Re-Roll: This Week’s Tabletop Game News for the Week Ending August 28, 2020

Here is the board game (and board game-related!) news that caught our attention for the week ending August 28, 2020.

Gaming News

• The Tabletop Writers Diversity Initiative is a project sponsored by the Tabletop Writers Guild. GeekDad Jonathan Liu serves on the board of directors for the guild and has a write-up this week about the Initiative and what you can do to help get involved.
• IDW has announced a delay in the production of the long-awaited Metal Gear Solid: The Board Game. Now promising delivery no later than GenCon 2021, the company stated that the delay was so that they would not have to “compromise our standards for the quality of game our community deserves”, although they did not specify why exactly what compromises were being avoided. They have set up a Q&A thread on BoardgameGeek to facilitate communication with the game’s backers until it can be fulfilled.
• You how sometimes you hear that a celebrity has passed away and your first thought was that you thought they had been dead for some time? I had that exact reaction on reading the news that it was only this week when Fantasy Flight has canceled all remaining organized play events for 2020.
• Japanime Games has announced Ramen! Ramen!, a game for 1-4 players to try to sell the most delicious bowls of ramen. The game should be available everywhere in November.
• Beyond the Sun is the latest game from Rio Grande and the first from new designer Dennis K. Chan. Due in October, the game has 2-4 players competing to develop new technologies and colonize new worlds as our sun begins to die.
• Roll for the Galaxy is now available on Stream, and on both iOS and Android devices.
• According to a post on Twitter, Keyforge has now seen 2 million decks registered on Fantasy Flight’s Master Vault app, which allows players to track win/loss and participate in organized play. However, registering isn’t required to play, so the actual number of decks out there is likely considerably higher.
• Publisher Board & Dice announced Mandala Stones, an abstract pattern-matching game coming mid-2021. The game, designed by Filip Głowacz with art from Zbigniew Umgelter, has players collaboratively creating arrangements while competing for victory points.
• A new trailer for the movie no one needs right now—The Batman—hit the internet this week. Perhaps the only interesting part was a coded message sent by The Joker to the ultra-violent millionaire vigilante. While only shown for a brief moment, the code was cracked fairly quickly, by none other than boardgame designer Mike Selinker from Lone Shark Games, who shared his process of breaking the code on Twitter.
• Tabletop Gaming Live was canceled months ago, but now, like most other events in 2020, it’s going virtual. Running from September 26-28, the event will feature “exclusive videos from your favorite designers, publishers, and online creators as well as hobby tips, interviews, and more.”

GeekDad and GeekMom Reviews

• Greg Howley reviewed Spirit Island Digital.
• Jonathan Liu reviewed Red Planet.
• Michael Knight reviewed Antematter.
• Paul Benson reviewed the Game Theory tables.

What We’re Playing

Finally, here’s what the GeekDads played this week:

• Will James played Tiny Epic Mechs.
• Michael Pistiolas played Forbidden Desert, The Great Cheese Chase, Zombicide: Black Plague, and Love Letter, the deluxe edition of which is our featured image this week.
• Jonathan Liu played Cascadia, My City, Dragonland, In Too Deep, and Truffle Shuffle.