The future of tabletop games

Rabbits & Demons update, hidden movement, future of games, and Knarr

TL;DR Summary

• 🐰 New Rabbits & Demons art added

• 🐺 Hidden movement games

• 🔮 The future of tabletop games

• 🎲 Recently played: Knarr

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🐰 New Rabbits & Demons art added

Rabbits & Demons is a free collection of hand-drawn tracings of public domain woodcuts and other art from the 16th through 18th centuries. This art asset pack is published under a CC-BY-4.0 license. You are free to use these images in your personal and commercial projects.

I recently added thirteen (13) new pieces to the collection, bringing the total to twenty nine. There's now a rabbit wielding an axe, fishy people, and some skeletons in a new style.

If you need art for your tabletop projects or #MÖRKTOBER creations, check it out!

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🐺 Hidden movement games

A couple months ago we looked at hidden movement mechanisms in Hunter vs. Hunted at Skeleton Code Machine.

Using Beast (Midhall, et al., 2023) as an example the post covers:

• What is hidden movement?

• Common elements of hidden movement games

• Three interesting things Beast does

• Other examples of hidden movement games

• Specific design challenges

Hidden movement isn’t just a mechanism for board games. It’s something that can have applications in all tabletop games, including TTRPGs.

Read Hunter vs. Hunted at Skeleton Code Machine.

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🔮 The future of tabletop games

I recently watched The State and Future of Board Games panel from GDC 2023:

• Elizabeth Sampat (Game Director, Electric Square / Lively)

• Carol Mertz (Senior Game Designer, Exploding Kittens)

• Ming Liu (User Research Manager, Thunderfire UX)

• Cole Wehrle (Creative Director, Leder Games, Wehrlegig Games)

The panelists discussed the various themes and trends in tabletop gaming as they see them. I took some notes as I watched, and here are few of the highlights:

• Sustainability and game production: Publishers are starting to care more about sustainability impact of their games. There’s a desire for recycled materials and lower plastic usage. Start with a sustainable design. See also: Green Games Guide

• Blurring lines between TTRPG and board games: This one is near to my heart, because it’s the type of games I want to make. Roleplaying games becoming more like board games (e.g. structure, components), and board games becoming more like roleplaying games (e.g. narrative, open world).

• Building communities: Significant talk of Discord, communities, and continuing to support games after the sale. Players want more community, relationship, and discussion. Provide tools for community to make things for the game.

• Focus on the social experience: Start with what you want the social interaction to be. Think of players as critical game components. Games like The Mind (Warsch, 2018) and Wavelength (Hague, et al., 2019), and more connections between players in non-traditional ways.

• Urgency of the game: When thinking of game ideas think about why the game needs to exist, and what social experience you want it to create.

• Playtesting with TTS: Everyone seems to be extensively using Tabletop Simulator for playtesting, but with important caveats. Arcs (Wehrle, 2024) was intentionally only tested with physical copies for the first year. Handling interrupts is hard. The pervasive use of TTS for testing might be changing the overall design of games. Need safeguards in place.

• Cozy and accessible games: Not only is there a trend of solo games, but also making them cozy, friendly, and accessible. Games that are approachable with a low barrier to jump in.

• Solo gamers like to talk about solo games: You might think that solo gamers would be solitary and not looking for community, but that’s not the case. Just like any other gamers, they desire community and place to discuss games they are passionate about.

• Game development tools and simulations: Beyond TTS, there were mentions of Machinations.io, Monte Carlo dice simulators, and Python. Cole specifically mentioned one called “MC Dice” perhaps? I was unable to find that one online.

Watch the panel recording: The State and Future of Board Games 2023.

I’ve really been enjoying these GDC talks, and will continue to post some notes and summaries. For previous ones, check out No one cares about your game and How to pitch your indie game.

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🎲 Recently played: Knarr

I’ve played four games of Knarr (Dupont, 2023) on BGA recently, and have really been enjoying it!

It’s a fairly short game (~30 min) with some really interesting card play:

In Knarr, you are the leader of a band of Vikings that you send to new destinations. Manage the recruitment of your crew, and choose the best territories to explore.

Each turn you either play a card to get some benefits (e.g. points, recruits, bracelets, or prestige) or explore (i.e. purchase) a new territory. With just a few simple actions, each game has been different and engaging at both 2-players and 3-players.

I don’t believe the game is available for purchase yet in the US, but it is available via the Bombyx website.

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- E.P. 💀