Lessons from Gamicon
It’s been a while since our last post, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been hard at work. When we had Basketball G.M. polished to the point we felt we could call it “done,” we set to work on some new ideas. We currently have prototypes for two games, which we are calling Downtown Dash and Intruder Alert! (Those who follow us on Twitter may know the latter as Self Destruct.) This past weekend, Gamicon was held right here in Iowa City, Iowa, so I packed up the two prototypes and took them to the convention. There, I had the opportunity to demo them for Jay Tummelson, the CEO of Rio Grande Games. This was a fantastic opportunity and a very encouraging experience. Though you won’t be seeing one of our designs published by Rio Grande in the near future, I came away from the demos with lots of good feedback and many ideas about how to make the games more appealing to publishers. But that’s not the main focus of this post.
In addition to demoing our prototypes, I also had the opportunity to listen to Mr. Tummelson talk informally about game design and, perhaps more importantly, game publishing. Mr. Tummelson has more than a decade of experience publishing games (he founded Rio Grande Games in 1998) and provided great insight into what it takes to sell a game design to a publisher, so I thought I would share some of what I learned in that respect with any other aspiring game designers out there. (more…)
Basketball G.M. – Alternate Draft Types
As we wrap up our demo game for Basketball G.M., it seems this would be an appropriate time to discuss some alternate gameplay options that we enjoy. The beauty of Basketball G.M. is that it closely imitates a fantasy-style draft at the beginning of the game. (more…)
Basketball G.M. Demo Game – The Championship!
Today we conclude our Basketball G.M. demo game with a head-to-head Championship Game. Chris finished the regular season with more victory points, so he will roll 3 performance dice, while Tony will roll only two. During postseason play, GMs do not draw Occurrence cards and do not sign Free Agents. (more…)
Basketball G.M. Demo Game – Turn 8
Today we continue our Basketball G.M. demo game with turn 8. Chris clinched home court advantage in the championship round by increasing his victory point lead to 3 with just one turn to play. Time for our GMs to rest their starters for the postseason. (more…)
Basketball G.M. Demo Game – Turn 7
Today we continue our Basketball G.M. demo game with turn 7. The trade deadline passed last turn, so we jump right in with Chris’s turn. In turn 6, Tony faced a do-or-die situation, and came out with a win. However, he still has to win out in order to simply tie Chris in VPs by season’s end. (more…)