2017 Judges

Phil is a board and card game designer from Sydney, Australia. His published games include Sushi Go!, Imhotep, Cacao, and Archaeology: The New Expedition. After publishing his own games from 2007 to 2014, he is now focusing entirely on designing. He has recently enjoyed working with some great publishers all around the world, including Kosmos, Gamewright, Z-Man Games, Abacusspiele and Wizkids.

Chris Kirkman is the founder of Dice Hate Me Games, and is currently the Game Development Director at Greater Than Games where he finds awesome games and makes them awesomer. He enjoys podcasting, whiskey, and games with camels.

Curt Covert is the owner of Smirk & Dagger Games. A veteran of 13 years, his designs include Cutthroat Caverns, Nevermore, and Hex Hex. He is also the inventor behind Crayola 3-D Outdoor Sidewalk Chalk, which won Game Of The Year at NY Toy Fair in 2009.

Randy Hoyt is owner and game producer at Foxtrot Games, publisher of Lanterns: The Harvest Festival, World's Fair 1893, and more. By day, he works as a developer at an enterprise software company, writing JavaScript and other web languages.

Game and a Curry started off as a game review blog in 2013. They are now focused on providing aid to advertising and crowdfunding campaigns for game designers via merchandise, videos and networking events. They also produce YouTube videos whenever they get the chance so you can watch the duo's snarky comments in interviews (with board game and other designers) and vlogs. GaaC is composed of Banana Chan and Herb Ferman. 

Burke Drew is a software engineer, political junkie and board game designer/player/hoarder. He is a member of the Game Designers of North Carolina.

Nicole Kline is one half of Cardboard Fortress Games. The duo make games in their spare time in Philadelphia.

Zintis May is a game designer who enjoys bringing people together over innovative and challenging games. His recent projects include Huts, Cave Paintings, and Wise Guys & Lies. He currently works as a web developer.

Ben Begeal is not a game designer. He came up with the idea for 'Say What Again' but a bunch of real designers helped make it good. He develops games with Button Shy Games. He is no one of consequence.

Rob and Sean Moore have been making board game instructional/review videos for a little over a year now as Overly Critical Gamers. They also run a Tumblr where they committed to post written reviews with photos every day of 2016. Sean sometimes works with a local game designer to playtest games, so he's no stranger to reading rules for an unfinished product and offering feedback.

Shari Spiro is the founder of Ad Magic / Breaking Games, printer of Cards Against Humanity and Exploding Kittens, and publisher of games like Game of Phones and Game of 49.

Matt Fantastic makes games. He currently does consulting on all manner of game projects, handling manufacturing, prepress, logistics, and whatever else needs doing. He also publishes weirdo indie stuff as Prettiest Princess Games, designs games for other publishers, owns a game cafe (Elm City Games in New Haven, CT), talks too much about games to whoever will listen, organizes designer events, and loves unicorns & weed. If you see him around, you should totally buy him a beer.

I cut gaming teeth on classic board and trick taking games, but continually felt obligated to modify them and/or create house rules. While I have dabbled in game design, the title being a published game designer remains a mirage on the horizon.  In 1987 I was introduced to Settlers, and after living 4 years in Germany, I was forever hooked on Euros.  I truly love playing games, be it an abstract, a euro or a highly themed Amerithrash.  While winning is certainly important, it the experience of playing a game with those who share my passion which I find the most rewarding.  Gloaters and whiners are the bane of the hobby.  I feel that in this era of ever social distancing brought on (in part) by social media masquerading as legitimate relationships, tabletop games create a unique space for people to interact as humans (even if they are playing zombies spreading fresh brains on toast).   

AJ Porfirio is the President of Van Ryder Games, a company he founded back in 2011. AJ grew up playing all kinds of games from sports to tabletop. He has designed two games and tends to design with solitaire play in mind. So far Van Ryder Games has published 5 games including Cardboard Edison's first published game, Tessen.

Tim is a game designer and publisher as part of Galileo Games. He’s got a special fondness for two-player games and terrible puns. He spends his spare time making dice birds to torment Chris Kirkman.

Doug Levandowski is a game designer and occasional reviewer on The Nerds' Table. He's the designer of You're Fired! and has co-designed Gothic Doctor and UnPub: The UnPublished Game. Currently, he's working on mostly RPGs, including Seven Minutes in Hell and Uncanny, both scheduled for release in 2017. When he isn't designing games, he co-organizes North East Nerd Night, a monthly board gaming charity event. When he isn't doing either of those things, he's teaching truly amazing literature to a bunch of truly amazing high schoolers or grading their papers.

Jordan and Mandy Goddard are a husband/wife game design duo. What started as a love for playing games together led to a passion for game design. They self-published their first game, Collapse, together in 2014 and released Lotus with Renegade Game Studios in 2016.

Australian judge Peter C. Hayward is an Australian game designer/author from Australia. He was born Down Under (Australia) and now lives in Canada*.

*not Australia. It's confusing, we know.

Tam Myaing is an artist, engineer, entrepreneur, and game designer. He has been creating digital and board games since age 10 and is the founder of Wee Big Games and Neuronic Games. @TamAtPlay

Dan Cassar's first game, Cavemen: The Quest for Fire, was published in 2012 by Rio Grande Games, and his second, Arboretum, published in 2015 by Z-Man Games, was nominated for two Golden Geek awards. His third game, The Blood of an Englishman, won the 2016 Cardboard Edison Award for best unpublished game and was published that same year by Renegade Game Studios.

Dirk is a social futurist and game designer. His most recent release is Einstein, and he is currently working on Chronicles: Origins, Solium Infernum, and an Einstein expansion.

Husband. Father. Technical Professional. Board Game Player/Collector. Board Game Designer/Publisher.

Eric Cesare and Anthony Rando are the masterminds behind the game design company Devious Devices, which published a party game, Epic Picnic, in 2014 and designed the forthcoming Sharknado: The Board Game! They both live in PA, occasionally wear sharks on their heads, and are frequently mistaken for each other.

Diane Sauer owns a business restoring old pinball machines, and is a game designer and co-owner of Shoot Again Games.

Nick Sauer is a scientist and game designer, and has a collection of close to 3000 games. He is co-owner of Shoot Again Games.

Ian Zang works by day creating allegedly fun professional development works at the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh. By night, he works in the hobby game industry as a developer, making great games even greater! He is also one-third of the podcasting team behind Breaking into Board Games. 

JR Honeycutt is a game designer and developer who lives in Ft. Worth, TX. His work includes published co-designs Unpub: The Unpublished Card Game, Food Truck Destruction Derby, and Fantasy Fantasy Baseball. His development credits include legacy games SeaFall and Charterstone, as well as the Chronicles series and Tesla vs. Edison: Powering Up. JR runs the community organization DFW Nerd Night and hosts The Nerd Nighters twitch stream and JR Plays podcast.

Dave is a venerable member of the tabletop gaming industry, with over 10 years experience in advertising, demoing, designing, playtesting, and proofing various designs and concepts.  Dave's current focus is his YouTube channel, Gamers on Games, which focuses exclusively on tabletop gaming and adjacent topics. Madalyn is big into board games and card games since her introduction in 2007.  Her industry experience includes convention volunteering and running demonstrations for designers.

Scott is an amateur game designer and spent a number of years as a youth worker using games to build relationships with the younger generation. His interest is in how games bring people together.

Daniel Newman is a game designer from Brooklyn, NY. His game Enemy Anemone was a finalist in the inaugural Cardboard Edison Award. His first published game, Ahead in the Clouds from Button Shy Games, was successfully funded on Kickstarter in October 2016.

Erik Herrington is a web engineer by day, indie game designer by night and has been active in the game designer's world for the last five years. Soon, you will know his works. Now you will face his judgement.

Brian Frahm (@Frahminator) has been a tabletop enthusiast since 2011. From Carcassonne to Arkwright, he loves to learn/teach/play games with family & friends. Brian is a fan of the hobby and looks forward to doing what he can in promoting its growth and health.

Lauren Woolsey is a co-founder of CGS Unit, a company whose goal is to "share our love of Crafts, Games, and Science with the world!" She has designed three games, and the first two are science-themed games that have been featured in the Boston Festival of Games Tabletop Showcase: Stars, Inc (in 2014) and Amino (in 2015). Her latest game brings crafts and games together in a card game called Match Quilt, and is licensed with Dice Hate Me Games. She earned her doctorate in astrophysics from Harvard in May 2016 and is currently and Assistant Professor in the physical sciences department at Grand Rapids Community College

Dr. Wictz - bringing you academic inspired articles disguised as practical advice for board game design since 2012.  Read more and learn about our game designs at dr.wictz.com.

Kevin Brusky is the force behind APE Games, a board and card game publishing company, since 1997. APE has published such games as Rolling Freight, Spirits of the Rice Paddy, Order of the Stick, The Great Dinosaur Rush, and Trickerion. 

Geoffrey Engelstein is the designer of several tabletop games, including The Ares Project, the Space Cadets series, The Dragon & Flagon, The Fog of War, and more. He is the host of Ludology, a biweekly podcast about game design in its fifth year, and a ten-year contributor to the Dice Tower podcast with his biweekly GameTek segments discussing the math, science, and psychology of games.

Matt Wolfe is the designer of Wombat Rescue and Avalanche at Yeti Mountain. He founded the Game Designers of North Carolina and assures everyone he'll one day design a game without a strange creature in it.

Andrew is the founder of Knapsack Games and designer of Apotheca and Knee Jerk. Follow him on Twitter @knapsackgames.

Jay Treat designed Merchants of Araby, Cunning Folk, Legacy of the Slayer, and two games expected in 2017: Cahoots, and Very Busy Business Person (in partnership with Chris Zinsli).

Anthony Racano is the host of The Cardboard Jungle Podcast and an avid gamer. He is not afraid to say what he truly feels about a game and lives by the mantra that "Friends tell friends their games suck."

Charles plays, studies, teaches, designs, and compulsively buys tabletop games! He currently develops games for Foxtrot Games and teaches tabletop game design at a local high school. 

Steven Cole is both a game designer and game publisher. He is the owner of Escape Velocity Games and, of course, dozens of unfinished prototypes. He is a member of Table Treasure Games and is slowly getting the Baltimore Boardgame Design Group up and running. He can be found on Twitter @SteveOnGames.

Gil Hova is a game designer and publisher living in Jersey City, New Jersey. He has designed everything from word games to strategy games to party games. His games have raised almost $150,000 on Kickstarter to date, including The Networks, a strategy game about running your own television network.

Allysha & Kevin are the Canadian game design duo behind the Dancing Giant Games blog and Play & Pub tabletop prototype convention.

Tim is a local to Boston and has been involved in the tabletop game design community for some time. In addition to running and designing for Gameworthy Labs, he is the Vice President for BostonFIG, New England’s largest Indie Game Festival, where he runs the tabletop showcase. Tim is also the President of the Boston Game Maker’s Guild, as well as a judge for IndieCade. Tim is active in the game design community and has spoken on a number of panels, appeared on podcasts, and has written a number of articles, all pertaining to game design.

3rd Generation Nerd. Long-time board game enthusiast, aspiring board game designer. EHS professional, amateur absent-minded professor.

Ryan is the founding editor of The Cardboard Republic, a site with an analytical approach to game reviews and a soft spot for indie games.

Nate Murray manages the Games Vertical for Indiegogo. He is also a game designer, and air hockey enthusiast. Nate claims Duke.

David is a passionate board game enthusiast, euro game evangelist, and budding game designer. He recently finished designing the Automa for Scythe: Invaders from Afar. He's currently working a variety of other projects with his design partner, Morten Monrad Pedersen, including the expansion for Euphoria and Automas for far too many amazing 2017 releases. He loves helping designers make their designs better.

Chris and Suzanne Zinsli are the founders of Cardboard Edison. They are bloggers and advocates for the board game design community. As designers, their published and soon-to-be-published titles include Tessen, Dubai and Sultana. Most recently they have turned to publishing with their first title, Cobras.