Flatout Games is a board game design collaborative that was founded in 2017 by Molly Johnson, Robert Melvin, and Shawn Stankewich. They are “focused on creating innovative and elegant game experiences” and “love puzzly games with simple rules, high replayability, and great tension and decision-making, typically with low-luck, high-skill euro-style mechanisms.” 

As a design collaborative, they have several published designs, including the 2018 Cardboard Edison and LUCI award finalist Point Salad (AEG), Public Market (Talon Strikes Studios), Dollars to Donuts (Crafty Games), Abstract Academy (Crafty Games), Truffle Shuffle (AEG), and TEN (AEG).

In early 2019 Flatout Games created The Flatout Games CoLab, allowing the founding members of Flatout Games to team up with established and emerging designers in the board game industry and make games together. The CoLab has published Calico and Cascadia, and is currently working on publishing Verdant.

Eric:

• Point Salad
• Public Market
• Dollars to Donuts
• TEN
• Calico
• Cascadia
• Verdant

Patrick

• Point Salad
• TEN
• Calico
• Cascadia
• Verdant

Verdant Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/flatoutgames/verdant

Online solo play here:

Cascadia: https://cascadiagame.github.io/

Verdant: https://verdantgame.github.io/

Beth Sobel kickstarter

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bethsobel/river-and-stone-playing-cards

Recorded 9/12

Discussion

Inka / Marcus Brand - Married couple, won Kennerspiel des Jahres for the Exit series

Patrick

• La Boca
• Village - take actions - take time, when you cross the time track someone dies and they go into the book of the villagers or anonymous graves
• Rajas
• Exit series
• Orleans: Invasion (with Reinr Stockhausen) - Invasion co-op and prosperity scenario (other stuff in box too)
• Murano - glass factories of Venice and gondoliers moving around the outside of the board in a rondel like mechanism
• Word Slam
• Noch Mal (Encore) roll and write 

Eric

• Rajas of the Ganges
• Rajas: Dice Charmers
• La Boca
• Word Slam
• Exit series (some with Ralph Querfurth)

Other notable games:

• Saint Malo (roll-and-write)
• Rise of Queensdale (legacy/campaign)

Available online (all on Yucata):

• Rajas of the Ganges
• Rajas: Dice Charmers
• Murano
• Noch Mal app

@overthehillier

@ericbuscemi   

Punchboardmedia.com

Recorded 7/31/2021

BGA:

• Dice Hospital

In Person Gaming: (New games to Patrick/Eric in bold)

Patrick

Work Lunch Games

• Dex games, since we couldn't play those on line — Meeple Circus, Junk Art
• Pandemic: The Cure
• Mama Mia

Game Night Light

• Just One
• Wits and Wagers: Vegas

 D20  

• Imperium (Not good with four players)
• Glory to Rome
• Krass Kariert (Available as Dealt!)
• Adrenaline

4th of July meetup

• Century
• Sagrada
• King of Tokyo
• Horrified

Eric

CraigCon - Day One

• Marvel United
• Miyabi
• 7 Wonders
• Skull King
• Dead Man’s Draw
• Diamant (Available as Incan Gold)
• Bullet♥︎
• Fantasy Realms

CraigCon - Day Two

• Air, Land, & Sea
• Unmatched: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
• Old West Empresario
• Era: Medieval Age
• Dune: Imperium
• Brew
• Cubitos
• Nidavellir
• Pairs

CraigCon - Day Three

• Paleo

Part two of the episode discussing favorite themes and games that may or may not align with that theme.

Treasure Hunting 

• Fortune and Glory 
• Karuba 
• Artifacts Inc. 
• Lost Ruins of Arnak 
• Fireball Island 
• Fireball Island: The Curse of Vul-Kar
• Tobago
• The Adventurers: The Temple of Chac
• The Adventurers: Pyramid of Horus
• Thebes
• Luxor
• Deckscape: The Mystery of Eldorado

Heists

• Burgle Bros 
• Burgle Bros 2
• Deckscape: Heist in Venice
• Caper
• The Mansky Caper 
• Cash and Guns?

Steampunk

• Spyrium
• Steampunk Rally
• Mission Red Planet
• Scythe
• City of Gears
• Quicksilver/Kings of Air and Steam/Aether Captains

@overthehillier

@ericbuscemi

@punchboardmedia

Patrick and Eric discuss their three favorite themes in game. This is the start of a series since they ran out of time covering three categories.

• Amusement Parks
  • Dinosaur Island - David Gilmore, Brian Lewis/Pandasaurus 
  • Steam Park Aureliano Buonfino, Lorenzo Silva,
  • Lorenzo Tucci Sorrentino / Cranio Creations
  • Unfair - Joel Finch / CMON
  • Arcadia - Greg Bush, Phil R. Chase / APE games
  • Coaster Park - Scott Almes / Pandasaurus Games
  • Grand Carnival - Rob Cramer / Uproarious Games  

• City building / planning
  • Suburbia - Ted Alspach / Bezier
  • Urban Sprawl - Chad Jensen / GMT
  • Cities: Skylines – The Board Game
  • High Rise - Gil Hova / Formal Ferret
  • Sprawlopolis - Steven Aramini, Danny Devine, Paul Kluka / Button Shy
  • Quadropolis - François Gandon / DOW
  • Cloud City - Phil Walker-Harding / blue orange
  • Bloom town - Asger Harding Granerud, Daniel Skjold Pedersen / Sidekick games
  • Welcome to Centerville - Chad Jenson / GMT

• Civilization Building 
  • Advanced Civ Lauren Banerd, Jim Eliason, Jeff Groteboer, Bruce Harper + 6 more / Avalon Hill
  • Mega Civ - Flo de Haan, John Rodriguez, Francis Tresham / 999 Games
  • Through the Ages - Vlaada Chvátil / CGE
  • Sid Meier's Civilization: The Board Game - Kevin Wilson / Fantasy Flight
  • Civilization: A New Dawn - James Kniffen / Fantasy Flight
  • The Golden Ages - Luigi Ferrini / Quined Games
  • Tapestry - Jamey Stegmaier / Stonemaier

     

    @overthehillier

    @ericbusemi

    punchboardmedia.com

After the following tweet by Bruno Faduti and the backlash on twitter…..

Patrick and Eric decided to have a discussion about drinking at conventions and their thoughts and experiences.

Breakfasts at Conventions

Tim Viring @tim_virnig (Patrick went with Tim and Asdruval Cifuentes @retroboardgamer the name I forgot on the podcast - Patrick)

Since recording Faduti has posted a response on his blog here.

Patrick @overthehillier

Eric @ericbuscemi

Punchboardmedia.com

As part of their favorite designer series Patrick and Eric this time chose to discuss Friedemann Friese.

Patrick

• Power Grid
• Power Grid Cards
• Power Grid Factory Manager
• Fauna
• Friday
• Copy Cat  deck-building, worker-placement, drafting race game.
• 504 
• Fabled Fruit

Eric

• Power Grid
• Fauna 
• Friday
• Fuji Flush
• Folder

Episode 36

Patrick and Eric discuss "Abstract Games"

“Abstract” from BGG:

"Abstract game" often refers to games of perfect information with alternating turns and no randomness; usually for 2 players. e.g. Chess or Go.

It is also often used to refer to a game without a theme (regardless of the game mechanics). E.g. Backgammon or Tantrix.

It is also often used to refer to games that are "mostly" perfect information and "mostly" lacking in theme (leading to even more confusion and disagreement about whether a given game is an "abstract game" or not).

Classics:

• Checkers
• Chess
• Xiangqi
• Go
• Mancala
• Reversi/Othello (1883)

Modern:

• Gipf Series (Gipf, Yinch, etc)
• Shobu
• Canosa
• Tak
• Blokus
• Amazons
• Onitama
• Quoridor 
• Quarto
• Quantik

Abstracts with Theme:

• Battle Sheep
• Patchwork
• Hive
• Santorini

Abstracts with Luck:

• Backgammon
• Nova Luna
• Qwirkle
• Number 9
• Ingenious

Abstracts with Theme and Luck:

• Azul and sequels
• War Chest
• The Duke
• Calico
• Seikatsu

Episode 35

Patrick and Eric discuss favorite Racing Games

They start up talking about growing up watching real racing.

Long Shot: The Dice Game 

Long Shot the Original

Camel Cup

Mint Julep

Snow Tails

Formula D

Downforce

Automobiles

Rallyman/Rallyman GT

Thunder Alley

PitchCar

Wacky Races

Power Boats (remade as Powerships)

Jamaica

Flamme Rouge

Steampunk Rally

Quicksilver (balloons)

Missippi Queen (steam paddleboats)

Oden’s Ravens

Granite Game Summit show 3/13/21 at 11:00am 

http://www.granitegamesummit.com/

@overthehillier

@ericbuscemi

punchboardmedia.com

Patrick & Eric in the Morning Episode #34 - Catching Up

Recorded Sunday 1/24

Recent Plays:

• Deckscape - Escape from Alacatraz
• Burgle Bros 2 
• The Search For Planet X
• Three sisters - see notes below
• Underwater Cities - yucata
• Longhorn
• Elfenland (Bga)
• Letter Tycoon 
• Near and Far
• Takenoko (Pandas)  

 BGA Update:

• Carcassone Hunters and Gatherers
• Alhambra
• No Thanks
• Rolled West  
• Paris Connection
• Claim It - Yucata

Granite Game Summit 2021 - VIRTUAL

Patrick & Eric in the Morning - Live Show Saturday 3/13/2021 - Cartographers and maybe other roll and writes.

https://www.granitegamesummit.com/

Three Sisters is a strategic roll and write from designers Matt Riddle and Ben Pinchback.

Three Sisters is a backyard farming roll and write. Three Sisters is named after the Indigenous agricultural technique that is still widely used today. Three different crops—in this case, pumpkins, corn, and beans—are planted close together. Corn provides a lattice for beans to climb. The beans bring in nitrogen from the air into the soil, and the squash provides a natural mulch ground cover helping to reduce weeds and keep pests away.

The player sheets have several areas: Your field, divided into six zones, each containing the three crop types, and various other areas related to additional actions you can take: Fruits and flowers, beehives, and a shed with tools that have special abilities. 

All the crops, fruits, flowers, and hives are represented by mini-tracks. The areas are interconnected to other elements in the game, giving you bonuses along the way. Many crops generate goods that are used to unlock bonus actions. Advancing on all of these tracks offers various amounts of points, advancements, and bonuses.

So basically combo driven roll and write that is a spiritual successor to Fleet Dice coming to KS March 9.

A sort of Patrick & Eric in the Morning episode - but this episode we invited on Charles from the Things of No Interest Blog to discuss the 31 games released on Board Game Arena during the month of December.

12/01: Thurn & Taxis, from Andreas Seyfarth & Karen Seyfarth, 2006 Spiel des Jahres

12/02: Welcome to… / Welcome to New Vegas, from Alexis Allard & Benoît Tupin

12/03: 99, public domain

12/04: Flaming Pyramids, designed by Norbert Abel

12/05: Small Islands, designed by Alexis Allard

12/06: Map Maker, designed by Louis Lafair, Joshua Lafair, Becca Lafair

12/07: Solo Whist, public domain

12/08: Kami, adapted from Goïta Shogi

12/09: Luxor, from Rüdiger Dorn, 2018 Spiel des Jahres nominee

12/10: Hungarian Tarokk, public domain

12/11: Cacao, from Phil Walker-Harding, 2015 Spiel des Jahres Recommended

12/12: Piraten Kapern, from Haim Shafir

12/13: Off the Rails, from Andrew Platt, Stuart Platt

12/14: Connect 6, from Professor I-Chen Wu

12/15: Spades, public domain

12/16: Saint Petersburg, from Bernd Brunnhofer, 2004 Spiel des Jahres Nominee

12/17: Cribbage, from Sir John Suckling

12/18: Yokai, from Julien Griffon

12/19: Quantik, from Nouri Khalifa, from Gigamic’s Classic game line

12/20: Nanga Parbat, from Steve Finn

12/21: Oh-Seven, from Alex Weldon

12/22: Bandido, from Martin Nedergaard Andersen

12/23: Concept, from Gaëtan Beaujannot & Alain Rivollet, 2014 SdJ Nominee

12/24: Haiclue, from Will Leaf

12/25: Via Magica, from Paolo Mori, reimplementation of Rise of Augustus

12/26: Martian Dice, from Scott Almes

12/27: Dungeon Roll, from Chris Darden

12/28: Con Sonar!, from Christian Boutin

12/29: Big Time Soccer, from Andrew S. Fischer

12/30: Forbidden Island, from Matt Leacock, 2011 Spiel des Jahres Nominee

12/31: Klaverjassen, public domain

@BoardGameArena

Patrick Hillier @overthehillier

Eric Buscemi @EricBuscemi

Charles Hasegwa @charleshasegawa