It’s the calm after the storm, folks. A bit of a slow week on the heels of the best four days in gaming. We’ll be bringing you lots of reviews of games in the weeks (and months) to come. But for now, I really just need a short nap.
- In case you missed it, there wasn’t just one, but four Re-Rolls pushed out while we were at Gen Con. We tried to bring you a taste of what we saw and heard, including a very special look at the museum they erected to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Gen Con and, one of my favorite things from those four days, I played Telestrations with a bunch of people I talked to.
- Gen Con released its attendance figures, going up another 4% over last year with total turnstiles of 207,979.
- Oni Press has carved out a piece of business for games. Oni Games is an imprint that will be bringing games to market soon.
- Fireside Games is taking their show on the road again. The “Smash & Burn” Tour will bring their newest games, Hotshots and Kaiju Crush, to game stores in the Midwest this fall.
- Renegade Game Studios, in a never-ending bid to dominate all tabletop news cycles, announced two more games this week. Pie Town is a worker placement with hidden info. Players endeavor to become the best pie shop in town in this 60-90 minute game from first-timer Daniel Fremgen. Also, Sundae Split is a fast-playing game about building the best ice cream sundae with sweet toppings, while avoiding vegetables. Both games hit shelves in November.
- So, beginning anew this week, CMON announced another Bloodborne card game. This one, called The Hunter’s Nightmare, introduces a couple new features, Death Tokens and Runes, and goes direct to retail in Q1 of 2018.
- Fantasy Flight has three new expansions for X-Wing on the way. There’s an Alpha-class, an M12-L Kimogila Fighter, and a Phantom II Pack, all starships packing plenty of punch. All three will be out this year.
- I think we all know that supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony. Yet, we will all still compete for Excalibur in Lancelot, a recently announced game from Wiz Kids.
- Wiz Kids is also bringing a fast-moving Euro style game to you via the neighborhoods of Rio de Janeiro. In Favelas, you’ll be competing to beautify these communities, but before you do anything, you’ll have to convince the Council first.
- Coaster Park looks like it’s going to need a big table when it comes out in November, but the fun you’ll have when constructing a real roller coaster… this one’s gonna be fun!
- It’s worth pointing out that CMON’s Rising Sun charity event raised more than $11,000 for Child Advocates, this year’s Gen Con charity. CMON’s contribution was a sizable portion of the total of $26,000 raised by all events for Child Advocates. Nice job to CMON and everyone who participated!
- What? Didn’t get enough games last week? Well, Bunny Kingdom will release next week from Iello. Dread Draw makes its way to shelves from Upper Deck. Seikatsu, an abstract strategy from IDW, becomes available, and Unearth from Brotherwise also makes the new product list.
- Cryptozoic is releasing Master of Orion. It’s based on the video game and sold out in a blink of the eye at Gen Con. You can find a copy on shelves September 6.
- Finally, there’s one game, Dropmix, that I’m really intrigued by because it combines my love of games with my love of music. This one is a mix of cards, an app, and… some sort of tray… that challenges you to blend songs and mix music. It’s a partnership between Hasbro and Rock Band‘s Harmonix. I can’t wait to learn more about it!
At GeekDad, we write a lot about tabletop games. Here’s what we’ve written about this past week:
- We all contributed our two cents about what we liked most at Gen Con.
- Jonathan wrote about the Nefarious expansion, Becoming a Monster, and the relaunch of Wanted Earth. He also told us about a new one, The King’s Guild, and showed off the end result for Go Nuts for Donuts. He also reviewed the awesome Photosynthesis.
- And, wow, Ryan Hiller dove deep into the new release of Starfinder. It’s kind of like Pathfinder in spaaaaaaaaaaaaace!
- I let you know about QST, the tabletop subscription service, now on Kickstarter.
Finally, here’s what some of the GeekDad Crew has been playing this week:
- Ryan Hiller: Pathfinder RPG, Starfinder RPG
- Anthony Karcz: Fires of Eidelon
- Preston Burt: 5-Minute Dungeon
- Jonathan Liu: Magic Maze, Kingdomino, Clank! In! Space!, Codenames, Deckscape: Test Time, Deep Sea Adventure, Delve, Flip Ships, Kill the Unicorns (upcoming Kickstarter), Photosynthesis, The Pyramid’s Deadline, Spot It!, Tiny Epic Galaxies, Unearth, 5-Minute Dungeon, Beeeees!
- Gerry Tolbert: Photosynthesis, Wasteland Express Delivery Service, Go Nuts for Donuts, Mountains of Madness, Kingdomino, Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Monkey Around, Deckscape: Test Time, Flip Ships, Unearth, Tiny Epic Galaxies, Mole Rats in Space, Okey Dokey, The Climbers, Magic Maze, Codenames: GeekDad Edition, Find It!: GeekDad Gen Con special, The Cult of Barnacle Bay (Forthcoming Kickstarter from Wander)
- Robin Brooks: Citadels, Red7, Nanofictionary
- Mike LeSauvage: Between Two Cities, Roll for the Galaxy, and Clank!
- Michael Harrison: Fate of the Elder Gods, Lords of Waterdeep with Scoundrels of Skullport expansion, Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective (we released our podcast, including a review of the first five cases, last week)
- Dave Banks: Magic Maze, Kingdomino, Clank! In! Space!, Codenames, Photosynthesis, Spot It!, Tiny Epic Galaxies, Unearth, Wasteland Express Delivery Service, Go Nuts for Donuts, The Climbers, Magic Maze, Codenames: GeekDad Edition, Find It!: GeekDad Gen Con special, Bunny Kingdom, Codenames Duet, That’s a Question, Rising Sun, Decrypto, Blurble, Fog of Love, Meeple Circus, Head of Mousehold, Museum Heist, Brew Dice, Sports Dice: Baseball
What is codenames GeekDad edition?
We made our own version of some games just for Gen Con. We wrote a bunch of geeky words on cards for Codenames. It made the game a bit more difficult!