Reviews & Previews of Indie and Kickstarted Games
Today, Benny takes us on an adventure in search of the greatest healer in the world. He explores how using a game and game mechanics can provide helpful insight into what you need to understand about yourself to heal. Follow him as he works with a patient using the mechanisms of Tikal.
Today, Benny takes up the question of what game mechanisms work best for therapy.
I recently concluded my Kickstarter campaign for Groves. During this campaign, I found many ways to help spread word about the campaign but what surprised me the most was how interactive people were with our Tabletopia version of the game. I expected potential backers to be interested in the prospect of playing the game digitally but I did not realize how many would actually play it. We were lucky enough to get data directly from Tabletopia and this post will dive into all the juicy details on how Tabletopia helped drive interest to our live Kickstarter campaign.
I’m BACK! And now a proud member of The Indie Game Report network. This time out I’m talking to Steven Aramini. Steven is the hot designer at the moment. He just had TWO successful Kickstarters (Barker’s Row and Circle The Wagons) and two more going on right now (Groves and Coin & Crown). Steven and I have a real nice talk about those games and some of his game design philosophy. I hope you enjoy it.
I was impacted by the news of Chris Cornell’s death. Soundgarden had been one of my favorite bands as a teenager, them and Pearl Jam. So a lot of my developmental history was framed by those bands, also by delving into DC hardcore bands like Fugazi, Bad Brains. In many ways these bands shaped who I am as a professional in mental health and also a board game designer.
Today, Fairway reflects on the very clever “Bag Building” game mechanism used by co-contributors Steven Aramini and Dan Letzring in their upcoming Kickstarter game, Groves. This peculiar variation on the common deck-building or deck-optimization mechanisms results in some fantastic game play. So fantastic, it’s worth exploring in a bit more detail.
It’s the perpetual creator question: how much of the art really has to be done before I launch my campaign? In today’s lesson, Dan takes a stab at answering that very question: how much art is enough?
Fairway regularly hangs out in the chat on The Game Crafter. A very common question from new designers is how to get your new game reviewed. It’s a common question on game design groups on Facebook too. Those discussion often answer the “who” question, which quickly devolves to linking to this list of reviewers. What doesn’t really get answered is: how to get the “best” review of your new game or your upcoming, crowd-funded game.
In bringing my professional lives together, I wanted to touch on something that is very important for me and has been for a number of years, games used in counseling or therapy. As a Licensed Professional Counselor Supervisor in the great state of Texas, I am often challenged with interesting clients. Often the goal is helping them through a situation and be able to get onto the next chapter of their lives.
Steven takes game design into another dimension. He examines using vertical space in game design.