Once again I seem to have been sleeping and missed this announcement at the start of October.
Since I sold up and stopped playing Netrunner I’ve missed the game and the Android universe. I really do love the whole cyberpunk, Bladerunner-esq setting. It’s a genre I love. And the art that has been created for the Android universe (read Netrunner) is some of my all time favourite. It’s just stunning, atmospheric, and thematic. Look at the art above for the cover of the book. It screams Bladerunner, and already you have that whole neon, gritty, industrial, futuristic world in your imagination as the setting. Gorgeous. Anyone that’s seen one of the movies or the many ones after that it’s influenced will be instantly at home and have frames of reference they can start using to imagine their adventures in the Android universe.

Which is why when they released the Genesys RPG system and covered a cyberpunk setting within it I was excited. It was obvious from the art used that they were implying an Android type setting. After the release they talked about the world of Android being one of the source books they would be working on.

Now that FFG have gotten their fantasy themed sourcebook out in the world, their attention has turned to Android. You can now pre-order Android: Shadow of the Beanstalk, the sourcebook for the Genesys system covering the Android universe. Although sadly there is no actual release date yet. So I’m hoping that pre-order means soon.

You can read the full post about it from FFG here.

P.S. FFG can we have the Tannhäuser universe next please?

It’s been like this for most of today. It was like it for a large part of yesterday.

You would have thought with Essen on at the moment, you’d want your site up and running. Friday is meant to be the day Asmodee UK share with the world, well UK the new releases for the week ahead. It’s definitely where a lot of gamers go to see what they will be spending money on.

Plus with the worlds largest board gaming expo currently in progress you’d want your site sharing tweets, news etc to your customer base that are unable to get there.

I’m not expecting the situation to improve before Monday. Maybe they might have a decision maker who can authorise money to be spent back by then.

Until then I can’t see their IT bods able to do anything about this.

Embarrassed much?

I’m late to the party on this following bit of news, I’m kicking myself on how I missed it, but better late than never.

Yesterday on one of the many many boardgaming Facebook groups there was a post about selling a copy of Love Letter: Batman for £25. Like many others on the discussion that followed I was shocked that the game was going for this price. But apparently that was on the cheap side.

Why was this my favourite version of the Love Letter games so expensive to buy now? The obvious answer was that it was out of print, and also the licence hadn’t been renewed. I thought that was a little short sighted.

I then thought wow I wonder what Love Letter The Hobbit The Battle of the Five Armies (my close second favourite Love Letter) is going for then? Because if they didn’t renew the licence for Batman, then I was pretty sure that they wouldn’t do The Hobbit. And I was right, some-one responded saying the game was going for £40 on eBay when they checked!

Madness.

So I did some quick digging around with Google, and the bit of news I missed earlier in the year was that as of 1st May 2018, the Asmodee Borg collective took over the Love Letter game from AEG, and stamped it with the Z-Man brand of the Asmodee Borg collective. The only versions that transferred over were the “classic”, Premium, Lovecraft and Wedding editions. The other licensed versions gone.

Hence the situation that we are now seeing ourselves in with the prices of the Hobbit and Batman editions etc shooting up.

I’m sure Z-Man/Asmodee have their plans for the game. If we are lucky they will include the English version of the Russian Star Wars printing. But I would love to see them get the licences back for the likes of Batman so that people can enjoy the game at a reasonable price.

I’m off to sleeve my copies of The Hobbit and Archer (Batman is already sleeved). Need to protect that investment!

This December sees the release of Scythe Encounters. 32 fan designed encounter cards for my all time favourite game Scythe. Sufferers will remember my recent preview post of four cards for this where I rambled on trying to sound intelligent about the cards. But they were pretty sweet cards.

You can find links to other preview cards from Scythe Encounters and preorder links HERE.

Looks like Christmas arrives a couple of weeks early.

So this hits your FLGS next week. Really looking forward to playing it. And really glad I pre-ordered it, so it will just turn up.

The Rise of Fenris is the final expansion for the already awesome Scythe. And long time sufferers will remember this is my all time favourite game.

This expansion has 12 modules if I remember correctly that get introduced while playing a replayable campaign. Which is the recommended way to try the modules I believe. Then after that you can replay the campaign or play Scythe with whichever modules you like mixed in.

But more on this once it arrives and been played.

This morning while doing my morning check of channels I subscribe to on YouTube I saw this video on the IGN Channel and thought “no feckin way”.

This game was a massive hit in 2017 and I’d say also this year too when the second Kickstarter was delivered.

But I was not expecting this. Gloomhaven the video game. Here is the teaser trailer.

As you saw at the end of the trailer definitely coming to PC. It’s not clear if what we are seeing is cut scenes, or simulated game play. If gameplay then it looks more like it’s been done in an elder scrolls RPG mode. I’m hoping for cut scenes and we are getting a game more like the boardgame. It’s what fans of the game would be after.

But I’m pretty excited about this. I hope it will also hit consoles, and my beloved iOS (iPad Pro which it will look amazing on).

I’m assuming that one or two of you suffers have heard of Humble Bundle. For those that haven’t it’s a website for raising funds for charity while giving you a great bargain. You pay what you want for the bundle, even deciding how that money is distributed amongst the charities the bundle is benefiting if you want to. Most of the content is also drm free.

They currently have a great offer on at the moment for those interested in Game Design. This is board game and video game design. So amazing value for me.

Included in this bundle are the 2 volumes of Board Games That Tell Stories by Ignacy Trzewiczek. I already had the first volume, and been waiting for the second to come out digitally. Although I hadn’t checked in recent months if it had. But no need to now.

The bundle also has 2 great books on game design. I use Level Up! By Scott Rogers with my students. His 10 page design document and beat chart are ideal for the level of students I teach. A Theory of Fun by Raph Koster is a classic. And one I’m always recommending to students to read.

This is a great offer, with some great books. If you are interested in game design you’d be silly not to get these books.

You can take up this great offer HERE.

Oh and while there have a look at the other bundles they have, and sign up for the email alerts so you don’t miss anything in the future.