Articles

A variety of articles about the world of boardgames from an equally varied mix of authors.

< Back to Special Features

---

Headlines May 6, 2008 - Mary Dimercurio Prasad: Game Room Accessories and Snackage May 3, 2008 - Brad Keen: Convention Report – Saturday at CABS April 29, 2008 - Ray Smith: Interview with Jim Sandefur April 25, 2008 - Larry Levy:  Gathering Memories—The Games (Part 2) April 25, 2008 - Travis Reynolds: Basic Training – Conflict at the Gathering April 21, 2008 - Larry Levy:  Gathering Memories—The Games (Part 1) April 6, 2008 - Mary Dimercurio Prasad: Boardgaming with Polymer Clay March 24, 2008 - Larry Levy: Coming Up for Air, Part 1 March 21, 2008 - Travis Reynolds: Basic Training – Target Arnhem, 1960 March 9, 2008 - Postcards from Brazil: Carnaval & Board Games March 3, 2008 - Gilad Yarnitzky: Interview with Yonatan Aloni February 15, 2008 - Travis Reynolds: Basic Training – Athens & Sparta, Battle at the Cross Roads

---

Articles

Mary Dimercurio Prasad: Game Room Accessories and Snackage

What should a well-stocked game room include? You may be surprised by the number of items that can enhance your board gaming experience!

Read more...

---

Brad Keen: Convention Report – Saturday at CABS

On March 28th, I returned to my boardgaming roots, if you will pardon the expression, and traveled back to Columbus Ohio to attend a CABS (Columbus Area Board Gaming Society) Saturday gaming session. These special gaming sessions are held on the last Saturday of most months. For more information, you can checkout the CABS 2008 Schedule.

Read more...

---

Ray Smith: Interview with Jim Sandefur

Preface by Ray Smith: Being a fan of Boulder Games by way of its wonderful service, selection, and prices (and the zillions of dollars I’ve bartered his way), I contacted Jim Sandefur for an interview. Beyond him graciously agreeing to provide the usual background on his online game business based in Lizella, Georgia, Jim provides some passionate insight on a hot topic in the gaming industry.

Read more...

---

Larry Levy:  Gathering Memories—The Games (Part 2)

Here are my quick summaries of the rest of the new games I played at the Gathering.

Pandemic - I forgot to mention this one in my list of 7+ rated games I covered in my first report.  This was a fun challenge and has good potential, but I’ll probably need to play a few more times before I finalize my rating.  We played with our cards face up and advice was given freely; consequently, as a first-time player, it was pretty hard not to get drowned out by the more experienced players.  I think some contests with other newbies are called for, but I liked what I saw.  Rating: 7.

Read more...

---

Travis Reynolds: Basic Training – Conflict at the Gathering

Hmm, perhaps I should be more clear – I was lucky enough to attend my very first Gathering of Friends earlier this month AND I caught up with Uwe Eickert to discuss his upcoming game, Conflict of Heroes. I guess it’s all in the wording…

Read more...

---

Larry Levy:  Gathering Memories—The Games (Part 1)

Unlike years past, I’d done a pretty good job of getting to play most of the 2007 titles I wanted to prior to the Gathering.  And I didn’t think there was a huge number of riveting games coming out of Nuremburg.  So I was quite surprised at how many new games I played in Columbus:  over 20 new-to-me designs.  That, combined with the very large number of prototypes I played over the course of the week, meant I played relatively few older games, which was just fine with me.

Here are my quick impressions on the new games I played.  Time permitting, I’ll try to post some more complete reviews in the days to come.  None of the new designs blew me away, but most of them were worth playing and I can see a few entering the regular rotation in my game group.  Unless otherwise indicated, I only played each of these games once.  I’ve also included an initial rating for each game, just to give some idea of how much it appealed to me.

Read more...

---

Mary Dimercurio Prasad: Boardgaming with Polymer Clay

My husband recently brought to my attention a Geeklist on BoardGameGeek of board games enhanced with polymer clay pieces. For example, one guy made all new pieces for Agricola, including the cutest little sheep, boar, cattle, and vegetables. I also enjoyed the images of Primordial Soup (amoebas and amoeba poop… uh, food!) and Power Grid (check out the garbage cans).

Over the years, I’ve made quite a few things with polymer clay (e.g. jewelry, figurines), but I had not yet used it for game pieces (except to replace missing pieces). At one point I had thought about making a Settlers board but that would be a lot more work than I’m interested in doing for one game. A smaller project would be fine, though, so I decided to make dinosaurs for our Evo game.

Read more...

---

Larry Levy: Coming Up for Air, Part 1

Well, hello again. It’s been a while, hasn’t it? When Eric and I agreed that I would go to At Large status, I wasn’t planning for my output to drop to the level of the other ”Comets," but one of the reasons I wanted to be relieved of regular column duties was that I knew that I’d be entering an unusually heavy period at work and wouldn’t be able to devote the amount of time to writing that I usually do.

Well, the prediction was true and then some. It was a very frantic time at work, with late hours, weekends, and lack of sleep. Kind of like your typical gaming con, without any of the benefits. There’s been limited free time and to be honest, the last thing I wanted to do when I got some was more thinking. So no articles from me for the last two months. Thankfully, things are finally easing up and I’m able to devote some time to the work that I actually enjoy. With luck, I’ll be able to contribute some pieces in the weeks ahead, including (I hope), my usual rundown of all the new and old delights I’ll get to sample at the Gathering.

Read more...

---

Travis Reynolds: Basic Training – Target Arnhem, 1960

This month I was lucky enough to attend a Games Day put on by the Appalachian Gamers‘ own Charlie Davis. The Games Day was held on the campus of WVU Tech in Montgomery WV. Last year’s event was plagued with bad weather – Ted Cheatham almost killed me on an icy bridge traveling home! – and this year’s was similarly stricken with uncharacteristically good weather, a bane for indoor activities in the spring. Nonetheless, the turnout was good and the fun was great.

Read more...

---

Postcards from Brazil: Carnaval & Board Games

By Antonio Marcelo and Flavio Jandorno
March 9, 2008

In Brazil every year in the months of February or March (this year at the very beginning of February), we have the greatest popular extravaganza in the world – the Brazilian Carnaval. Brazilian Carnaval, a huge party that lasts for four whole days, has its origins in the Carnaval of Venice, but over time it has morphed and is now an event that attracts tourists from the whole world.

The Carnaval climaxes with the parade of the “Samba Schools” in which thousands of men, women and children in costumes and often on floats participate in a parade while fighting for that year’s title of “Best Samba School”. More information and images of the Carnaval are available in Portugese on Globo.com.

Read more...

---

Gilad Yarnitzky: Interview with Yonatan Aloni

Yonatan Aloni is the owner of Silverstars Publishing, the official translator of D&D into Hebrew, one of the largest game companies to translate Euro-style games into Hebrew, and probably the largest importer of Euro-style games. With Eran Aviram, he also co-owns the only game shop in Israel dedicated to table-top gaming. I spoke with Mr. Aloni after he returned from the Nuremberg toy fair to find out what’s expected from Silverstars in the upcoming year.

Read more...

---

Travis Reynolds: Basic Training – Athens & Sparta, Battle at the Cross Roads

Editor’s note: Basic Training is a new column that will run monthly on BGN if Travis enjoys it enough to keep writing. As for what the column is about...

For the military, basic training is the course that transforms civilians into soldiers. In this case, it represents the effort to transform gamers into wargamers. Okay, maybe the word “transform” is a little much; more accurately, let’s say the goal is to introduce wargames to gamers who are not familiar with them. An eye opener, so to speak. Certainly, the gap between the average gamer and wargamer is nowhere near as large as that between a raw recruit and the heroic soldier he is to become – although some may argue with that! In any case, this task should be much easier…right?

Read more...

---

Eric Flood: The Value of Discount Games

Like many others, I recently fell into the craze of cheap online games and bargains. I’ve been relatively poor for the past few years, with an international relationship and a plan for attending grad school (which I started in August 2007). Due to school, I’ve applied only for jobs which were short-term and consequently lower-paying, which contributed to my desire for cheaper games.

My habit really began in February 2007, with Barnes & Noble’s annual post-holiday sale. I drove to three different B&N stores on the first day of the sale and came away with RoboRally and Carcassonne for about $25.

Read more...

---

Chris Kovac: 2008 Canadian Toy & Hobby Fair

Over the weekend of January 25th, I put on my “game reporter” hat and headed down to the Toronto Convention Centre for the 68th Canadian Toy & Hobby Fair. Attending this convention is a little like being New Hampshire in the American presidential elections: It’s a small start of far bigger events to come. For me, the Toronto Toy Fair—as it’s generally known—marks the beginning of the game convention and fair season which ends every year with Essen.

Read more...

---

Kris Burm: TZAAR, TAMSK, and the Future of Project GIPF

Since the pre-release of TZAAR in Essen, I’ve had many questions about TZAAR, TAMSK and further plans with Project GIPF. SMART, the new publisher for the games of Project GIPF, issued a short press release to announce the limited edition of TZAAR at SPIEL 07 in Essen, Germany, but obviously such a text cannot be complete. The speculation and many questions made it clear that there’s a demand for more info. Here is an attempt…

Read more...

---

Sterling Babcock: An Open Letter to Publishers

First, I want to express my heartfelt appreciation to all game publishers for making the extreme effort to publish all of our favorite games. Without their hard work, we would not be enjoying this hobby or the friendship that comes from gaming.

Having purchased and played many games, I find some things that game publishers do when they create a game amazingly great—and some things that I just do not understand. I’ve also noticed potential changes that could make games better from a physical standpoint.

Read more...

---

Postcards from Brazil: Castles, Samurais and Conventions

By Antonio Marcelo and Flavio Jandorno
January 25, 2008

Hi everybody, we’re here once again bringing the gaming scenario in Brazil, and we’re off to a great start this year. This January we had here in Rio the first “Expo Jogos” (Expo Games), a convention that gathered a vast array of games like table games (foosball, pool), electronic games (video games, arcade) and also board games (domestic and imported). The event took place at a local mall.

Read more...

---

Winners of the 2007 Board Game Internet Awards

After much delay due to urgent non-game related matters, I’m pleased to present the winners of the 2007 Board Game Internet Awards. Without further ado, here are the BGIA winners for 2007:

Best Game Resource Site - Bruno Faidutti

In addition to being a talented game designer, Faidutti maintains an excellent website that features an extensive Ideal Game Library with well-written recommendations and cross-links, background into the development of his creations, and articles about the game industry—all of which makes his website ideal for newbies and aficionados alike.

Read more...

---

Andrea “Liga” Ligabue: Games in Italy, 2007

It’s that time of year when people are inclined to look back and ahead, ahead and back. Kids and romantics make promises and resolutions; scientists and engineers write reports and lists; and gamers—who are both kids and romantics, not to mention scientists and engineers—like to make game-related resolutions and reports!

I’d like to adopt Dale Yu’s resolution to play more. It’s something I need and I want! But for now I’ll focus on a report, in my personal view, of what has happened in Italy over the last twelve months: Publishers, designers, conventions and everything else that interests me and, I hope, you. I won’t claim to be exhaustive, but I’ve done my best to be as complete as possible.

Read more...

---

Kevin Whitmore: Gaming in the Mid-List

A friend of mine who is a published author once commented to me, “I’m a mid-list author, but they keep chopping off the list at my heels!” Despite his anxiety, he’s done well, writing a number of novels over his career. He seems to keep finding ways to get his next effort published, and his fans apparently keep buying enough of his product to keep a publisher interested in him as an author.

For the last several years game publishing has been ramping up, and game players have been presented with a vast array of games from which to select. With a vibrant array of online resources, players can easily separate the hot new games from the rest of the pack. Naturally the highest rated games tend to get a lot of attention, as do scheduled releases pending from respected authors or publishers.

Read more...

---

Steve Bennett: Notes from a Game Party II

With some work-related interruptions, I’ve been hosting monthly game parties at my house for a year now. We started in December 2006 armed with little more than a game closet and a dream…. All right, I exaggerate, but the truth is there was no known gaming scene in our town of 9,000, and we were trying to build something out of nothing. Let’s be frank: We wanted to expand our pool of nearby game partners and have some fun in the process.

I think it’s working.

Read more...

---

Point/Counterpoint: Ticket to Ride vs. Blueberry Pie

vs.

Read more...

---

Brett Constantine: Report from the 2007 Scrabble Players Championship

Editor’s note: Brett is a member of the 6am Gamers in southern New Hampshire and one of the first people I met after moving to Concord, NH. He has worked as a teacher, juggles on street corners, and recently completed a solo bike trip from Massachusetts to North Carolina before heading to Dayton, Ohio to play competitive Scrabble. With his permission, I’ve assembled his tournament reports into this article, which he then amended with additional anecdotes.

A note on Scrabble terminology: Players use ALL CAPS when referring to a word played on the gameboard, with blanks represented by a lower-case letter in the word. Blanks on a rack are shown as a question mark. Illegal words are followed by a *; you’ll see a lot of those in the following article...

I began the 2007 Scrabble Players Championship with three straight wins on Saturday, August 4th, and felt great. Unfortunately, I followed those up with four straight losses. Oh well.

Read more...

---

Ray Smith: Snippets of Origins

I’ve lost count, but reaching back to when Origins was frequently in Baltimore and alternated with Atlanticon, I think this was about my 25th Origins. Referencing my presence as a regular attendee and sometime exhibitor, here’s my synopsis of the goings on at Origins 2007:

Gloom and Doom (and I don’t mean the card and board game).
This was the sparsest Origins I’ve ever attended. The exhibit hall was only half full, attendance appeared to be down, and as for the gaming luminaries, they must have been secluded in their Kehlstein shadow cabinet—both the Board Room and War Room were subdued.

The big guns of Wizards of the Coast and WizKids, who usually take up one fourth of the exhibit hall, were absent; Fantasy Flight Games had shrunk down into a single booth; and the largest game space was occupied by Science Fusion(!), which was usually devoid of customers. Of course, rumors were rampant as to the causes of the sparsity—increased booth costs, a lack of tables and chairs in the booths (you needed to bring your own!), the elimination of incentives to draw the large companies, etc.—but apparently this was some sort of transition year for Origins. Transitioning from what to what I don’t know, but regardless it was disappointing.

Read more...

---

Fragor Games: An Open Letter to the Board Games Community

Friends,

Running a games company is enormous fun. It is an enormous amount of work but we love it. However, every now and then, through no fault of your own, a problem presents itself without which has no real obvious “good” solution. This has just happened to us.

Part of what makes a Fragor game is the animal pieces that we put in our game. Some even describe it as our trademark. We go the extra mile to ensure that our pieces are as good as we can make them. It causes production problems and presents a whole load of logistical problems but, ultimately, we think it is worth it.

As you may know, we announced at the beginning of the week our Essen 2007 release “Antler Island”. We have started taking pre-orders which already number over 200. Our intention was and had always been to produce 1,000 games and to take pre-orders on that basis. That was the plan up until yesterday.

Read more...

---

Steve Bennett: An Invitation Primer

How did I go about inviting people to my first neighborhood game party? How many people did I invite? Whom did I invite? What form did my invitation take? Inquiring minds want to know.

I’ll walk you through the whole invitation process and reprint the invitations here. Bear in mind that when read in rapid succession, the invitations might seem repetitious. Certain key elements need to be restated in every invitation. But if you look closely, you’ll also see a progression that makes sense, a progression you might be able to utilize when you start hosting game parties. If I manage to inspire you to try this yourself, feel free to copy and paste from my invitations and adapt them to your own situation, starting by taking my name out and inserting your own!

Read more...

---

J. Neil Edge: aka “Another Writer”

Call me Ishmael.

Wait a second, I think that intro has been used somewhere before—coupled with the fact that my name is not Ishmael and, well, I guess I don’t really want you to call me Ishmael.  That means my first writing for Boardgame News is already off to a pretty rocky start.  What else can you call me?  I noticed that when Eric wrote his “from the editor” news update about adding Steve Bennett as a party games reviewer I did get mentioned as he called me “Another writer.” I’m good with that if you wanted to go that route.  Still if we strip away all the subtleties, nuances and innuendo about who I am, you could just…

Call me Neil.

Read more...

---

An Essen Survival Guide

By Rick Thornquist

For many boardgamers, the ultimate game convention is the Essen game fair in Germany.  In October of every year, Essen welcomes around 150,000 people for four days of gaming goodness.  All the familiar German game companies are there along with many designers, gaming luminaries and oh, hundreds of just-released games just ripe for the playing.  For me, it’s gaming nirvana.

For those who haven’t been to the fair but want to go, I know it can be a bit intimidating.  How should I get there?  Where should I stay?  Where should I eat?  Do the people there speak English?  What games should I buy?  A million questions.  I’m here to help you - this is a survival guide that will help you plan your trip to Essen and assist you while you are there.  Hopefully this will take away the intimidation factor and lure you into joining in the fun.

Though this guide has been written from my first-hand experiences of being at the fair, I can’t guarantee it will all be absolutely correct.  My memory may not be perfect and things change.  I can’t tell you everything, but this should give you most of what you need to know to enjoy the fair.

Read more...

---

Steve Bennett: Notes From a Game Party

I mentioned in my introductory piece that I am trying to foster a game scene in my town of 9,000—Grinnell, Iowa. We hosted our fourth game party on an incredibly beautiful May Saturday. I’m learning as I go, and I’ve learned a thing or two that you might find useful.

Weather Matters
In February we had to cancel a game party when an ice storm knocked out our power for four days. Great weather, though, can inhibit attendance as much as bad weather.

Our recent game party was held on a cloudless day with the temperature in the upper 70s. In my mind it was a perfect day to sit inside playing games with friends and grazing the food table like a gourmand just out of prison. Apparently less committed gamers thought otherwise. Attendance was down. I don’t think we had more than six people at a time. We did manage to play games straight through from 12:30 to 9:30. All who came enjoyed themselves.

Read more...

---

Steve Bennett: The Host of the Party

I’m Steve Bennett, and I will be writing about party games here at Boardgame News. I’m thrilled to have the gig as I love playing games and I enjoy writing.

Let’s start by defining the parameters of what constitutes a party game.

I believe a party game is one where the primary motivation for playing is social, particularly with a larger group. You can argue that almost every game is a party game by that definition, and you’d be right. Let’s qualify it a little: You should be able to learn a party game easily; you shouldn’t have to think too much to play it; and even though you’re keeping score, you shouldn’t really care whether you win or lose. Bohnanza fits this description. Category 5 fits it. Guillotine fits it. For Sale fits it. I think Ricochet Robots fits it. (My wife would argue that it requires too much thinking to be so designated.) A party game has a rhythm that speaks primarily to our social sides. As I’m sitting here struggling to write a blanket definition for party games, I’m struck by this similarity between a party game and pornography: I may not be able to define it exactly, but I know it when I see it!

Read more...

---