Crowdfunded eurogames from smaller board game publishers had a banner year at the latest Dice Tower Awards, accounting for half of the wins at the high-profile prize ceremony.

The biggest success of the night was Kinson Key Games’ Galactic Cruise, which was crowned game of the year in addition to picking up gongs for best strategy game and best game from a new designer.

That triple win caps a two-year success story for Kinson Key’s first major release, which began with the title raising over $800,000 from more than 8,000 backers via its Kickstarter campaign.

Its Dice Tower Awards victories come three months after Galactic Cruise was named Heavy Game of the Year in BoardGameGeek’s similarly high-profile Golden Geek Awards, in addition to being named a runner-up in the artwork and presentation and thematic game categories.

Fellow indie publisher Paverson Games was also a standout winner in this year’s Dice Tower Awards, with its classical music-inspired title Luthier picking up awards for best theme, best production and best game from a small publisher.

Other crowdfunded titles honoured by the awards were mid-weight euro Critter Kitchen for best artwork thanks to the work of Sandara Tang, and 20 Strong: Tanglewoods Red for best solo game – the latter the only one which raised money through Gamefound rather than Kickstarter.

The string of crowdfunded successes is significant given the notable shifts which have taken place on Kickstarter and Gamefound in recent years, with a rise in larger publishers using the sites, and more campaigns focused around big-budget releases, miniatures heavy projects, deluxified components and major licensed IP.

Winners which did not originate through a crowdfunding campaign were The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring – Trick-Taking Game, which won best co-op game, FlipToons, which won best welcoming game, and CMYK’s reprint of Magical Athlete, which took best reprint.

CMYK scored a second success in this year’s awards with Hot Streak, which won best party game, while Stonemaier Games took the most innovative game prize with Vantage and Tag Team won best 2-player game.

Presented annually during Gen Con, the Dice Tower Awards are among the board game hobby’s highest-profile jury-voted honours, given the winning titles gain exposure with the veteran reviews giant’s more than 360,000 YouTube subscribers.

Winners are selected from the previous year’s games by a panel of more than 60 Dice Tower contributors, reviewers and content creators. The awards celebrates its 20th anniversary next year.

The Dice Tower also inducted 7 Wonders Duel, Codenames and Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 into its Hall of Fame this year.

Dice Tower Awards 2025 winners

Game of the Year
Galactic Cruise – designed by TK King, Dennis Northcott, and Koltin Thompson (Published by Kinson Key Games)

Best Welcoming Game
FlipToons – Jordy Adan and Renato Simões – (Thunderworks Games)

Best Artwork
Critter Kitchen – Alex Cutler, Peter C Hayard (Cardboard Alchemy)

Most Innovative Game
Vantage – Jamey Stegmaier (Stonemaier Games)

Best Cooperative Game
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring – Trick-Taking Game – Bryan Bornmueller (Office Dog / Asmodee)

Best Reprint
Magical Athlete – Richard Garfield and Takashi Ishida (CMYK)

Best Strategy Game
Galactic Cruise – TK King, Dennis Northcott, Koltin Thompson (Kinson Key Games)

Best Board Game Production
Luthier – Dave Beck and Abe Burson (Paverson Games)

Best Game from a Small Publisher
Luthier – Dave Beck and Abe Burson (Paverson Games)

Best 2-Player Game
Tag Team – Gricha German and Corentin Lebrat (Scorpion Masque)

Best Game from a New Designer
Galactic Cruise – TK King, Dennis Northcott, Koltin Thompson (Kinson Key Games)

Best Party Game
Hot Streak – Jon Perry (CMYK)

Best Theme in a Game
Luthier – Dave Beck and Abe Burson (Paverson Games)

Best Solo Game
20 Strong: Tanglewoods Red – Josh J Carlson (Chip Theory Games)

The post Crowdfunded euros from smaller publishers dominate Dice Tower Awards as Galactic Cruise claims game of the year first appeared on .

Hot on the heels of Dale Yu’s review of Not Alone: Remastered Edition from Geek Attitude Games, you get to see it again here as I was given a rundown on the new title by the folks at Luma Imports. … Continue reading →

Gen Con 2026 – Thunderworks Games Gen Con 2026 is over (as well as the fall school kick-off) and I’ve come back up for air, just in time to ramp up the annual Gen Con run-down here at OpinionatedGamers. Will … Continue reading →

North America’s biggest tabletop gaming convention, Gen Con, has continued its record-breaking run after more than 74,000 attendees left this year’s sold-out show bursting at the seams.

Gen Con’s latest hefty attendance figure extends its steady post-pandemic growth, following record crowds of 70,000 in 2023, 71,000 in 2024 and almost 72,000 last year – which all broke the 2019 pre-pandemic high.

But the convention, which has sold out before opening for three consecutive years, is operating at a hard capacity ceiling at the Indiana Convention Centre. Gen Con president David Hoppe told the Indianapolis Business Journal last year that the show’s growth had left it “capacity constrained”, saying: “We fill every nook and cranny of this downtown core area.”

He added in that interview that he would love to get 80,000 attendees at the show some day – and Gen Con is set to take a step closer to that goal for its 60th anniversary show next year thanks to a significant floor space expansion and opening of a new Signia by Hilton hotel.

That expansion includes an extra 143,500 sq ft of floor space – roughly the size of 2.5 American football fields – and 800 new hotel rooms.

Indianapolis already claims to have the most hotels and hotel rooms connected by enclosed skywalks into a city centre in the US – and the new expansion will boost that capacity to more than 5,200 rooms.

Gen Con’s organisers did not say how many extra exhibitors or attendees the expansion is expected to accommodate, how much of the new space will be devoted to the exhibition hall.

Exhibitor and vendor numbers reached almost 800 at the packed out four-day event, Gen Con said. The show reported a then-record 575 exhibitors showcasing their wares last year, although the inclusion of “vendors” makes it unclear if the 2026 figure is directly comparable.

BoardGameWire contacted Gen Con’s press office earlier this week for confirmation on how much additional capacity next year’s expansion will create, and for clarity on exhibitor numbers in 2026, but is yet to receive a response.

This year’s convention also faced an unexpected operational test after severe thunderstorms prompted a tornado warning on Saturday evening, and caused water to shower down into parts of the Indiana Convention Center.

The worst affected areas were the convention’s playtest area and part of Exhibit Hall B, with attendees told to relocate to safer parts of the building while the warning was in place.

Exhibitors affected included Tycoon Games, with managing director Ben Rathbone telling the Indy Star, “As we were doing our demos and tournaments, drop of rain started coming through the ceiling up there.

“We immediately started pulling our stuff back, then there was a deluge came down, flooded the whole floor there, and we had to move all our games and store them out of the way.”

He added that the publisher’s games had been damaged “only a little bit”, saying that most of them were out of the way.

Gen Con said staff responded quickly to ensure safety and make repairs, adding that there was “minimal disruption” to the convention due to the leak.

This year’s event was also impacted by heavy amounts of construction work taking place around the convention site, leading to large build-ups of foot and vehicle traffic.

Gen Con president David Hoppe said of this year’s event, “Even through construction and thunderstorms, Gen Con 2026 was bigger and better than ever, with a record-breaking number of attendees gathering in Indianapolis for the best four days in gaming.

“We can’t thank Indy enough for hosting us, and we’re already looking forward to our 60th anniversary convention in an expanded Indiana Convention Center next year.”

Next year’s Gen Con is scheduled for August 5 to 8, with badges set to go on sale in early 2027.

The post Gen Con tops 74,000 attendees as record-breaking show preps for much-needed venue, hotel expansion first appeared on .

Gen Con is fast approaching, and along with the annual Essen convention, it’s one of the biggest times for new board game releases. As of this writing, there are over 500 new tabletop games either being released or demoed at the convention. That’s a lot of new content. For those curious about which games to […]

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The summer heat is intense, but it’s not as hot as Gen Con 2026. Soon gamers from all over the world will descend on Indianapolis for North America’s largest board game convention. Just like in past years, hundreds of new board games will make their debut – over 600 this year, an overwhelming number. But never fear, the Meeple Mountain team is here to help you find the gems among the coal. Our staff have scoured through the upcoming titles to select our most anticipated games of Gen Con 2026! So without further ado, here are our picks!

Check our past recommendations and see how we did!
Gen Con 2025 | Gen Con 2024 | Gen Con 2023 | Gen Con 2022 | Gen Con 2021

Andy Matthews

Class of '89

As someone who graduated from high school in 1989 I am, as the marketing literature says, “the target audience” for this upcoming release from Paverson Games. Class of ‘89 is set back in time when hair was…

The post The 22 Most Anticipated Games of Gen Con 2026 appeared first on Meeple Mountain.

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Gen Con is Gen Coming, so we’re looking in our wizard’s glasses to tell you what’s what. Whether you’re going or not, you’re gonna want to know what the hot games are, and we’ve got you covered. Before we Indianapolize, we talk about Koinobori, Compania, and Mood Swings.

If you don’t want to miss an episode, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts/Google Podcasts/Stitcher/Spotify, or add our RSS feed to your favourite app. Reviews and subscriptions really help us and would be greatly appreciated! To download the episode directly, click here.

If you’d like to discuss anything in the episode, please do so in the comments below, visit our BoardGameGeek guild, join our Discord, or Facebook Group! Any feedback is also always helpful. If you’d like to show your support for the show, we also have a Patreon with some fun rewards, and a merch store!

Timecodes:

02:32 – Koinobori
09:50 – Compania
19:52 – Mood Swings
25:39 – Gen Con preview
24:57 – Prague Unseen
28:27 – Triangulation
30:24 – All Mine!
32:25 – Hell of a Deal
34:51 – Night at the Zoo
36:22 – Stonk Market
39:45 – Bullseye
41:57 – Jibber Jabble
44:38 – The Lord of the Rings: Circle of Conflict
46:05 – Revenant
48:11 – FaeKin
49:32 – Mythologies
50:18 – World Order
52:28 – Greylune
57:22 – Corps of Discovery Duo

Thank you to Heart Society for generously letting us use What’s On Your Mind, Kid? from their album Wake the Queens.

The post BGB Podcast #365 – Gen Con 2026 Preview appeared first on Board Game Barrage.

The Diana Jones Award committee has picked a trio of TTRPG creators as the latest winners of its emerging designer program, who will each receive a $6,500 prize package that includes an all-expenses trip to Gen Con.

Glaiza Champion, J Strautman and Kodi Gonzaga will also receive one-year memberships to trade bodies GAMA and the Tabletop Game Designers Association through the award, as well as prizes including prototyping credit at The Game Crafter, an online badge to Protospiel and a game demo spot on Gen Con TV.

The emerging designer program, now in its sixth year, seeks to amplify the voices of up-and-coming tabletop creators, with a particular focus on designers from marginalized communities.

Filipino-American designer Glaiza Champion describes themself as a ‘third-culture’ kid whose experiences span Brunei, Cambodia, the Philippines and Korea.

Champion is a game designer, writer, performer, podcaster and variety streamer, whose work is rooted in tabletop roleplaying games and storytelling – with designs to date including Beef, Missing Month and Meet Your GelCub.

Toronto-based RPG designer J Strautman, who also works under the name Yes No Goodbye, combines game design with a career as a professional musician.

Strautman has released the GM-less zine-sized RPGs Contact and Insatiable Cravings, and in 2025 co-released A Fool’s Errand through Planet Arcana Games.

Alongside their design work, Strautman tours internationally as a professional bass player, and co-hosted, and scored and edited the tarot-infused science fantasy actual play podcast Planet Arcana.

Los Angeles-based designer Kodi Gonzaga began designing games in 2018, and has since created a growing catalogue of tabletop RPGs including Extra Ordinary, Misfits & Mayhem SRD, Down the Road Through the End of the World, Voxinn: A Firebrands Hack and In This Echoing World.

Gonzaga is also a creative writer, actual play performer, Big Bad Con POC Scholar and former IGDN convention coordinator.

Other finalists in this year’s competition included Wyrmspan and Apiary designer Connie Vogelmann, Cretaceous Rails designer Ann Journey, and Elijah Djan – the co-creator of FinMaster, a game designed to help teach families about investing and enable positive discussions about money.

Also making the list of finalists this year was board game designer Gene Koo, who works to promote tabletop game designers based in the Washington DC metropolitan area.

Last year’s emerging designer program winners were High Tide designer Marceline Leiman, Ashraf Braden, Elliot Davis and Lyla McBeath Fujiwara.

Speaking to BoardGameWire after being selected last year, Leiman said the award had enabled her to attend Gen Con at a time when financial pressures and industry uncertainty would otherwise have made the trip impossible.

“Gen Con is an incredibly important convention for freelance designers to get their work noticed and signed,” Leiman said. “This amazing opportunity for underrepresented and underprivileged folks represents a great step in equalizing this dream of a creative field for all.”

The Diana Jones emerging designer award program was launched in 2021, with Jeeyon Shim picking up the inaugural award.

The emerging designer program is part of the wider Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming, which was founded and first awarded in 2001.

That award is presented to the person, product, company, event, movement, concept or any other thing that has, in the opinion of its committee, best demonstrated the quality of “excellence” in the world of hobby-gaming in the previous year – and is traditionally hugely wide-ranging in its choice of candidates.

Previous winners across the award’s 22-year run have included Blood Rage designer Eric Lang, Nigerian games industry publisher and evangelist NIBCARD, and the entire ‘actual play’ movement of people livestreaming and podcasting roleplaying games.

Last year’s Excellence in Gaming award was deemed a tie between author Rose Estes and the climate action-themed board game Daybreak, designed by Matt Leacock and Matteo Menapace.

The post TTRPG trio triumph in latest Diana Jones emerging designer program, win expenses-paid trip to Gen Con first appeared on .