On the development of Acquire....

Here's a lovely and very well-researched article by Joe Huber of The Opinionated Gamers on Sid Sackson's Acquire, one of the greatest and most influential board games ever made (IMHO).  A quote:

Having now detailed the path to the production of the test marketing edition of Acquire, the next step – and the most interesting part of the story, for me – is going through the game’s journey to the Acquire we know and love still today.  This is where Sackson’s habit of drafting his letters – and saving the drafts – makes all the difference; as a result it’s possible to follow nearly the whole path.

More than 50 years later and the game is still a monumental achievement that I beg people to play every other week.  Definitely worth the read.

Reflection on the 2013 Gathering of Friends...

Last week I got to experience my first ever Gathering of Friends, an invite-only board game event hosted by Alan Moon. It took me the last 5 days to recover from this amazing experience. I didn't pace myself well. I ended up getting sick when I got home. Guess I was desperate for some sleep, home cooking, and getting back to a regular routine.

Me with Alan & Janet Moon. 

This was honestly the best board game experience of my life. I did some number-crunching and it looks like I played about 70 games total (a mix of prototypes, published games, and coming soon games). Of the 70 games, 40 were unique titles. And of those 40 titles about 30 of them were new to me. That's a lot of games!

One of my favourite games at GoF13 - Rialto by Stefan Feld

It was so amazing to get to try a bunch of games that are not out yet. I discovered some great games that are coming soon. Some highlights for me include: Terra Mystica, Brugge, Spyrium, Rialto, Tzolkin expansion (post coming), Russian Rails, Black Spy, Clubs (post coming), etc, not to mention all the great prototypes.

Quarantine by Mercury Games (Coming Soon)

A neat success story from last year's GoF is the game Quarantine by Mercury Games. Last year my roommate Jay Cormier pitched this game by Mark Klassen (fellow Game Artisan of Canada) to a new board game company Mercury Games (Canadian company!) at GoF12. Well this year, Mercury Games had a couple advance copies to preview at the event. I got to try the finished product of the game even before the designer! The game is tons of fun, and hopefully I will be able to get the game (reviewers copy?) in the future.

Vlaada playing Cards Against Humanity with GAC

However, the Gathering's real highlight is the people. As a member of the Game Artisans of Canada, I hadn't met many of the west coast and prairie members. What a great way to meet them! Above you can see us playing a game of Cards Against Humanity. Vlaada also joined in. But the list doesn't end there. I got to meet so many great people. Some of the more noteworthy examples are the publishers and designers I got to meet. I already mentioned Vlaada & William. I dont have pictures, but some of the other highlights include getting to do dinner with great designers like Kevin G. Nunn (1955: The War of Espionage, Rolling Freight, Zong Shi) & Kevin Wilson (Arkham Horror, Android, Cosmic Encounter, Descent, Elder Sign, Fury of Dracula, A Game of Thrones, Sid Meier's Civilization, etc). Also got to hang out with a variety of amazing board game reviewers. Basically every writer for Opinionated Gamers was in attendance at the Gathering.

Game Artisans of Canada (GAC) being interviewed

One of the more unique experiences of the Gathering, atleast for me, was being part of a documentary. As many of you know, I am a big movie fan, and really love documentaries. Well, it looks like I might be part of a board game documentary. Doug was able to capture many of my pitches to publishers and he said there is a good chance my story will be part of the finished product. So keep an eye on Kickstarter as he plans to crowd-fund his documentary. I honestly sometimes forgot I was being filmed and I know Doug managed to capture some amazing moments. From live pitches from a variety of designers, to back room interviews with publishers, to insider tips from industry experts, if you like board games, or are just curious about insider business tips, you will need to watch this film.

Sails To Steam presented to Hans Im Glueck & Z-Man

Talking about pitching games, I havent mentioned some of the great success stories GAC experienced at this year's Gathering. The main goal of GoF is not pitching games, but thankfully Alan Moon is okay with it happening at his event. The amazing thing is, the entire experience is very casual and personal. Instead of it feeling very rigid and business like, the entire pitch process is fun. Publishers like to hang out with designers, and listen to pitches over dinner or even a beer. Its a real win-win environment. I give all the credit to Alan for creating such an amazing atmosphere. 

At this point I wont go into much more detail about some of the GAC games that got picked up, because I wouldn't want to get in the way of any contract's being negotiated. However, I will be sure to mention them in the future, as paperwork gets signed, and designers are open to me sharing.

Prototype designed by Stephen Sauer & I

I will share a brief summary of my pitching experience. I managed to present Londonderry to 7 publishers at the Gathering of Friends. I was actually a little shocked they were willing to meet with me, as I am an unsigned designer. Each of them are amazing companies I would be honoured to work with. It is easy for me to say that I liked them all, when all of them had many great things to say about Londonderry. Even the one publisher who outright said he was not interested (yes, most of the companies said to keep in touch), did say the game was "flawless!" What?! The publisher said it wasn't his taste of game, but really nothing major should change about the game because there is a market for this game. 

Overall, of the 6 other publishers who expressed interest to keep talking, we decided to move forward (at this stage) with two of them who were most excited about the design. A couple of the publishers I talked to even suggested I move forward with one of these two companies as they thought it would be a good fit. One thing I learned from this experience, is that publishers really work well with each other. I find this very admirable about the board game industry. That does not mean either of them will for sure sign the game. But at this point, they wanted prototypes of the game to be able to give it a more thorough evaluation. If both publishers decide to pass, then we will pursue another publisher. I really look forward to getting past this stage in the process - and focus on developing and making this game incrediable.

Alan Moon & I with the prize I brought

Last but not least, the prize table. At the end of the Gathering, we have a big ceremony and people earn prizes. Everyone gets to walk home with at least one prize because everyone brings a prize. Above is a picture of the prize I brought (thanks to my co-designer Stephen Sauer for providing me with an amazing prize). Alan Moon liked the prize so much he placed it on his main table of his favourite prizes. Woohoo! Many of the prizes on his table went to tournament winners (I played in 4 tournaments and sadly never won. I did manage to get to the finals in 3 of them). But I ended up getting a pretty amazing prize, a jumbo version of Blokus (generously donated by Kevin O'Brien!) However, after the event, my friend Ben (owner of Snakes & Lattes) was heartbroken I scooped that prize on him, so I traded him the prize for a couple games. I know it will get lots of love at Snakes & Lattes, and I can visit my awesome prize any time I go.

Daryl chats with William Attia at GOF...

Daryl Andrews & William Attia (Gathering of Friends 2013)

Where do I start?! I have spent the last 4 days at the Gathering of Friends and it has been beyond amazing. I confess I am not even sorry for not posting much about it, because I have been busy enjoying it too much. So many highlights to share. Where do I start?!

Today, I played a prototype copy of Spyrium designed by William Attia (maker of the great game Caylus - basically the best classic heavy euro game of all time). You can see a picture of us above. First off, the game is amazing! It does everything I love in games. Its deep, with tough decisions and never enough turns to make them all. Every turn is fun, and even in your downtime you are engaged and care what other players are doing. 

Jay Cormier teaching us (Ian, Debbie, Jeff, & I) Spyrium 

However, this was not the highlight of my interaction with William. Later I found out that he is also keeping an eye out for games for Ystari publishing AND he wanted to see my game Londonderry that I co-designed with Stephen Sauer. WHAT?! We played the game and it was tons of fun. Thanks to Gord Hamilton & Ian Mackey for joining us. William expressed Londonderry is not necessarily his taste in games, but offered great feedback and encouragement. My bias but favourite comment after he found out I liked the game "Rialto" by Stefan Feld, "well I can tell why you like that game because this game reminds me of it very much, but I like your game more." 

After I came back down from cloud 9, William spent a significant amount of time sharing his story, talking about his progress as a board game designer. It was so amazing to hear a candid and personal story from such an accomplished designer about his journey. From a simple beginning of organizing a Puerto Rico tournament in game store in Paris, meeting the shop owner that hosted the tournament, becoming friends, helping him develop a game called Ys, which lead to his friend starting Ystari board game company, to initially starting to design Caylus in January 2005 and having it out in print by October 2005. And still today most would say its the greatest worker placement game ever designed.

I doubt Londonderry will get published by Ystari, but after such an amazing experience meeting William, and hearing about all the care and development Ystari puts into their games, I must confess I really hope some day I have the honour and privilege to work with them in the future. They sounds like a great company that cares about games and wants to work to make the best products possible for their customers. And you can tell when you play Spyrium, it is amazing. I plan to buy that game. And every person I have at GoF who has tried the game, is planning to buy the game too. Its that good!      

Buried in the sands of time....

Will we still be playing board games in a few millenia?  Check out this article about game designer Jason Rohrer, who won a design contest after burying his board game in the Nevada desert. Seriously.

Rattling off a list of board game materials that would be unlikely to last the intended passage of time (wood, cardboard, aluminum, glass), Rohrer ultimately decided to make the game from a resilient metal. He machined the 18-inch by 18-inch game board and the pieces future players will use out of 30 pounds of titanium.

Rohrer laid out the game's rules diagrammatically on three pages of archival, acid-free paper, hermetically sealed them inside a Pyrex glass tube — which were then housed inside a titanium baton — and set about burying them in the earth.

Although some 900 clues were handed out at the conference, Rohrer suggests it could take 2700 years to finally unearth the game.  (I imagine the desert will have expanded greatly by then.)

Sadly, no one but a computer has actually played the game or seen in it in its entirety which seems like a waste.  It definitely makes it impossible to predict whether it'll be a candidate for the 2736th annual Spiel des Jahres award or even whether the Kickstarter campaign will get funded.  Sigh.

(Thanks for the tip, Sibs...)

Deadly Danger Dungeon

Hilarious video. Inspires me to make crazy role & move games. Also, makes me wish I still had all my old crazy kid creations from years long past. Anyone else like me out there, who made crazy homemade games like Deadly Danger Dungeon?!

Ideal post-secondary institutions....

If game design is your thing and you don't already have a ridiculous amount of useless degrees like me, then this post about gamer-friendly universities might help you out.  It's mostly video game-related but there is at least one instructor mentioned who makes her students play Clue to sharpen their skills (although I think could name at least a few much smarter deduction games than Clue....)

You tell me: favourite game designers...

Managed to play a game of the new Ticket To Ride: Asia team expansion last night and loved it.  My favourite series of games now has an option for clever partnership play and it felt quite rewarding when you worked together with someone to complete a ticket.  I am reminded again and again of how much I enjoy Alan R. Moon games, whether it be a game in the TTR series, the lovely Elfenland, the interactive and nasty Oasis, or the brilliant and under-rated card game Gloria Picktoria.  He is the tops for me right now with Knizia, Sackson, Friese, Kramer, and Wallace following not far behind.

Who is your favourite game designer and why?

Canadian game-design contest!

FallCon in Calgary announced that they are looking for entries for a new annual game designing competition. The information is here.

I have pages upon pages of ideas and yet I still have not put together a single prototype to try out. I think I have this weird fear that the game I produce will be completely unplayable. I really must get over that.

(via BoardGame News.)