The Family Gamers Podcast

It’s time for another interview! This week, we’re talking to Jason Kotarski from Green Couch Games. Their new game Best Treehouse Ever: Forest of Fun is on Kickstarter now. The new game is a stand alone game, but it can be combined with the original Best Treehouse Ever to play with up to 8 players. Green Couch Games has made their name as primarily a publisher for filler games. Jason’s passion is for great games that tend to the small and quick. I want to intentionally raise the bar for filler games. Green Couch Games has released 10 games in the past 3 years. We called out a few games specifically: Before the Earth Explodes Ladder 29 Wok on Fire Rocky Road a la Mode Fidelitas If any of the games we mentioned sound interesting, you can see their whole selection.   We ask Jason to tell us a few of his favorite fillers that aren’t published by Green Couch Games. Jason’s favorites include: Incan Gold – press your luck 6 nimmt! – blind bidding Qwixx and Rolling America – roll and write games that engage all players on every turn.   Find Green Couch Games online at greencouchgames.com or on Twitter (@GreenCouchGames) and Facebook (@GreenCouchTabletop) Jason also runs the 20 Minutes of Filler Facebook group and the 20 Minutes of Filler podcast. You can find him on Twitter @jasonkotarski

You love gaming so much that you want to go to a convention. Your kids love gaming, and you want to bring them too. What should you know? A good convention experience starts with good preparation, and that goes double when there are children involved. What we’ve been playing NMBR 9 Showed BOO to friends (see our review) Pairs, Pirate deck Story Cubes: Voyages Caverna: Cave vs Cave Match Madness Voodoo (see our review) Zelda: Breath of the Wild Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle Hob (review coming soon)   Helpful tips for taking kids to conventions Start small. Do a one-day local convention before trying something big. Plan on bouncing a lot from thing to thing, or staying for an overly long time at one stop, depending on your child’s personality. Check-in / talk with your kids: what are you planning on? What worked yesterday? Set expectations – yours AND your kids. Plan on taking time out to rest – but that might look like doing something less “gamey” – like run around outside. Boston FIG was great for that this year – they had Boffing demonstrations outside. Supplies! Water, snacks, first aid kit. Let the kids carry some of their own. Health! Hand sanitizer, immune support gummies or Airborne, DON’T TOUCH YOUR FACE.   Any other tips? Let us know with a comment on the show notes, on Facebook, or a tweet.

Welcome Stephen Duetzmann from Engaged Family Gaming this week! Since EFG has already released their holiday gift guide, we decided that Stephen would be an excellent resource for our listeners. We present our top ten(ish) video game purchases for your family this holiday season. What We’ve Been Playing Stephen has been really enjoying Tail Feathers with his older son (11 years old). It’s their favorite move-minis-around game. We should get back to Mice & Mystics soon. We all loved Boston FIG, and re-visit a few of the games we first mentioned on our post-BFIG episode. King of the Hat reminds Andrew a little bit of a game called Gang Beasts (another over-the-top brawler game, but not as appropriate for kids). Anitra has been playing more BOO, a great game for $5. See our review. Stephen asks about Dairyman, which we really enjoyed (and reviewed). Speaking of fighting games, our kids have not yet tried Street Fighter on our SNES Classic, but they love Super Punch Out. Stephen gives some excellent advice on how to introduce Street Fighter (or similar fighting games) to children or anyone who hasn’t played them. Start with move, jump, and ONLY ONE attack button that you all agree on (ie. “heavy kick”). This will teach strategy and positioning, and gives opportunities to learn fighting skill without having to grasp the special moves (ie. fireball). Andrew’s first try on the SNES Classic was Starfox. Anitra’s was Mario Kart. Bob Ross Art of Chill – it’s a game that is “mechanically neutral, and therefore relies on its theme”. Top Ten Video Game Gifts Toys-to-life: most of them are well-designed for kids, and the older styles are aggressively marked down, making them an excellent deal – as long as you don’t need the online features. Our favorite is Disney Infinity; Stephen’s is Skylanders (Superchargers version). We’re not a huge fan of LEGO Dimensions; it’s much more expensive even though it has been discontinued. LOVERS in a Dangerous Spacetime: an excellent co-operative game, and no one player is dragging the other(s) along. Note: LOVERS is an acronym, and the spaceship is powered by the “ardor reactor” and the power of love. The actual characters are cute bunnies/frogs/etc. ($15) SNES Classic (mentioned above). An excellent value for the money, and it will introduce your children to video game history. Nearly all of the games included were groundbreaking when they were first introduced and have stood the test of time – true classics. ($80) Nintendo Switch: it’s an excellent time to buy it. Between Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Super Mario Odyssey, this is an excellent buy for your kids. A home console that is also a handheld seems too good to be true, but it really does work and is sturdier than it looks. ($300 + games) Note: if you have Amazon Prime, you get 20% off pre-ordered video games. What a deal! Mario Kart 8 Deluxe: among other things, it has accessibility controls that actually make it possible for a 2 or 3 year old to really play! This may be added to the Smith family Christmas list, even though we already have Mario Kart 8 for the WiiU. Especially since with the Switch,

We’ve been looking for games that capture some of the spooky feeling of the Halloween season, without being too scary or too difficult for younger children. We cover four of our favorites, recommendations from our listeners, and give the run-down of what we’ve been playing. What we’ve been playing: Scythe – a beautiful, elegant game. We spent the first 12 minutes talking about Scythe because we enjoyed it so much. Magic Maze – this might be our new favorite game. Timed co-operative play for 2-8 players. Not being allowed to talk to each other makes the game more challenging but also more interesting. And the artwork is fantastically funny. Brew Dice Super Hack Override (here’s our review) Downforce (here’s our review) NMBR 9 Bob Ross: Art of Chill Illuminati – 35th anniversary this year! We’ve probably been playing it for 20 years. You play as an “illuminati” (secret society) aiming to take over the world by developing a network of other groups that you control. The money makes it a little bit fiddly, but the fun is worth it. Super Smash Brothers WiiU – our three year old actually won a round! Rummikub – another classic. Andrew’s sister enjoyed it so much she turned around and ordered her own copy. Robo Diner – a game coming soon to The Game Crafter. Counting Kingdom – a great game that drills arithmetic skills (mostly addition & subtraction) For Science! Andrew repeated his “Spicy Sweet Chili Dorito”-breaded chicken experiment. Baking did improve the flavor and texture, but most of the special flavor was lost in cooking. Backtalk! Chad Gray’s story about playing games together becomes creating a game together, and eventually launching it via Kickstarter. (The game is Goatfish; the Kickstarter is already doubly funded.) Four Halloween Games for Kids We want something a little spooky, but not too scary (or too difficult!) for the kids. Our community was helpful in this regard, and you should check out their recommendations. Potion Explosion – Spencer and Lara (Married with Board Games) first introduced us to Potion Explosion when we had them on the podcast in March. Since then, we’ve grown to love this game, and it fits well with a Halloween theme. Voodoo – from Mayday Games. “Curse” your friends and make it increasingly difficult for them to keep playing. BOO – Cute (and tiny!) two-player puzzle game. Use ghosts to scare each other and flip cards. At the end of the game, the player with the most ghosts of their color showing, wins! Only $5, and you could pick it up at a Barnes & Noble today. (Ask for help though; it’s so small it will...

We have a great Halloween-themed game to share with you this week. Dennis Michael Sawyers from Amber Palace Games joins us. His game Scream or Die is a family-friendly dice game for 2-8 players.Each player plays as a cute monster attempting to collect the most candy on Halloween. Rolling the dice is done by one player at a time, but all other players may spend “scream tokens” to influence the rolls. All players stay invested on each turn, since they may collect candy on other players’ rolls. Dennis tells us where the name Scream or Die came from. Remember the NES game “Skate or Die”? That gave the team a clever idea so they could still make it obvious this is a dice game. We love the art. The monsters aren’t scary, but they are still obviously monsters, paying homage to the style of old monster movies. The symbolism is strong and it all ties together well. Players may choose male or female versions of any monster type, which is a nice feature, especially in a kids’ game. We wish more games did that. Andrew and Anitra enjoyed this filler game, and found it easy to teach to kids, too. Would your family be interested in an easy dice game? Check out the Kickstarter. Get the full game for $25 (including US shipping), or the deluxe edition for $39 (adds monster meeples and a dice tower). Find Amber Palace Games at their website, on Facebook, or on Twitter.

We’ve been doing dice game reviews, and we’ve got dice on the brain this week! Listen as Andrew and Anitra each list their top 3 dice games. What we’ve been playing Dairyman (review here) Scream or Die (currently on Kickstarter). Dr. Eureka Connect 4, Go Away Monster, etc. are common games for the kids to pull out and play together. Video games Hob from Runic Games (review coming) Cuphead Viticulture (online with friends) Through the Ages (iOS) Magic Moving Mansion Mania (iOS and Android)   Backtalk! Listener Kyle Nelson shared some press your luck games that depend on cards rather than dice.   Dice games! Listener favorites: * Star Wars Destiny * Bears! from Fireside Games * Saint Malo (roll and write castle building) * Sagrada * Wurfel Bohnanza * Pandemic: The Cure * Alien Frontiers * The Voyages of Marco Polo * Roll for the Galaxy * Roll Player * Bang! The Dice Game * Eldritch Horror * Flatline * Fuse * Backgammon? Sure, it depends on dice too. Anitra’s top three: * Batman The Animated Series Dice Game * Knot Dice * Quarriors (with expansions) Andrew’s top three: * Roll Player * Quarriors / Dice Masters * Zombie Dice / Batman The Animated Series Dice That’s it for our show this week. Don’t forget to leave us a review on iTunes or your favorite podcast catcher.

It’s our favorite time of year! We discuss our favorite games from Boston FIG, with special guest, Corey Lagunowich. Then, listen to interviews from the show floor with Andrew. Notable tabletop games Pitman by Wild East Games (in progress) Baon: The Game of Leftovers by Brainstein Games Cake Duel by Sizigi Studios (Kickstarter completed, should be shipping by December. $25) Prom – a protoype still in the playtesting stage by Oxford Street Games Takeout – a set collection game Pinball Showdown from Shoot Again Games – Andrew liked this game so much, he bought it as soon as he played it. Shiki by Alex Garens – a haiku-building word game. Very relaxing and chill. Corey: “The Bob Ross card game… Happy little poems repair frienships”. Rainbow Octopus by Cray Cray Games – A card game to build an octopus with each tentacle a different color. Notable because of the multiple difficulty levels – easiest is playable by a 4-year-old, but hardest becomes a fun game for 12+. Still in development. Gut Instinct by Best Coast Games – in early playtesting. Play as white blood cells in the gut, destroying bad bacteria and using good bacteria to boost your power. Biome Builder by Killer Snails – winner of FIG Best Family Tabletop Game (Kickstarter completed. Review coming soon?) Notable digital games King of the HAT – Anitra was wrong. It is near release. Back King of the HAT on Kickstarter now – this game is pure gold! Winner of the FIG Audience Choice award. Pollywog Pond – we’ve mentioned this preschool educational game in the past, but it is finally out! Exposure: A Game of Camouflage from The Sheep’s Meow – an abstract game, coming soon to Steam and Xbox ONE. Splats from Unruly Studios – a toy that can teach kids coding (with Scratch) so they can make their own active games (jumping, racing, whack-a-mole inspired games). Coming soon to Kickstarter; we expect to spend quite a lot of money on these. Make Sail from PopCannibal – beautiful exploration game with very realistic sailing. No real story, but if you like sailing or you like exploration games, you might like it. Magic Moving Mansion Mania – puzzle game for iOS / Android where you swap tiles to guide the constantly-walking princess to her throne. Winner of Best Student Digital Game. Free! Battery Boy – an endless runner game tied to the battery level of your mobile device. Difficulty level increases as your (real) battery level decreases. Interviews Rainbow Octopus with Josh Degregorio

It’s been quite a week! We define a handful of board game terms (what’s a meeple?) and talk about lots of games we’ve been playing. Andrew describes his recent cooking experiment “FOR SCIENCE” and we share a big announcement! We talked about some common video game terms back in episode 46. This week, we’ll define a few common tabletop game terms. What we’ve been playing: Ingenious (by Fantasy Flight Games) Bärenpark (see our review. We love this game!) Think ‘N Sync Flip City – it’s a deck-builder that’s also a city-building game. You can also level up cards (the “flip” of Flip City) More Go Away Monster – it’s a super fast play and the 3 year old is always happy to play it. kids have resurrected Disney Princess Uno. We don’t mind, as long as they’re not always asking us to play (it’s got some strange extra rules). Asher showed his grandmother how to play My First Stone Age. Grandmother showed him Celestia – a press-your-luck game with a travel-the-board aspect. Andrew is loving Through the Ages on iOS We co-sponsored another B&N Game night. We got to play some brand-new games! Magic Maze – this was a Spiel des Jahres finalist, recently localized to the US by Dude Games. Co-operative movement game with a cute theme – and you’re not allowed to directly communicate with your fellow players! NMBR 9, from Fantasy Flight and Z-Man Games. Downforce, from Restoration Games (brainchild of Rob Daviau, also known for Stop Thief). Remake of Top Race, AKA Formula 500. Board Game Terms Lightning Round: Meeple – a pawn representing your player, usually person-shaped. Tap a card – Turn a card (or board, or token) sideways to indicate that it has been used. D4, D6, D10, D20, etc. FLGS – support it if you have one! Announcement We have a panel at PAX Unplugged!!!! Tentatively scheduled for Sunday at 11:30am. FOR SCIENCE! Andrew’s disappointing experiment in “Spicy Sweet Chili” Dorito fried chicken. Next time, he’ll try baked chicken. More Tabletop Game Terms: 4X game – “eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, and eXterminate”. Usually long, usually space-themed. (dozens of 4X games on Board Game Geek) Deck builder – play cards to accumulate currency to buy better cards that will allow you to do more things. Can feel slow, can feel isolated (only building up your own stash without much interaction with other players). Classic examples: Ascension, Dominion. Non-card example: Quarriors. Press Your Luck – Almost always a dice game. Take chances to get a better reward, but risk losing everything. Examples: Can’t Stop, Zombie Dice.

Aditya Batura is co-founder and CEO of Codomo Inc., a technology education group based in Singapore. They teach children about programming at an age-appropriate level, and wanted to bring that to a larger community. Enter Potato Pirates, the game that “teaches 10 hours of programming in 30 minutes”. Listen to the podcast, and check out their Kickstarter at http://potatopirates.game Coding is a personal experience without a lot of interpersonal interaction; and there tends to be a steep learning curve. Potato Pirates makes the learning process offline, interacting with other people and removing the worries about syntax. Potato Pirates teaches many basic programming concepts such as for loops, while loops, conditionals (if/else), switch statements, variables, and creating a complete function or program (known as an attack in-game) before executing it. We mention Robot Turtles (one of our favorites), which teaches mostly just the logical progression of programming. Potato Pirates is aimed at an older age group and teaches more concepts. We’ve had fun playing it with our family and look forward to playing it with some adults as well. The good news is that the Kickstarter is already fully funded; if you check it out, you can see what sorts of stretch goals they are aiming for. The game is polished and complete, so as soon as the Kickstarter is done, it will be in production. Potato Pirates should be shipped to the backers before Christmas.

Sometimes you just need to buy a game in person, whether it’s because you don’t want to buy online or because you need to pick up a last-minute present. We share with you our top games that we found at our local Target store. What We’ve Been Playing: Dairyman from Tasty Minstrel Games Flip City from Tasty Minstrel Games – only played solo so far Zooscape from Tasty Minstrel Games Voodoo from Mayday Games Windup War Kids pulled out Dr. Eureka (among others) Our youngest asked to play Mmm! – one of Anitra’s favorites to play with kids. Problem Picnic – new review! My First Stone Age Go Away Monster! we found at the local charity store (Savers). Adorable toddler fun. Bärenpark – Please bear with us while we make a few koala-ity puns. Stop Thief! from Restoration Games Silly Street winner Congratulations to Trey LaCaze! Board Games at Target? Yes, they have a decent selection. Good for last-minute shoppers. Our top five: Silly Street Forbidden Island Sushi Go Ticket to Ride (several variations, including First Journey) Machi Koro: Bright Lights Big City   Honorable Mentions: Codenames, Splendor, Catan, Carcasonne, Exploding Kittens, Suspend, Little Hands Card Holder

This time we have a special guest in the studio! Our friend Liz Kelley is a staff writer for The Family Gamers website, but she’s also a teacher. Since school starts this time of year, we wanted to talk to her about something special: she coaches the board game club at her school. What Has Liz Been Playing? Liz learned to play Sushi Go Party! at the most recent Barnes & Noble game night. Patchwork – we love it, although Bärenpark is quickly replacing Patchwork as a favorite. We all agree on our love for games by Uwe Rosenberg. Board Games After School Liz was involved with the review for Sushi Dice, and the kids who played it in her game club love it. One surprising thing about the club is that the noise level of 24 kids playing tabletop games is high. Liz remarks that many kids will form alliances, helping each other rather than simply being cut-throat about winning. Benefits of Game Club As a trained child educator, Liz sees three major benefits game club offers to kids: * Practicing social interactions (treating each other kindly, waiting for your turn, etc.) * Critical thinking / problem solving * Higher order thinking – working through multiple ways to solve a problem How to Start At Liz’s school, the board game club started as a chess club. The principal asked her if she would be willing to coach the chess club if she could also add other games and make it something new. The way Liz runs her club, she has a “game of the week”, which she’ll teach to a group of 6+ kids (and to a second group once the first group gets started). A few kids came from board gaming families, which gave them a leg up on being able to teach games to their peers. This past year, the club has been run in 6-week, 2-hour sessions. Two hours allows enough to teach and play a whole full-length game, but it’s a little long for some 9-12 year old kids. Some kids who finished early would play filler games (Sushi Dice, War, build card towers). Some kids created their own games; Liz describes a game the kids designed out of Othello pieces and Pass the Pigs. Advice for parents Reach out to your children’s principal. Is there a similar club, like a chess club, already in place? Could it be expanded to include board games? You could also reach out to the Parent-Teacher organization and suggest a board game club as a new after school activity. Liz’s club had very supportive parents who appreciated the club. If your children have this opportunity, thank the teacher! You could also suggest a parent night – parents and kids playing games together.   Have Feedback? You can email any of the three of us on today’s show @thefamilygamers.com. Or contact us on Twitter or Facebook. Please leave us a review on iTunes if you like the show. Last but not least, don’t forget to check out our Silly Street review and giveaway. Until next week, play games with your kids!

What We’ve Been Playing: Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime Robo Diner Purrrlock Holmes Set Windup War Qwingo Roll Player Batman Fluxx H.I.D.E. Potion Explosion Silly Street   GenCon: Whistle Stop Our listener Nick M (@ShredDemon) tweeted us a selfie with Andy Geremia! His highlights include: Fireball island from Restoration Games was the most exciting news for me. (Remake of Fireball Island circa 1986. Molded plastic board with tiki idol in the raised middle. Periodically spits out “fireball” marbles that roll down the mountain, knocking over pawns or destroying bridges.) Santorini & 5 Minute Dungeon both sold out on the first day at GenCon. (5 Minute Dungeon: cooperatively escape a randomized dungeon – in under 5 minutes. Use the cards in your hand to fight monsters and the final boss.) Century: Golem Edition – Plan B’s popular Century: Spice Road, re-themed. Manga-like illustrations, beautiful crystals as currency. Stuffed Fables HABA Tiny Park – basically Barenpark for kids! Slide Blast (FoxMind) looks fun. Everyone was tweeting about Clank! In! Space! Still a deckbuilder, still traverse the board trying not to make too much noise. Board fits together like a puzzle. More compact than the original Clank!     GenCan’t: Welcome to Dino World – PnP roll and write game. Build a dinosaur theme park, and try to avoid having too many “incidents”. James O’Connor (Stellaris Games), illustrated by Beth Sobel (Lanterns: The Harvest Festival, World’s Fair, Coldwater Crown, Viticulture, etc.) Photo contest – http://www.gencant.com/2017-photo-contest-winners/

This week’s interview is with Chris Anderson, a board game designer (Blue Cube Board Games) and host of The Board Game Workshop podcast. The board game design community is full of great people who really want designers to succeed. Shout out to the chapter of the Game Maker’s Guild based on Boston. There’s very little competition; rather, everyone wins because there are more good board games. We experience some bonding over our love of Boston FIG and its family-friendliness. Chris is having one of his games published with Button Shy – an indie publisher that publishes a large quantity of small games. Most of their games fall into one of three categories: wallet games (18 cards), postcard games (rules only for a game that uses standard components like dice, coins, or a standard deck of cards), and nano-games (9 cards or less). We decided that with their Game of the Month club, Button Shy probably publishes 30 or more games per year! We ask about the game In Vino Morte (which should be available as part of the next Kickstarter from Button Shy). This was a favorite game of Anitra’s at Granite Game Summit. (See episode 42 – Granite Game Summit for more.) Chris started The Board Game Workshop podcast because he wanted to give back to the game design community, and because he listens to a lot of podcasts. It started as an interview show and has evolved into a roundtable format with multiple designers. “I want to design board games. Where do I start?” * Read articles, watch videos, listen to podcasts on board game design. * Follow the resources cited in those media to find even MORE media to read/watch/listen * Just start making a game. Realize that your first game will be terrible. “You have to get that out of the way, because your next one will be better.” * Never stop designing. * Join (or create) a community of designers. It doesn’t necessarily have to be in person. Chris is a part of several meet-ups in the Boston area, but also mentions online groups that have helped him with his designing. Up next for Chris: His next project, titled Plutocracy 3022, is a large-scale space exploration game where no one controls the space empires, but instead players use their money/influence/etc. to build their own wealth. His next podcast will probably be on worker-placement. Andrew and Chris discuss their shared love for worker-placement games, especially Tzolk’in. Find Chris on twitter @BlueCubeBGs, or check out the websites for Blue Cube Board Games and The Board Game Workshop.

As we mentioned last week, we’ve been camping! We talk about several camping-themed games from Education Outdoors. We discuss how we set parameters for personal screen time for our oldest on trips: she can only use it in appropriate circumstances, without recharging. Now that she has had the same rules a few times, she’s figured out how to stretch out her screen time and make it last, rather than playing it non-stop for the first day. Almost like that’s what we have suggested in the past! What we’ve been playing: Exploding Kittens (friends got it out from the library!) War (Wikipedia has the rules) Cribbage – a great example of adults and kids playing together! Poker, mostly played among children who don’t know all the rules What’s Up & Strawberry Ninja – which we also reviewed recently. Great use for our Card Caddy! We love What’s Up. Please check out our recent written reviews, including Potion Explosion. Chicken Cha Cha Cha Video games: Andrew finally beat the first set of the Master Sword trials in the Zelda: Breath of the Wild bonus content. Horizon Zero Dawn The kids have picked up Portal 2 and are slowly each making their way through the solo campaign. They tried the co-operative mode, but it is so hard. They have also started playing Type:Rider. It seems to be helping Asher with persistence. Announcements: The Family Gamers will definitely be at PAX Unplugged! At the end of the show, we announce the winners of our most recent giveaway. Camping Games:   S’mores – see Anitra’s review. We didn’t really enjoy playing it with more than 3 players, because there weren’t enough s’mores to go around. Toasted or Roasted – we interviewed the creator, Jeff Johnston, back in April. We briefly compare to Cootie – Toasted or Roasted has mechanics to try to keep things moving if someone gets stuck. CAMP – a great multi-age trivia roll & move game. All the questions are nature-based, and there are 4 difficulty levels built in. See Andrew’s review. Honorable mention to Qwingo, which we are looking forward to playing many more times.   Don’t forget to check out our Facebook community and leave us a review on iTunes!   Do you have any games you love to play when camping?

We are not here. We are camping! No electricity means no computers, no microphones, no podcast. We will be back next week with a great episode centered around games to play when camping, of course.