Orphan Black Catches the Eye of Boardgaming For The Win

As our first published venture into the realm of Intellectual Properties (though we’ve been working on Godzilla for much longer) and the first social deduction game we’ve made, Orphan Black holds a special place in my heart.  BBC America’s amazing show (starring the stunningly talented Tatiana Maslany – a fellow Canadian), which is further chronicled in IDW’s equally excellent comic adaptation, is one of my favourite series of the past few years eclipsed only by the recent rash of Netflix awesomeness.  But I still have much love for the Clone Club. And so does Christopher Richter, who posted an insightful review of the game, its rules, plus his gameplay impressions here:

https://boardgamingftw.wordpress.com/2016/08/21/orphan-black-the-card-game/

For those of you who are fans of the show and haven’t picked up the game, give it a shot!  For those of you who are fans of games, but haven’t seen the show, check it out!    You’ll be amazed at how many boardgames are prominently featured in the show.  It’s as if the showrunners were gamers or something…

 

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Jay and Sen Talk Teamwork on the Ludology Podcast Episode 134

There is no “I” in team.  It’s true.  So we have the next best thing – a Jay!  On our first night at Gen Con 2016, we hightailed it from the airport to the convention centre to seek out the illustrious Geoff Engelstein for an interview about how Jay and I work together so well.  It was great talking to Geoff and Mike Fitzgerald (one of my favourite card game designers of all time) about a topic that is near and dear to our hearts.

For us, it comes fairly naturally as we’ve been friends for more than half our lives.   We’ve lived together for several years and our lives are intertwined one several levels.  So maybe we have it easy.  But we were also able to talk about how to get over the rough patches that inevitably crop up in relationships and how to work on interpersonal communication for the betterment of the team.

I think we might have even convinced Mike to collaborate with someone in the future!  Maybe he’ll pick me!

To listen in, check out:

http://ludology.libsyn.com/ludology-episode-134-theres-no-i-in-team

~ Sen

If you missed out on the Kickstarter…

There are just over 40 copies of This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the 2-4 of Us available from online retailer (and one of my favourite places to get prototyping bits) – Meeple Source!

Just in time for the holidays, this tiny game makes a GREAT stocking stuffer!

~ Sen-Foong Lim

 

Production Proof for But Wait, There’s More!

Check out the first sneak peek of what our upcoming release, But Wait, There’s More! will look like in it’s full glory!  Sadly, it won’t be in stores in time for Christmas, but it most certainly will be available soon after that, so save your Christmas money and grab yourself a great game when it does hit shelves!

~Sen-Foong Lim

The episode where I become the King of Canada!

Jay and I were interviewed recently on the Boards Alive Podcast, a fun show by fellow Canadians, Quinten (who regularly beats me at Star Realms online) and Aaron.

Check out this episode and come back for more from these two BC boys!

~ Sen-Foong Lim

Cardstockawa 2014

Each year, the Ontario chapters of the Game Artisans of Canada meet up at a secret location and cloister themselves for a weekend of design, playtesting, and comraderie.  This year was no exception.  If you follow my Twitter feed (@SenFoongLim), you’ll have been spammed with pictures of at least 17 or 18 prototypes from various designers in attendance.  From experienced designers like Yves Tourigny (Top This, Blue Prints, Expedition Northwest Passage), to designers who have just had their first signing like Daniel Rocchi (Bomb Squad Academy – a game co-designed with Josh Cappel that’s going to be packed in with TMG’s current Kickstarter, Bomb Squad by Dan Keltner and David Short) and Chris Chung (Lanterns from Foxtrot Games), to journeymen designers like Jessey Wright (who though unpublished, has made good headway through the print and play community with games like Zeppelin Strike), we meet to share our ideas and make each others games just that much better.

I can’t go into too many details without express consent from each designer, but I will share some of the pictures here of the games I’m involved in designing.

Midnight Men from Yves Tourigny and myself

Codename “Voltron” until we find a better name or acquire the IP – from Jessey Wright and myself.

Coaster Quest by Jay and me gets the run through at Cardstockawa 2014

Choice Words by Daryl Chow and me is so close to ready, I can feel it in my bones!

Jessey rolls the dice and tests his might in Crossed Blades, a co-design with yours truly.

So, if you’re part of a design group, do yourselves a huge favour and set up a retreat.  A day, a whole weekend, a whole week.  You’ll thank yourselves for doing it.  You’ll be refreshed, have new directions and new ideas, and your colleagues will be more vested in your success as they’ll have a chance to have a hand in shaping your design.

~Sen-Foong

Train of Thought Experiment on Twitter

Jay and I still love Train of Thought after all these years and we’ve been using Twitter a lot lately, so it just seemed like a natural fit!  We’re going to do a little experiment and try to run a Train of Thought game (kinda) on Twitter next Tuesday at 3:00 p.m. EST.  If things go well, we’ll make it “a thing”.

The goal will be slightly modified in that the Conductor (me for the first one), will be trying to get the team (all y’all out there in the Twitterverse) to get to 10 Destinations in 10 minutes.  Can we do it?  YES WE CAN!

The Tweet format will be important for game flow:

<round number> <Guess> <hashtag>

e.g. 1 starfish #ToT

Got it?  Good!

Now review the rules, follow me on Twitter @SenFoongLim and hop on board this crazy train!

ALL ABOARD!

~Sen-Foong

Meeple Syrup Show a Success!

The Meeple Syup Show (which Jay and I co-host on regularly) has a brand spankin’ new logo, courtesy of Gavan Brown (he of Roxley Game Laboratory fame) and we’ve knocked out 2 shows with some very cool guests (like Scott Almes, Michael Eskue, Chris Handy, and Micah Fuller).

We’ve also got a new website just for the show complete with its own blog at http://www.meeplesyrupshow.com so stick that in your favourites and visit often.  That’s where the shows are archived so we’ll point back there every now and then, I’m thinking.

We love interacting with the audience, so send us your questions or let us know in advance if you can’t watch live.  We’ll get your questions for the guests specifically or about design in general.  You can do that on Twitter or on the YouTube channel.  Hopefully, y’all follow us @MeepleSyrup on Twitter, so you can get the link when the Google Hangout goes live.

Just as a sneak peek, here’s some of the luminaries we’ve got lined up for future shows…

Matt Leacock (Pandemic)Kevin Nunn (Sentinels: Tactics)
Gil Hova (Battle Merchants)
Eric Lang (X-Com)
Jermemiah Lee (Zombies in my Pocket)
Emmanuel Aquin (D-Day Dice)
Gavan Brown (Jab)
Jeph Stahl (1775)
Josh Cappel (Wasabi)
Yves Tourigny (Blueprints)
Kevin Wilson (Descent: Journeys in the Dark)

If you’re interested on being on the show, write us a note at info@meeplesyrupshow.com and we’ll serve you up a platter of piping hot pancakes, straight of the griddle!

Tom Vasel Reviews Tortuga on The Dice Tower

Spoiler Alert:  He liked it!

Good to see Tom playing the game and having fun with it.

~Sen-Foong Lim

Well, that just happened…

Nice new box top for Belfort with the Geekie Award logo upon it!  Wicked awesome!

~Sen-Foong