I've always wanted to do something weird. Well, not just something generally weird (yes, that too)... but instead I've had the specifically odd concept of creating a game that plays during other games, or even alongside other games. It's not the most original idea, but it's always been a challenge that I wanted to tackle. I've thought of games where you do things in-between turns and in-between other games, but nothing ever felt natural. And I think the key to a weird idea is making it look and feel more natural.  Pretense is an extension of the "game that you play...

We're just wrapped up the 34th episode of Something From Nothing (my 5th episode as a co-host!), and it was a lot of fun. We had special guest Jonathan Gilmour, who you may know from South Park's Dead of Winter, as well as the usual cast of myself, TC Petty III, Jason Slingerland and Chevee Dodd. Tonight's discussion hovered around big moments in gaming, building expansions off of existing framework, strategy in social gaming, text adventure games, and much more. We end with a designer Q&A lightning round, which is always fun.Check out the episode below and you can tune in live on Google...

It's that time of year again. Christmas is this week, yes, but Unpub is about 9 weeks away! EEEEEEK! That's single digit weeks, minus 2 or so for prototyping and dealing with printing issues. (This time every year I have issues keeping ink in my printer). But most importantly it means it's nearing time to settle on some designs. WHAT DO I BRING?!? I'm kind of stumped. I have a few things I'm working on, but I'm mostly working on existing games as usual. The Unidentified Licensed Project takes up a good portion of my week. I've been testing almost...

If there's a convention that I've sworn off, it's Congress of Gamers. It's not even the convention's fault or anyone involved with it. It's simply that it's an expensive drive, at almost $35 in tolls for a 6 hour round trip. Mix that with the traffic ticket that I received in the mail last year, and add the rest stop $3 ATM fee because I THOUGHT $30.00 cash would cover all tolls... and you've got one unhappy Congress member.But what brings me back each year is the Unpub room. This is a small convention, with an even smaller Unpub room. I've barely...

Here's a Kickstarter life lesson for those of you who are having trouble funding, or for anyone in their mid-campaign slump... WHEN ALL ELSE FAILS, POST A CAT PHOTO! I did this, and it worked. Here's the story.My campaign for Alex Strang's Movie Plotz opened to about 25% on its first day and had a few pledges bringing it up to about 35% by the end of day two. I was a little stressed out because I had hoped it would have done better, but at the same time I wasn't too worried because I knew it usually works out by the...