These well-tested prototypes are available to publish. If you are an interested publisher, please reach out for further discussion!
2-5 players, 10-30 minutes, ages 8+
75 cards, 55 coins
In each turn of BUZZ OFF!, the active player draws a damage card, which threatens the rest of the group UNLESS they can bribe the active player to take the damage instead. They collectively offer some coins (show-of-fingers); the active player can accept and take the damage or tell the others to "BUZZ OFF" and they must take the damage instead. Score points at the end for cards you've managed to keep and coins you've kept or acquired. Quick-playing, with everyone involved in every turn. Lively and tense, full of doublethink.
2-5 players, 20-60 minutes, ages 10+
3 boards (mats), 80 tiles, 70 cards, 15 tokens, 5 screens, 5 pawns, 35 cubes, 1 die.
In STORYLANDS, we are each writing a hero's journey story, and creating lands in which that story could be set. We each build a row of journey cards, representing the locales our hero will visit (e.g. "the haunted forest", "the abandoned castle"), and place tiles onto three central mats to create three storylands. While doing this, we vote on which land will be the true storyland. Turns are quick and simple: place a tile, then cast a vote or add a card to your story row. Then, at game's end we move our heroes through the chosen storyland, telling our stories and scoring points for the journey cards that we're able to visit. The dynamism of building-writing-voting leads to agonizing risk management decisions in the first phase, and the journey phase naturally encourages creativity and playfulness as the players tell their heroes' stories, turning what can often be the driest part of a game -- adding up the scores -- into the liveliest and most entertaining.
3-5 players, 60 minutes, ages 10+
1 board, 5 mats, 110 cards, 70 wood pieces, 28 cubes, 2 pawns, 35 discs, 60 coins
In THE REFORMATION, pass action cards to your opponents and use the cards you're passed, to add buildings to territories, increase the value of those territories, and levy points, prestige, and wealth from them. Cards of yours selected by your opponents earn you coins, which you can use to bid on valuable power cards. Prestige helps advance your side in the nascent Reformation. Score points for majority control in the most valuable territories, for acquiring valuable power cards, and for backing the right side in the Reformation. A game that requires a delicate balance between helping your opponents enough but not too much!
1-4 players, 15-45 minutes, ages 10+
1 board, 40 discs, 54 cards, 2 pawns, 16 cubes, 8 tokens
In LANDFALL, we are placing bets on where hurricanes will make landfall along the eastern U.S. coast. (Why? Perhaps we are relief agencies, or rival weathercasters, or perhaps greedy profiteers). Each time a new hurricane spawns, players make an initial bet by placing two cubes along the coast, signifying where they think the hurricane might land. Then, the hurricane moves via the "disc-drift" system, whereby the tail of the next disc is aligned with the tip of the previous disc, according to a randomly-drawn card. Players can adjust a cube each time to try to make their prediction more accurate. When the hurricane makes landfall, players receive more points the bigger the hurricane's category, and the more precise their bet. After 12 hurricanes, the player with the most points is the winner!
3-4 players, 30 minutes, ages 10+
66 cards, 57 tokens, 4 tiles
In MAGIC LAMP, the active player makes a wish of the lamp. Will you wish for wealth, health, enjoyment? The other players function as the genies of the lamp; each offers a response card, these are shuffled, and one is chosen, which gives the lamp's response. Perhaps your wish is granted, perhaps you will become cursed, perhaps you'll receive the opposite of your wish!
After each of two rounds of three wishes, players score points for tokens they hold and for majority in the different suits. The player with the most points wins!