All posts in Board Games

Friend Spotlight

by Drey on May 7, 2008 in Board Games, Video Games with No comments

Allow me to direct your attention to some cool projects my friends have produced.

Ryan’s company is behind the technology used in Yahoo! oneSearch with Voice. It lets you do searches on your phone by speaking instead of having to type everything. It will eventually be available for the iPhone.

Dave was on the team that created Steven Spielberg’s Boom Blox, what looks like an insanely fun game for the Wii. It was featured on Penny Arcade, which, some might say, is the highest honor one can achieve in the video game world.

In the cardboard realm, a game publisher finally came to their senses and snatched up Dan’s Monkey Lab, a ridiculously fun board game. It will premiere at Essen, but there is no word on a release date. Trust me, you’re going to want to play this.

Speaking of board games, Marc’s Coalescence is now available. It looks really sharp, is easy to learn and provides a lot of challenging fun.

And, finally, I heard that fellow Landmark graduate Jonna will be appearing in Oliver Stone’s film “W“, filming now.

Congratulations, everyone, on bringing the awesome!

An extraordinary evening

by Drey on November 24, 2005 in Board Games with 1 Comment

The other night I went to this local board gaming group and had a completely unprecedented experience. First of all, this guy has a whole guesthouse just for games. His library contained pretty much every Euro game I had ever heard of. At least 150 games. Then he introduces me to one of their regular members, the owner of Rio Grande Games. I got to playtest two games, one that was a prototype, one that isn’t available here yet. They were really fun. There was also a stack of games that debuted at Essen (the big German game expo) that you can’t get here yet. Just sitting there!

And get this: when Jay, the owner of Rio Grande, found out I was a graphic artist, he asked me to bring him samples of my work next time because he needed a graphic artist for an upcoming game. It was like a weird dream. I didn’t even push for any of it to happen, he was just there and he asked if I did graphics for game design. I would not mind doing graphics for a board game that would be published by one of the most recognized publishers in the world.

Hexile

by Drey on June 20, 2005 in Board Games, Creations with No comments

Inexplicably, while facing a mental block with my game House of Whack, I had an idea for a new board game. Two days later I finished the prototype. It is called Hexile. It is a hexagon-based strategy game involving aspects of chess and, well, other stuff. It is still too early to describe the game easily or to make comparisons.

Basically, two players face off across a tiled board made of hexagons. Each has a tower from which they fire caroms. These caroms have to move across the board, avoiding black holes, ricocheting off repulsor fields, avoiding blockers, using teleporters, in order to hit the opponent’s tower. Players uncover various types of terrain hexes and the obstacles mentioned and try to place them strategically on the board. Certain hexes will allow players to upgrade their towers with catapults and tractor beams, and their caroms with force fields and blasters. All of this requires power, so the players need to discover power generators and claim them in order to have power to accomplish their goals each turn.

I don’t imagine a long development time for Hexile. Maybe adding some more hexes and balancing the number of hexes in the deck. Tweak the rules and then it is done.

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