I was invited to be on the Cardboard Architects Podcast recently. The hosts, Chris and Joe, are also hobbyist board game designers who love to talk shop. The conversation is relatively brief by podcast standards — right around 40 minutes. … Continued
I love being out in nature, and sometimes while I’m there, I’ll take pictures. Often, the pictures are just close-ups of specific natural features, like rocks, grass, bark, water, etc. I’ve worked out a trick for turning some of these … Continued
I distinctly remember the “aha!” moment I had on one particular day when I was in my third year at college. I had checked-out a few old history books from the library (yes — I did go into the library now and then) … Continued
While I try to do something different in each game I design, and I try to let the theme of the game drive what mechanisms are used, I do have some common tendencies … and most obvious of them is … Continued
I like to say “I am not a patient man” — misquoting and doing a bad imitation of Forrest Gump — but that isn’t exactly true. I have a lot of patience for people — especially people closest to me, or those I am … Continued
As I mentioned in my previous post, the Happy Mitten team has really focused on a handful of clear goals with the games they want to publish: easy-to-learn, engaging player interaction, and allowing players to be clever. That “Magic Sauce” … Continued
If you’ve listened to or read any of the player commentary about Aether Magic — like the player quotes on the Kickstarter page, or this succinct review on BGG — you will see a lot of references to player interaction, bidding/bartering, … Continued
Something I referred to in my previous post was what I termed “the weird, bio-rhythmic nature of my creative process.” For the most part, I work in natural bursts and I have a hard time forcing creative work. I know it’s … Continued
There is often a discussion of theme-versus-mechanics among board game designers. As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, I wanted to get a Q&A with A.J. Porfirio, of Van Ryder Games, about this topic. So, here it is. Matt: Howdy, … Continued
Tomorrow, I leave for a pretty exciting game design related road trip. I’ll be picking up Jeff King (from All Us Geeks), Jason Glover (from Grey Gnome games), and David Sheppard (known to most as Sheppy) along the way. We’re headed … Continued