Back from Consimworld Expo *kaff* 2015

Me and Ian Weir at table, playing a few cards of Colonial Twilight (photo: Cisco Serret)

So, it was a good week, marred only by my catching a cold from the hotel air conditioning, which usually happens after I spend 3 or 4 days in a hotel. It was 110 – 115 degrees outside for much of the week, and all the work/game stuff was inside, so I didn’t have much of a choice. Felt nasty yesterday but I’ll be all right in a couple of days.

Anyway, yes, a good week. I showed Denouement to Gene Billingsley, who liked what he saw and lo, the game is going up for P500 orders Very Soon Now.

http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/180199/colonial-twilight

http://talk.consimworld.com/WebX/.1ddb6d85/

However, the working title did not survive and the game is now called Colonial Twilight, which is OK with me – still an evocative title and nicked from the title of an excellent article on the French-Algerian War written by John Prados back in Campaign/Panzerfaust magazine (does anyone remember that?), issue #73, May-June 1976.

Talked to many many other people over the course of the week, it’s great to be able to see these folks, even if it is only once a year, and talk about technique or common histories/anecdotes. I even got in a game of Quartermaster General, which had some interesting choices in it but isn’t much more than filler (but it’s fun filler).

I brought a lot of new stuff with me but did not get to show much of it besides the two COIN games, which caught a lot of attention. GMT staff seemed interested in Thunder Out Of China which was also on display, but there are at least 8 or 9 teams working on COIN system games now so it would be years before this one saw production.

Contemplated setup for 1937 scenario (photo: Cisco Serret) (Santa did not fall off the map, he was like that when I got there)

So, back to work… until next year. But meanwhile there is BottosCon, November 6-8!

Off to Consimworld Expo 2015!

Very, very early tomorrow morning we are taking off for the 2015 CSW Expo in Tempe, Arizona. I go to this most years; this year there are over 300 attendees and while it draws a lot of monster gamers (people who play monster-sized games, not people who play games about monsters or who look like monsters, though there are a few who look like Igor from Hilarious House of Frightenstein) it also draws a lot of hardcore, long-term gamers, many of whom are designers themselves. It’s fun to get together with them and swap tales and techniques.

There will be a lot of publishers there, including GMT, so I will present the work done so far on Denouement (2-player COIN system, French Algerian War) and see if they are interested in Thunder Out Of China (4-player COIN system, China 1937-41, trying to make it a fun game for four passive-aggressives) too. Also bringing eight or nine other things to show and test:

– Algeria Redux, revision of original 2000 Algeria game with cleaned-up rules, scenarios and 140 counters

– Winter Thunder, revision of 2005 Bulge game, with fewer counters and simpler rules

– Palace Coup, multiplayer game on coup d’etat

– Caudillo, multiplayer game on power politics in thinly disguised post-Chavez Venezuela

– Binh Dinh 69, simpler game on Binh Dinh province in Vietnam 1969

– Binh Dinh and Kandahar modules of District Commander system

– and Victory Point Games will be there for playtesting of their developed version of Ukrainian Crisis

Will be there all week, may be able to post small things and pictures – bringing new tablet with tiny keyboard, and Aki gave me his old Android phone I can use as a camera.

Kandahar is shipping!

Pre-ordered copies of Kandahar are nosing their way into the postal system right now!

If you haven’t already, get yours at http://ossgamescart.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=50 !

Only $24.95!

Frighten Grandpa!

This is the last of the four folios of mine to be released by OSS this year. OSS is planning to do another round of new titles next year, and it’s quite probable I will have one or more of mine in the mix! I’ve been quite pleased with how this has worked out – Ania Ziolkowska’s maps are very good, the counters well-printed and nicely cut, presentation overall has been great.

We’ve seeing a resurgence of small wargames games these past few years – not like the first waves of Micro-games and Capsule games back in the 80s, but substantial enough – and these OSS items are among the best (IMO of course).