The State of Games, Episode 58 – The One About Unpub 4

stateofgameslogonewIt seems like just yesterday that I was heading up to Delaware for the second annual Unpublished Games Festival. That was way back when VivaJava was launching on Kickstarter, I didn’t even know that The Great Heartland Hauling Co. or Jason Kotarski existed just yet, and Compounded was still unofficially signed – but still kicking total butt in play testing. Dice Hate Me Games and Unpub has come a long way in these last couple of years. But as Darrell, TC and I settled in for Unpub 4 this past weekend, one thing remained unchanged: The event is still a big pile of awesome.

Links to important things mentioned on the podcast:

newbedfordcomponentsThe Unpub

The Dice Hate Me 54-Card Challenge

The Dice Hate Me 54-Card Challenge Finalists

TC Petty III’s Designer Ego

Ad Magic

Scoville

Tiny Epic Kingdoms

Fleet: Arctic Bounty

Coconuts

Games mentioned that are registered in the Unpub database:

  • New Bedford
  • Brew Crafters
  • Diner
  • Don’t Get Eated
  • Fantasy Fantasy
  • Human Resources
  • Lagoon
  • Lesser Evil
  • Nantucket
  • Ohalo
  • Pie Factory
  • Rolling For Amusement
  • Scoville
  • Seven7s
  • Sunset Shuffle
  • The Beat on the Street
  • The Lucky Penny Diner
  • The Wombat Game
  • World Shapers
  • Xenon Profitier

THE OFFICIAL WINNERS OF THE DICE HATE ME 54-CARD CHALLENGE

Grand prize winner – Diner by Matthew O’Malley!

Second place winner – Easy Breezy Travel Agency by J. Alex Kevern

Third place winner(s) – The Fittest by Graham Russell; Isle of Trains by Dan Keltner & Seth Jaffee

Stay tuned for a post profiling the winning games, including interviews with the designers!

FINALLY, PICS FROM UNPUB!

 IMG_0002The calm before the storm – all the busy bees setting up the Unpub venue the night before the festivities began.

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Obviously the coolest kids in the room. Friends of Unpub, designers and volunteers from left to right: Daniel Solis, Shawn Purtell, Stephanie Straw, Adam O’Brien and Tiffany Bahnsen

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The hustle and bustle of designers in the fully-operational Unpub testing area on Saturday. It was chicken and dumplings time.

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Stephanie Straw points to what could only be poop on the board during Matt Wolfe’s demo of The Wombat Game.

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TC Petty III makes a play for the dice in Matt Riddle and Ben Pinchback’s totally awesome Monster Truck Mayhem.

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Testing of Unpub games extended outside the venue. Here, Tiffany, TC and Daniel debate how best to not get eated in TC’s new design Don’t Get Eated.

IMG_0008 There was also lots and lots of testing of the Dice Hate Me 54-Card Challenge finalists. Here, Stephanie explains to Darrell that she will kill him if he takes her smoothie ingredients in Benjamin Chhoa’s Frozen Fruit Frenzy.

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Darrell and Stephanie test out Nathaniel Levan’s Human Resources. Look, it’s a cubicle.

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The publisher’s-eye view of Unpub on Sunday morning during the Publishers & Pancakes panel. There was also scrapple. Mmmm scrapple.

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Sunday morning started off with a test of Josh Tempkin’s dice game about choices, Lesser Evil. 

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A.J. Porfirio of Van Ryder Games (far right) joined me for the post-apocalyptic survival game, Salvation Road from MVP Boardgames. I don’t want to brag, but we totally won. Ok, yeah I’ll brag.

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If you’d like to draw attention to your prototypes, it never hurts to use very large bullets as game pieces. Here you can see weapons of mass distraction at use in Marcel Perro & Kurt Evans’ For Greed or Glory.

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Pointing, excitement, cards… pie. This photo has it all. Bryan Fischer of Nevermore Games (left) shows off his 54-card marvel, Pie Factory to me, Ben Rosset of Brew Crafters fame and Nevermore’s John Sizemore. Look for Pie Factory to don a Dice Hate Me Games label later this spring on Kickstarter!

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Speaking of Ben Rosset, he’s always a busy guy, churning out amazing new prototypes. Here he shows the always-gracious Paul Owen and Stephanie how to craft the liter beers in Brew Crafters Lite.

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As if Brew Crafters Lite wasn’t lite enough, Ben also created Brew Crafters Travel Card Game – another masterpiece of 54-card design. Here, Scott King is showing Brad Smoley the finer points of good card play. Get it, points? He’s pointing AND scoring points? *drops mic*

 

ALSO, OUR KICKSTARTER ALL STARS:

Compounded (It’s here! Get your pre-orders in!)

The Great Heartland Hauling Co. (All copies have been hauled away – but we’re hoping to get more!)

VivaJava: The Coffee Game (Almost sold out!)

Carnival (Currently sold out – but we’re hoping to get more!)

 

And, finally:

The Dice Hate Me Games Newsletter! Sign up for the best in behind-the-scenes goodness from our hearts to yours.

Like what you hear? Subscribe to the State of Games podcast RSS feed!

 

Related posts:

  1. The State of Games, Episode 53 – The One About The Germans
  2. The State of Games, Episode 51 – The BGG Top 20 and Future of Unpub
  3. The State of Games, Episode 40 – The One About Unpub 3
  4. The State of Games, Episode 52 – The One About Beer
  5. The State of Games, Episode 55 – The One About BGGCon 2013
Comments
2 Responses to “The State of Games, Episode 58 – The One About Unpub 4”
  1. MVP Boardgames says:

    Thanks for all the great things you said about Salvation Road and The Last Bastion. It was great meeting you guys and hopefully we will see you at PrezCon. For anyone else interested we have a twitter account now @mvpboardgames and we will have pages for the games at BGG this week.

    Peter

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