The most formative experience so far in my career as a game designer came the first time I tabled at a convention. As it happened, I was seated next to the only other tabletop game company selling there (name withheld to protect the innocent (me)). The first day, someone came…

If you’re really into board games, odds are you want to get lots of your friends into board games too. One of the main strategies towards this goal is to get them started with an “introductory game” like Catan, Ticket to Ride, or Carcassonne. However, a lot of more experienced…

The question of whether luck is appropriate in board games is a subject of frequent debate. Those in favor say that chance adds more variability to the game, and strategy arises from being dealt a poor situation and being able to respond to it successfully. Detractors say that any game…

Tiny Trainwrecks was a great game, but you know what the problem was? That’s right, NOT TINY ENOUGH. Phantom Knight Games is proud to present Tiny Trainwrecks: Even Tinier Edition! The same great game but now on smaller cards! While the old edition of Tiny Trainwrecks was on poker-sized cards, the new…

Columbo picked up the red pillar and placed it off to the side. “That’s my turn,” he said, “now which card are you going to take?” Smith smirked. “Sorry, Mr. Detective–“ he delicately placed one of the cards in front of him– “but this is my win. I’ll use my two…

Most people in the fighting game community, and some in board games, are familiar with the works of David Sirlin (Yomi, Puzzle Strike, Pandante). His most famous essay is about the term “scrub”, which refers to a type of player who will, instead of improving in a competitive game, will…

I’m not going to do a fancy introduction for this one, I just want to get into something that I haven’t noticed much discussion of: Turn autonomy. Turn autonomy is the number of things a player can do on their turn. Note that in some games, a player might have…

I’ve known one of my friends for about six years now, and he has a fascinating pattern of hobbies. He’ll get into a game really intensely for a month or two and talk to me nonstop about his favorite strategies before suddenly switching to another one. These games are in…

Nerds are generally not very good at being funny. If you want evidence of this, look at the way movies like Monty Python and the Holy Grail have been wrung dry by nerds who missed the point of the irreverent humor in favor of quoting the same lines until the…