Just Dandy!

Chace Daley

1st Place

Score 8.8333

Finalist

Just Dandy! is a lightweight 2-5 player tile placement game for ages 8+ that takes 20-30 minutes to play. In Just Dandy! you control Dandelions trying to prosper in a world full of looming dangers. Your dream is to reach high in the sky, unveil your flower, and bask in the sun. The player who best accomplishes this wins the game!

5 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

No Captions

Scission

Alexandre Larrain and Elena Marimon Munoz

2nd Place

Score 8.7000

Finalist

Scission is an engine building, last-person-standing battle card game that includes resource allocation mechanics. It is set in a steampunk universe. A game lasts about 45 minutes, and can be played by 2 to 4 people, ages 12 and up. Scission introduces original card racks that hold cards in upright position, revealing partial information about your army to other players. Although highly strategic, it works great for casual play.

22 Page Rules

13 Minute Video

Captioned

Watchsmiths

Robert Fisk

3rd Place

Score 8.5556

Finalist

Watchsmiths is a light engine, worker movement, resource management, action selection game. Players are 18th century Watchsmiths taking actions at different locations working towards creating watches to eventually sell to nobles. Players have 36 hours in order to make as much money as possible and be declared the best Watchsmith. The game plays between 1 and 5 players, ages 10 and up and takes roughly an hour.

13 Page Rules

7 Minute Video

Captioned

Drawing Conclusions

Perry Kleinhenz

4th Place

Score 8.5000

Finalist

Drawing Conclusions is a team based drawing party game. Players are split into two teams and are each given a piece of paper, a crayon and 30 seconds to draw a picture. Then each team gets one chance to guess each player’s drawing. However your opponents are the first ones to guess your drawing, your team only gets a chance to guess if your opponents guess wrong. This makes the game not one of pure artistic skill but of ambiguity, bluffing, deduction and guesswork.

8 Page Rules

6 Minute Video

Captioned

Duwen

Jeremy Lounds

4th Place

Score 8.5000

Finalist

An Aztec ziggurat has been discovered with 5 priceless gems situated at the peak. Can you strategically maneuver your 6 explorers and retrieve the treasure before your rival? To secure a gem, you must push it off the edge of the unique 3D board (which can be changed from game to game). Moving reduces the strength of your explorer, making them vulnerable to being pushed around, so plan carefully! Duwen is an abstract strategy game for 2 players, ages 12 and up, and plays in 15 to 30 minutes.

3 Page Rules

7 Minute Video

Captioned

Nomads: Origin Stories

Piotrek Chojnowski

4th Place

Score 8.5000

Finalist

Nomads takes you on a journey to the beginnings of mankind. Inspired by Yuval Harari's Sapiens, it is an epic experience of human advancement through exploration, discovery and survival. This dice worker-placement game involves area control, player development and skillful interaction with other tribes. Lead your people to inhabit the world around you while forming human DNA, inventing tools, creating art and building shelter along the way. How will you shape humanity's future? (2-4p/2h/10yr+)

22 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

No Captions

Uranus!

Ellie Dix

4th Place

Score 8.5000

Finalist

Catastrophic asteroid attacks are threatening your moon, and those of your neighbours. In this cooperative 'write and erase' network builder, you must optimise the ever-changing landscape of your individual moon and exploit its resources, before the moon is destroyed. Use your asymmetric powers to help your closest allies, for all races must make the journey to Uranus to be saved.

8 Page Rules

14 Minute Video

Captioned

Defenders of Yellowstone

Justin Schroeder

8th Place

Score 8.3333

Every summer, tent-pitching mess-making savages known as humans flock to Yellowstone Park to camp for a few days in the middle of your home. But this year you fight back! Lead some of the park’s smaller denizens to build a three-dimensional fortress at the entrance to one of Yellowstone’s many forests, and then form an alliance with some fiercer animals to occupy this fortress and scare those destructive campers away. Only the most intimidating forest will survive unscathed!

5 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

Captioned

Heading Forward

John duBois

8th Place

Score 8.3333

Heading Forward is a one-player resource management card game that abstracts the process of head injury rehabilitation. Use your brains, spoons, and skills to progress and complete treatment hierarchies and recover before insurance ends your therapy!

5 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

Captioned

Zodiac War

Paul Starr

10th Place

Score 8.0909

Zodiac War is an astrology themed game for 2-6 players taking an hour to play, suitable for ages 8 and up. The astrological theme is unique and uses a full 78-card tarot deck. You choose a zodiac sign and its special ability to attract the faith of people on Earth. Faith is collected by playing tarot cards and rotating the board to align planets and elements with your zodiac sign. Faith buys tarot cards and star crystals. You win the game by illuminating your constellation with 3 star crystals.

6 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

Captioned

Stack World

Drew Krehel & Ed McCreary

11th Place

Score 7.7222

Stack World is a tile based, 4X, competitive legacy game. It provides a uniquely three dimensional, infinitely evolving board state that persist from match to match. 2-4 players compete with the goal of building the greatest dynasty over the many seasons and ages of Stack World. Nations use robust Heroes, industrious Villages, powerful Scripts, and ancient Relics to dominate the forbidden island, sculpting the land for maximum resource and geographic advantage.

25 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

No Captions

Cocubu

Kevin Kotowski

12th Place

Score 7.6364

I love polyominoes, but I love BUILDING polyominoes even more! If you are looking for an original twist on polyomino puzzles, Cocubu delivers.

8 Page Rules

12 Minute Video

Captioned

Braila: City of Progress

Stefan Calin

13th Place

Score 7.5000

Play as aspiring entrepreneurs, expand your businesses, develop, innovate, and grow. Braila: City of Progress is a story-rich euro urban builder. Choose 1 of the 6 unique characters, follow personal goals while collectively writing the city's story with your opponents. The game uses an innovative card activated multi-queue system of public actions. Constant interaction in the public action space along with unique strategies for each character creates a deeply immersive and exciting experience.

29 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

Captioned

Tabula Rasa

Mary Flanagan, Max Seidman, Emma Hobday, Rachel Billings

13th Place

Score 7.5000

Tabula Rasa is a complex “write and fight”, 60-minute strategy game for 2-4 players. Tabula Rasa is played on a map of a region of Minervia printed on a single sheet of paper. The game comes in a book of 100 beautiful maps, and every one is unique - procedurally generated from over 50 different special features! It's ultra-portable: all you need to play is the map book and colored pens. And if you run out of maps in the book, you can use the online generator to print more completely unique maps.

11 Page Rules

7 Minute Video

Captioned

Let Sleeping Giants Lie

Jeff Johnston

15th Place

Score 7.4500

Climbing that mysterious beanstalk seemed like a great idea at the time, but stumbling into the Giants’ yearly feast is a completely different story! Now disguised as servers, you're desperately trying to appease the Giants using logic, timing and unique items to escape with their treasure. Work together to serve up the perfect meals or you’re next on the menu!

5 Page Rules

14 Minute Video

Captioned

Voracious

Adam Singer

16th Place

Score 7.3333

Voracious is a “Speak-and-Write” variant on the Roll-and-Write genre that plays 2-6 players and takes about 25 minutes to play. Players are garden pests with the goal of devouring the entire garden. To do this players will be taking advantage of Grid Movement, Multiple Maps (Garden and Greenhouse), Pattern Building, and Relative Movement to coordinate their swarms and come out on top. Unlike most Roll and Write games, Voracious incorporates player interaction at its core!

8 Page Rules

13 Minute Video

No Captions

Skyrift

Mitchell and Will Brannan

17th Place

Score 7.0556

Skyrift is a competitive, strategy game for 2 players; 1-on-1. It takes about 30-75 minutes to play and is geared for ages 8+. Players will assemble their teams of 4 Meeps, and face off in a battle of the wits against an opponent to conquer the rift. The rift will erupt natural disasters, elevate, and rotate terrain when it is least expected, demanding that strategies remain fluid, making every decision a crucial one.

8 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

No Captions

Rising Waters

Scout Blum

18th Place

Score 6.9500

While most Americans dance the Charleston & drink bootlegged liquor, the Mississippi Delta faces a flood of epic proportions in 1927. If battered river levees collapse, everything important to you will be washed away. Rising Waters is an area control, set collection coop game where players become laborers confronting two powerful & arbitrary forces - landowners and nature. Draw on hidden strength like your family, church, culture, and migration. Can you manage the rising waters to stay alive?

13 Page Rules

15 Minute Video

Captioned

The Restorers

Amy Price

19th Place

Score 6.4000

Sure, you can fix the Mona Lisa...but are you a team player? In The Restorers, you play a conservator of works on canvas at a large museum where technical proficiency is only part of how you get ahead. This mid-weight game of opportunity management supports 2-5 players 14+ and finishes in about 1.5 hrs.

15 Page Rules

14 Minute Video

No Captions

Scoinga

Justin Bari

20th Place

Score 6.2778

How fast can you count? It may seem easy enough to trip along with good guesses, but how much will you press your luck? And how much will you save for the end? Before long, you'll be seeing dots until it drives you mad. You may get really close, or you may get a Scoinga!

5 Page Rules

9 Minute Video

No Captions