out this short form and you’ll be entered to win. The form will give us a better idea about what the community wants as far as game nights are concerned.

4) Game design tutorial videos. Chris Perea is putting together regular content to teach you how to do various design related tasks, starting with getting your game setup on Tabletop Simulator. Please subscribe to the BGDL Youtube channel to see all the current and future how-to guides. 

The post Coming Attractions for the BGDL appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Richard Garfield, designer of Magic: The Gathering and a ton of other great games, discusses how to use luck and skill effectively in game design.

Richard belongs on the game design Mount Rushmore and has awesome insight and advice.

The post Luck vs Skill with Richard Garfield appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.

Jon Mietling, designer of Palm Island, discusses how to effectively design a game with multi-use cards.

Jon ran an incredibly successful Kickstarter for Palm Island which is rather innovative game that focusses solely on multi-use cards as its core mechanism.

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Justin Jacobson, founder of Restoration Games, discusses the process of bringing a game back to life.

Justin’s entire business model is built on taking old games off the shelf and breathing new life into them, and he offers great insight on how to do it. If you’ve got some old games of your own that you shelved for whatever reason, you just might get some ideas on how to bring those back.

The post Bringing Old Designs Back to Life with Justin Jacobson appeared first on Board Game Design Lab.