Every Night is Game Night

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ENGN 92 - Designer Rountable for Solo Variants, Part Two - featuring Keith Matejka, Mike Mullins, and Ricky Royal Jun 15, 2018

Show notes

Welcome to Part Two of our roundtable conversation about solo variant design. If you missed Part One, please go back in the feed and check it out. We've released both episodes simultaneously because... well, we want you to have it!

In this half of our discussion with Keith, Mike, and Ricky, we get into their process as designers, as well as their greatest difficulties and how they overcame them. They also get into solo variants within the board game publishing world, both within the traditional routes and in Kickstarter projects.

ENGN 91 - Designer Roundtable for Solo Variants, Part One - featuring Keith Matejka, Mike Mullins, and Ricky Royal Jun 15, 2018

Show notes

Before we get on to the episode, we want to remind every one about the contest we are running for our community. As of this podcast's airdate (6/15), you only have a few days left!

We are now offering more prizes. One winner will get a prize pack which includes Herbaceous and Sunset Over Water from Pencil First Games! Another will receive their choice between Hoplomachus: Origins and Comancheria. If we reach 75 likes on our Geeklist, we will give away a copy of Legacy of Dragonholt.

All you have to do to enter the contest is:

1) Join the new Every Night is Game Night Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/215849212533088/ 2) Put a comment in the general comment section of our BGG Geeklist: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/228542/every-night-game-night-episode-guide

Each entry is worth one point. If you do both, you will get credit for five entries! Contest will end Tuesday, 6/18, at 10 PM EST.

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Welcome to our second designer roundtable episode! The first time around, we had a few designers of massive, scenario-based games to talk about what it's like to design in the fantasy adventure space. This time, we were able to gather some of the best minds in solo variant design for a discussion about how they go about turning your favorite multiplayer experiences into games that the soloist can enjoy. We had a fabulous and edifying discussion with Keith Matejka (Roll Player, Sunset Over Water variant), Mike Mullins (Bottom of the 9th, Pentaquark), and Ricky Royal (Renegade, Guilds of London variant).

In Part One of our conversation, we get to know our three guests as gamers and as designers. We then discuss their overall approaches to solo variant design and the different kinds of variants one can make - high score challenge, binary win-loss conditions, or different kinds of "robot" players.

If you ever had any interest in getting under the hood of a game, either as a fledgling designer or as someone who is curious as to how professional designers make it all works, this is the show for you!

ENGN 90 - Origins Preview 2018 Jun 08, 2018

Show notes

Before we get on to the episode, we are happy to announce our first contest here at ENGN! We are looking to build some online community centers where people could reliably interact with us.

The first prize is a prize pack which includes Herbaceous and Sunset Over Water from Pencil First Games! Please visit their current Kickstarter page if you want the third game in the series, Herbaceous Sprouts - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ebaraf/herbaceous-sprou....

Here is your chance to get those first two games for free! If we get a certain number of entries, we will add more prizes! Good ones, too, including Hoplomachus Origins, Comancheria, and possibly more!

All you have to do to enter the contest is:

Each entry is worth one point. If you do both, you will get credit for five entries! Contest will end Friday, 6/22.

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For this episode, we hearken back to Episode 39 of our show, where we previewed some games that were featured at Origins 2017. Anthony and Jason take a new look at games like The Lost Expedition, Caverna: Cave vs. Cave, Sword & Sorcery, and others. Most of our previewed games really delivered! Others... not so much.

We then talk about games we are looking forward to at Origins 2018, including The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Archmage, and Fleet: The Dice Game. Along with this episode, we are also giving you a separate Preview Series episode talking with Rory O'Connor about Holding On: The Troubled Life of Billy Kerr from Hub Games. It will be available as a demo at this year's Origins show.

Finally, Anthony will be at Origins. If you see him walking around, feel free to invite him to play a game!

ENGN 31 - Holding On: The Troubled Life of Billy Kerr Jun 06, 2018

Show notes

This week, we preview one of the most distinct games you will hear about this year. The co-designers from Hub Games - Michael Fox and Rory O'Connor, join us this week to talk about Holding On: The Troubled Life of Billy Kerr. This is a cooperative worker placement game with an extremely unique theme - you are a nurse providing palliative care to a dying man, and your job is to keep him alive while helping him restore his memories.

Michael and Rory talk about taking on such a difficult theme, as well as mechanical issues such as how they dealt with the alpha player issue in a coop game. This one is really unique, and we are happy to give you an early explanation for it.

To be clear, this game is not on Kickstarter or any kind of preorder yet. However, you can observe demos of the game at both Origins and GenCon. It will be released at Essen 2018. If you want a demo, though, sign up fast at this year's Origins!

ENGN Episode 89 - Beyond the Hotness and Getting Started as a Reviewer Jun 01, 2018

Show notes

We welcome Liz from Beyond Solitaire and Jeremy from Jambalaya Plays Games back to the show! As we like to do when we have guests, we share about some games we completely adore, but which aren't getting the publicity they deserve.

First, Jeremy tells us about Coldwater Crown (2:58), a worker placement style game with a fishing theme. The expansion for this game, The Sea Expansion, is currently live on Kickstarter.

Next, Liz shares about something of a "grail" game for some gamers, Coffee Roaster (10:29). Jeremy then hops back in to discuss a cooperative deckbuilder from the designer of Terraforming Mars, After the Virus (18:13).

For our discussion, we chat about getting started as a board game reviewer. We share about our first steps, building relationships with the community and with publishers, and also trying hard to keep the sense that we are gamers, as well. For anyone who has a ton of passion about the board gaming hobby and wants another outlet besides just playing a ton, we hope that we can give you some ideas.

ENGN Preview Series 30 - Neverland Rescue with Dan Letzring May 27, 2018

Show notes

Today, we're featuring an asymmertrical, two player, family friendly deduction game with a Peter Pan/ Neverland theme (you guys know how much I love my thematic games). Dan Letzring of Leitman Games hops on the show to talk about this design from Scott Almes, including some bits about its original theme (Boston Tea Party???), how it works across different skill levels and age groups, and some other tidbits.

Neverland Rescue is live on Kickstarter!: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/letimangames/the-neverland-rescue-by-scott-almes?ref=nav_search&result=project&term=neverland%20rescue

ENGN 88 - Kickstarter Mega Pod! Featuring City of Kings, Centauri Saga, Roll Player expansion, Street Masters, and Renegade May 25, 2018

Show notes

We are happy to present to you our first Kickstarter Mega-Pod! If you've been following our Preview Series, you'll know that we cover lots of kickstarter projects while they are live. So it's very nice when the games actually deliver and we can talk about them!

This undertaking was so big that we had to enlist some help - Liz Davidson from Beyond Solitaire, as well as Jeremy Howard from Jambalaya Plays Games - https://jambalayaplaysgames.com/.

We have five games for you this week (spoiler - they are all good). First, we get into an interesting discussion about the City of Kings (7:58), both in terms of the game itself as well as the imaginative possibilities inherent in big adventure games like this one. Next, Jeremy tells us about the big space exploration game Centauri Saga (21:54), while Liz covers the Monsters and Minions expansion for Roll Player (28:53).

To finish things off, we have two games that all of us have played. We get into Street Masters (32:39), an arcade-style beat 'em up game with lots of similarities to Sentinels of the Multiverse. Finally, we chat about Renegade, the debut co-op puzzle game from our friend, Ricky Royal (46:52).

We apologize for presenting an episode that's a hair over an hour. But we had so much fun! We hope you enjoy it.

Enter the BGA World Cup Sci Fi contest for a chance to win a free science fiction board game here:

http://boardgamersanonymous.com/2018-world-cup-science-fiction-board-games-contest/

ENGN PS 29 - Herbaceous Sprouts with Ed Baraf May 22, 2018

Show notes

Herbaceous Sprouts is the third in a line of gorgeous small filler games from Dr. Steve Finn, Ed Baraf et. al. Both Herbaceous and Sunset Over Water were big hits for Pencil First Games, and now we have the third standalone game in that line.

Herbaceous Sprouts is a dice drafting and manipulation game that plays in about 20-30 minutes. Check out our interview with Ed to her how it plays, as well as how it compares to Sagrada and other dice manipulation games.

We also get into the previous two games in the series, so please check that out if you are interested in pledging for all three games.

Herbaceous Sprouts is live!: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ebaraf/1004273242?ref=468833&token=dee5c91b

ENGN Episode 87 - Bad Games May 18, 2018

Show notes

For anyone who has ever wanted us to "not hold back", so to speak, and give out some objectively bad reviews of games, this is the show for you! We tell you our reasons why you might want to avoid the Witcher Adventure Game (4:55), Witches of the Revolution (14:27), and Shipwrights of the North Sea (21:05). In the discussion at the back half of the podcast, we tell you about our approach to these kinds of reviews and why you haven't heard an episode like this from us before. Hopefully, we review nothing but good games going forward! (yeah, right...)

ENGN Preview Series 28 - Brook City with Adam and Brady Sadler May 14, 2018

Show notes

Out first repeat Preview Series guest! Way back in episode 6, Brady hopped on the show while he was on the road to Origins to talk about Street Masters. This week, his brother Adam joins him to talk about the follow up to Street Masters from Blacklist Games, Brook City. We get into the Modular Deck game system they are developing, how they wanted Brook City to evoke 80s cop games, mechanisms that make the different cops and criminals unique, and a lot more.

We ran a bit longer than usual for the game description, but the Sadlers were so much fun to have on as guests that we just let it ride. Lots and lots of laughs to be had in our discussion.

After we wrap our conversation about Brook City, the Sadlers share their Top Five Cop Action Movies. This was a really rip roaring good time of a conversation. You will be very, very surprised to hear which movie hits number one on both of their lists!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/blacklistgames/brook-city?ref=nav_search&result=project&term=brook%20city

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