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New Game: Arrello

Below is a new game, a cousin of Othello (also known as Reversi), which I am submitting to the abstract game design contest over at Recre.Games.Combinatorial. The Game's name is a combination of the...

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New Game: Swaparound

This popped into my head last night.  It's untested and I have doubts about its quality as a game (probably opaque), but it has a novel mechanism with some aesthetic appeal, along with a festive...

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Two attempts at a more strategic N-in-a-row game: Hedgerow and Morro

My life these days doesn’t allow for much playtesting, but game ideas still pop into my head. I sometimes post them without testing. Below are two.In most N-in-a-row games, each player tries to be the...

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Ketchup 3.0 - The rules have changed, again, for the last time, except if...

[EDIT] The rules DID change again, dangnabbit.  See here. I lately discovered how to make Ketchup, one of my best games, better.  So now I'm posting my second revision in as many years. First I'll...

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New Game: Clots

Last week I posted an update to my game Ketchup, the final version (fingers crossed) in a string of versions. In my tinkering I've come to grok its weaknesses, and decided to look for ways to address...

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Ketchup 4.0 - I've changed the rules again. This is just stupid.

For those who can manage to read about this game one more time without retching, I've found what I believe is another refinement. I won't dwell on it, but I'm convinced it's better. The idea: instead...

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New Game: Glorieta

[UPDATE: Since posting this, I've introduced a revised version of this game. See here] This is the first game I've designed in a long time that doesn't have a terrible name. Glorieta is a game for 2...

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More Morro

When I'm busy, I sometimes post rules to games I've invented without testing. The results usually lack...uh...any redeeming qualities. One such game, which I posted a few months ago, is called Morro,...

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Revised Game: Glorieta 2.0

Here's an improved version of my game Glorieta. First I'll present the rules and then explain how they got this way. Glorieta is a game played for two players with black and orange stones on a board...

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Games of Interest from the 1000-Year Game Design Challenge

I just submitted my game Ketchup to an interesting game design contest, called the 1000-Year Game Design Challenge, and I couldn't help but riffle through the other entries to see what the competition...

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The Beauty and Wonder of igGameCenter

As someone whose enthusiasm for abstract strategy games often shades into hallucinatory mania, I wish there were yearly awards with tuxes and gowns where prizes were given to those who contribute the...

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Ketchup Strategy Basics, Plus an Example Game

Another post about my game Ketchup. I'll wait here while my game-designer friends who endure my frequent discussions of this game go and retch in a corner. Done? Ok here goes.  This time I'm indulging...

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Zendo as a Tool for Teaching the Scientific Method

[Author's Note: 5 years ago I wrote an essay about a game called Zendo and posted it to the site boardgamegeek.com. Because it's one of the more important things I've written about games, I've been...

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Ketchup Popularity Tracker

This post is a bit of self-promotion to try to win a design contest. The contest is called the Thousand-Year Game Design Challenge and I'm mostly enamored with it because it's for the kinds of games I...

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New Game: Spry

This just popped into my head uninvited while I'm trying to go to sleep and it won't leave. I'm posting it here in the hope that I can make it go away by doing so.  It's a way to solve a problem for a...

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New Game: Breach (plus a discussion of the problems of n-in-a-row games)

I'm in a pitched battle with my own incompetence to design an n-in-a-row game I enjoy, even though I don't enjoy most n-in-a-row games. I'm doing it because trying to make lemonade from lemons is a...

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Woot: Ketchup a Finalist in 1000 Year Game Design Challenge

Quick, self-aggrandizing note: My game Ketchup is a finalist in Daniel Solis' 1000-Year Game Design Challenge, along with 6 other games, all of which look like they could be better than Ketchup. So...

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Definitive List of 2-Player Abstract Strategy Games for iPhone, iPad

Here's a collection of iOS apps for 2-player abstract strategy games with no luck, with links to the iTunes App Store for each. It was a pain to collect them but collect them I did, both because I...

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New Game: Magnapoco

I've got a battalion of game designs in the pooper, which I'm usually too lazy to post here, but my friend and fellow game designer Corey Clark is goading me to make some public, so here I go. Because...

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My Dream Book

Abstract games are at their best when players take the time to learn and share strategy, and though we're in the middle of an abstract-game-design renaissance, even some of the best modern abstracts...

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