Tabletop: Analog Game Design - A commons licenced book containing a series of essays about digital and non-digital games from some esteemed boardgame veterans:
"Much has been written about the videogame revolution, [...] In a scant thirty some-odd years,
we’ve grown from nothing to one of the world’s largest entertainment
forms, grossing tens of billions annually [...] Works that discuss the evolution of the game industry from an historical perspective generally talk about the connection between the pre-digital
arcade and the earliest digital games; I’ve even heard some claim
that “without the arcade, videogames would not exist.” This is, of course, bosh..." [more inside]
posted by Cogentesque
on Aug 24, 2011 -
36 comments
Minecraft mastermind Markus "Notch" Persson has
officially announced his company's next project:
a hybrid online board game/trading card system called
Scrolls. Spearheaded by Mojang co-founder Jakob Porser (
interview) and with backstory penned by Penny Arcade wordsmith Jerry "Tycho" Holkins, the game will consist of turn-based battles between collectible "scrolls,"
illustrated character cards strategically deployed on an abstract gaming grid. In an interesting inversion of the
Minecraft model, the game itself will be free, while updates in the form of additional scroll packs will cost a nominal fee -- a business model gaming analyst Sean Maelstrom decries as
"snake oil." Mojang, for their part, is unafraid and even eager to target an untested slice of the gaming market, and is angling to get their playable prototype of
Scrolls ready for a possible Alpha release this summer.
posted by Rhaomi
on Mar 2, 2011 -
128 comments
Shogi (将棋), or "Japanese chess," has been described here
before, but it's such a fascinating game that a little more exposure can't hurt. Specifically, shogi has spawned a lot of variants, many of them astonishingly large.
[more inside]
posted by GenjiandProust
on Jun 28, 2009 -
18 comments
Vegetable farming! Boar breeding! All the maniac thrills of 17th century agriculture --
on your tabletop! Since its
introduction two years ago,
Agricola has grown from being a German hit to a runaway success worldwide -- at least among the niche market of serious board game fans.
[more inside]
posted by Shepherd
on Jan 29, 2009 -
34 comments
Play board games during the holidays? Try an
updated version of an
old classic. You can indulge in as much sex, drugs, crime, and rock and roll as your health will handle, just don't roll a 1 on your first turn or you'll be aborted before you get started.
[more inside]
posted by mrmojoflying
on Dec 27, 2008 -
6 comments
Snowed in this weekend? Done with your Christmas shopping? Perhaps you're in no mood to shop anymore. Gather your friends together for a low-tech round of The Economist's
Credit Crunch Board Game.
posted by thread_makimaki
on Dec 19, 2008 -
8 comments
Play RISK using Google Maps. From the FAQ:
For some reason I decided a bit after the API for Google Maps came out that it would be awesome to be able to play Risk on it... I've always been a gamer and thought this was the perfect step.
posted by KevinSkomsvold
on Nov 8, 2005 -
37 comments
Etymology-wise, which hormone is an island? What word both denotes a prime and euphemizes Satan? What word denotes "the future" and abbreviates the unknown? Is urine pith? These are some of the questions from "
Moot: The World's Toughest Language Game," a homemade and little-known board game for lovers of words.
Some puzzles are available online; there are a few more available on a page detailing the
interesting story behind the game's creation. You can
sign up to have a new language puzzle e-mailed to you every week.
posted by painquale
on Dec 4, 2004 -
8 comments
