Cardboard Edison's Favorite Tips & Resources - October 2016

This month's roundup of our favorite board game design links includes a pair of interviews with self-published designers, some exciting uses for industry data, rulebook writing advice and more.

featured:

• The Process: Pleasant Dreams by Aerjen Tamminga

• Meaningful Decisions: Gil Hova on Design Choices in The Networks

industry:

• Why it's so difficult to be a full-time tabletop game designer: a fascinating analysis using the Cardboard Edison board game licensing reports

theory:

• How endgame and win conditions can affect the player experience (audio)

• 10 degrees of player interaction in board games (video)

rules:

• Ten best practices for improving the structure, style and clarity of your rulebook (audio)

playtesting:

• How to weigh feedback from different sources, depending on your goals

• “The single biggest thing you can do to be more productive is to reduce the time between your playtests. Play your games a LOT.” - Ben Pinchback

process:

• “Try to understand the market space. From that, identify who will love your product (game). Optimize for them.” - Grant Rodiek

publishing:

• How to run a board game Kickstarter (audio)

• Situations you will face shipping a tabletop game project (audio)

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ADVISERS: Peter C. Hayward, Aaron Vanderbeek

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