By Paco Garcia Jaen

Not very often one has the opportunity to host a panel with one of the most successful game designers of the moment and, judging by the stellar success of X-Win, Jay Little is, without a doubt, extremely successful.

But since that’s not all he’s done, by any stretch of the imagination, this seminar also covers other games he’s developed and turned into terrific products.

For starters the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying Game 3rd Edition. Undoubtedly one of the biggest successes of this game has been to get a totally different set of mechanics but manage to retain the feel of the Warhammer universe. With a gorgeously produced product line, this is a must have for any WHFRPG fan.

Blood Bowl Team Manager. Another product that indeed succeeds in capturing the spirit of a much loved game, re-hash it, turn it into something different and yet satisfy.

And then there are X-Win and the Star Wars RPG. But I won’t go into these because they’re covered *extensively* in the talk!

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By Paco Garcia Jaen

Organising seminars at conventions is hard work, though they’re also tremendous fun and, when one has the privilege of sharing the space with personalities like the ones in this seminar, it becomes a joy.

This seminar takes four influential names in the board and role playing games industry and puts them in touch with the public, answer questions and and challenge views you didn’t know were there.

Larry Roznai is the president of Mayfair games. Publishers of Settles of Catan, it is probably the best known gate-way game and one of the best sold games of the last two decades. Personally, I can’t wait to see it overtake Monopoly in sales!

Dominic McDowel is the CEO of Cubicle 7, one of the biggest publishers of RPGs with titles under his belt like the Dr Who: Adventures in Time and Space game, the Dr Who Card Game, Primeval, Victoriana, Airship Pirates, Kuro and many, many others.

Mark Wotton is… well… for me he is the President of All Things Cool at Alderac Entertainment Group. In reality, though, he is the Director of Company Development for the company. May not sound as cool as the title I gave him, but is still quite impressive!

Andrew Hackard, from Steve Jackson Games, is the line developer for the Munchkin Line, which means he’s one of the responsible people to ensure all those lovely expansions are really good fun to play and keep coming!

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The first episode of the interviews we recorded at Salute 2013. Bit later than we would have wanted, but here they are.

Interviews with:
Aquilifer Miniatures (https://www.facebook.com/aquilifer.miniatures?fref=ts)
Gaming Club Network (http://www.gamingclubnetwork.co.uk/)
Leisure Games (http://www.leisuregames.com/)
Fenris Games (http://www.fenrisgames.com/)

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Another Spanish game that caught my eye and did it with good reasons. It has exploration, lovely artwork, it’s very thematic and it comes from GenX in Spain, a company that has delivered some truly impressive titles in the past.

The Northwest Passage is a sea route that lies between northern Canada and the North Pole, joining the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. The first expeditions took place after the discovery of America due to the need of the English to connect both coasts of the Americas to avoid edging the whole continent. However, it was not until the beginning of the 20th century when the adventurous spirit of sailors led them to discover this passage.

The goal of Northwest Passage Adventure – a game of strategy and wit based on a historical adventure, with a playing time of ten minutes per player – is simple: Be the first to discover the Northwest Passage with the help of nothing more than your ship and your ingenuity. We’ll have to go tracing the most favourable route as the scenario takes shape, always 4-row vision. We will have to manage wisely our progress chips and exploit our character ability. We will also have the help of the treasures that we will find on the way. The player that crosses first the last row, row 24, wins.

Like everything GenX does, this game is bilingual, so instructions and cards are all in Spanish and English. No excuse not to get it.

But is the money you pay for this game worth it? Let’s take a look!

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I haven’t really done any videos in my native language before. I realise most of you reading my website are of English-speaking countries and thus not every one will be able to understand me in Spanish.

But since this product is Spanish, it will be seen in Spain, you probably like to have an excuse to learn some Spanish and my Spanish is better than my English, I thought I’d make an exception with this one.

And the captions are hilarious!

Amigos, por primera vez, presento uno de nuestros videos en Espanyol.

Las cajas de juegos de Las Aventuras en La Marca del Este han tenido un exito rotundo dentro de las fronteras Hispanas. Sin lugar a dudas se han convertido en el estandarte de los juegos al la “antigua usanza” dentro de nuestro pais y, si se conocieran en el extranjero, probablemente tambien arrasarian.

La intencion de este video no es la de resenyar lo bueno o malo que es el juego, sino lo buena o mala que es la produccion y daros una idea de si el dinero que os teneis que gastar para obtener esta caja merece la pena.

Espero que lo disfruteis!

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If you had the privilege of living near Snowdonia, you’d know it is a place that’s beautiful, beguiling, and deeply inspiring. You’d also know it’s a tough environment with mist, cold winters, rain more often than not and its own train line. All the way to the top.

For centuries, Snowdonia has inspired all sorts of artists, from the Bronte Sisters (I think) to Tolkien (don’t quote me on that one) to Turner (that one deffo! I mean, that man was inspired by anything… look at how many things he painted!), and now it has inspired another kind of artist, one under the name of Tony Boydell.

His company name, Surprised Stare Games, sprouted after reading what I just said about him in the paragraph above, and it has retro-actively been producing games for the last few years. And jolly good games they are!

Snowdownia is an Euro game in which players compete to carry out the construction of the railway that goes from the bottom of the mountain to the very top. Managing your resources and keeping an eye on the weather is quite an important part of this game indeed!

So, coming from a small company and with a theme that’s both as inspired as it is quirky, and considering that most people haven’t heard of Snowdownia the place before, is the money you have to pay to get your hands on this game worth it?

Let’s take a look!