Thousand Year Game Design Challenge - June Update

The Thousand-Year Game Design Challenge
It was another fruitful month for the challenge, with a very special guest now in the running. But first, some news: The deadline for entry is extended to August 31st. Hope to see you at GenCon and I look forward to showing off some of the entries so far.

Take-Back-Toe by James Ernest
Veteran game designer James Ernest submits this entry that actually doesn't have much in common with tic tac toe. It's more like a dice-driven mancala, with an elegant tension of constrained choices. The game suggests using poker chips on a mouse board, but you can play this with rocks or via forum post.

Antipode by Shane Hendrickson
Much like the classic game Hex, your goal is to connect two sides of the board. The twist is that the tiles are double-sided, as in Reversi/Othello. If your pawn passes over an opponent's tile, it flips to your color. Interesting mix of two well-loved abstract games. Usually those mashups don't fare well, but I think this one has strong potential.

Charing Cross by Mike C
In the tradition of many great games, Mike enters a chess variant that's actually a little more like Chinese Checkers. Each player has two pairs of chess pieces starting from two sides of a chess board, trying to reach their opposing side. I can immediately see the tension here. Interesting!

Saaguan by Andrew Cooke
With touches of Robo Rally, this game offers some more complex gameplay than the average 2p abstract. Robots move about the field, blasting each other with beams. Check out his automated and animated demo, too. Very cool.

Mint by Graham Walmsley
Graham actually withdrew this entry after some people told him they played a very similar game in school, but I'm putting it up here as sort of an honorable mention. With a bit of hacking and tweaking, the basic mechanics can still be used to create an interesting new game and I hope Graham submits a revised entry. Get on it, Graham! :)

Past Entries:
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» March: (No entries)
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