The Antibyss Remark – No. 015

Prototypes/Crowdfunding Projects to keep an eye on:

Monster Gunslingers the Game (J. Liu) – this project will be going live on Kickstarter on August 16th! This is a quick and fast paced twist on Texas Hold’em based in the Weird West universe from KC Grifant. The designer J. Liu is also located in San Diego, and there will be a fun launch party for locals!

Omega: The Dome (2CBJ Studios) – this project is live on Gamefound until August 31st! This is a betting and bluffing game where bet on the outcome of these cosmic gladiatorial competitions while you play cards to influence the outcome of the fight. This game looks fun, has a lot of style, and is being brought to life by a passionate small team.

Rosalie (Uchibacoya) – this project is live on Kickstarter until August 21st! This game is a heavyweight euro style game about managing your own rose garden. The game has a lot of detail from the mechanics to the art, and it looks like it will be a very rewarding experience for those willing to give it a chance.

Games we were playing this month:

Ark Nova (Capstone Games) – Whenever we have the time for a long board game (3-4 hrs), this one is always in contention. With every card being unique, I never feel like I’m playing the same game twice, and I find the crossing score trackers, of appeal and conservation, a very satisfying end each time.

Cat in the Box (Bezier Games) – This was a new game to me this month, and even though I feel like I’ve been playing a lot of trick taking games recently, this one still had something fresh to offer. While most other trick taking games took the co-op route, this one has a fun and competitive vibe when you lay down your card then “observe” the suit. It led to a lot of funny moments when you run into a paradox.

Isle of Cats (City Of Games) – I have a soft spot for games where there is a mix of communal competition and an individual puzzle. I feel like this game does such a great job of keeping players engaged at all times trying to think about what they need to fill their boat fully with rescued cats.

Project Aleutian Art Update (July 2026)

Since the last timeline update for Project Aleutian, I’ve been focusing on the final few reference art pieces along with continuing my research into short run prototypes. For the short run prototypes, the focus has been researching options as well as starting to figure out the requirements for different suppliers.

The image shows an example of one of the reference cards that I just finished. It has a mix of some of the early announcement art for Seulana along with some new ship artwork. The concept art for each nation’s ship is done, and now it is just a matter of going through the process with the vector artwork.

The Antibyss Remark – No. 014

Prototypes/Crowdfunding Projects to keep an eye on:

Button Kingdoms (Around the Stump Games) – this project is live on Kickstarter until August 6th! This cuddly yet cutthroat deckbuilder, has several fun features, but the one that caught my eye was the fun simultaneous play and bluffing mechanics around the bazaar phase.

Sprout (Rabble Game) – this project is live on Kickstarter until July 21st! This game is all about keeping house plants alive… which I can’t do in real life. At least in this game it is clear what exactly the plant needs, but there is still a risk of wilting your plants if a nutrient goes over the limit.

Galileo’s Truth (Awaken Realms) – this project is live on Gamefound until July 28th! I haven’t played the Darwin’s Journey, the game this is a successor of, but it caught my eye as a mix of fun theming and a mix of fun mechanics.

Games we were playing this month:

The Binding of Isaac: Four Souls (Maestro Media) – I haven’t played the video game that inspired this board game, but this game has a lot of charm and is a lot of fun. After 2 games that ended in dramatically different ways it felt like we only scratched the surface of what the game had to offer.

Exploding Kittens (Exploding Kittens) – It has been a bit since I played this game, but every time I pick it up, I have fun. I still laugh when I look at cards many years later, and if there is someone who doesn’t know how to play it is easy to get them up to speed.

Skull (Lui-Même) – This is one of my go-to filler games. It plays up to 6 and takes about 5 min to teach and the game normally takes 5-10 min to play. There is always a great sense of satisfaction when you break someone’s momentum with a skull in your stack of coasters.

Project Aleutian Timeline (June 2026)

It has been 6 months since the last big timeline update at the end of 2025. I wanted to give you a glimpse into the future and my newest estimates for the Project Aleutian timeline.

In December, our goal was to have the game artwork done by the end of June, and we are very close to achieving that. We have finished all of the card art! There are around 10 other pieces of art that will be used in reference pieces that still need to be completed. Even though these reference pieces are in progress and other visuals are still getting finalized, we will be moving on to preparing the documents for manufacture in parallel.

In preparation for the next steps, I’ve started looking into what it’s going to take to do some short run production for more professional prototypes/demo units. This is going to be the first step of the next stage of development as we figure out all of the details to get this game in your hands.  

I did shift a lot of the still broad targets further down the line. There are two main reasons:  more runway, and Kickstarter timing. There are a lot of little steps between now and the campaign, and most of them I’m going to be doing for the first time. Since, in general, tasks have taken longer than expected in every stage so far, I’m trying to give myself some needed time to make the launch a success. I’ve also been giving a lot of thought about the timing of the Kickstarter campaign. I don’t want to run it over the holidays, which will push it into 2027. I also like the idea of having it live while I can talk to people at a convention. Given that line of thinking, my current target is to have it line up with Dice Tower West in March. This is still a tentative target for now, but we’ll keep you updated as things develop over the next few months.

We are very excited about where the game is, and we are so grateful for you being with us on this journey.

The Antibyss Remark – No. 013

Prototypes/Crowdfunding Projects to keep an eye on:

Ballons Olympiques (Dream Bridge Games) – this project is live on Kickstarter until June 25th! This game caught my eye with fun art and the aeronaut theming, but the thing that got really got me excited while reading about it was the fun wind and altitude mechanics!

Hover (IbisTea Games) – this project is live on Kickstarter until June 19th! I’ve seen a fair few crazy feats from hummingbirds in our neighborhood, and theming a game around them is just brilliant. It looks like it will be a lot of fun competing over nectar with your friends.

Altera (IV Studio) – this project is live on Gamefound until June 28th! I’ve been a big fan of IV Studios for a while, and I think this game has a lot of really cool features that I’m excited to see play out. Simultaneous turns, dice bag building (drawing dice from your bag), and worker placement (using dice to place workers) are all things that I find exciting in a new game.

Games we were playing this month:

Obsession (Kayenta Games) – There is a bit of a shared theme (hint: England, Jane Austen) in the first two games I’m highlighting. Obsession is a worker placement game where you are working to bring your country house back from ill repair into a new age of glory. This game is a classic euro with lots of worker placement and deep strategy. A first game only left me wanting more.  

Endearment (Dux Somnium) – This game has a similar theme, and we mentioned it a while back when it was on Kickstarter. The game is absolutely gorgeous, and more directly attached to the characters of the Jane Austen novels. The game is a light game with some really fun strategic choices, as you go to town and visit settings so that you can ultimately pique a character’s interest.

Cosmic Encounter: Duel (Fantasy Flight Games) – I have not played much of the original game, but this game is just wild. It is strategic and satisfying while simultaneously being full of shenanigans that are hard to plan around.

The Antibyss Remark – No. 012

Prototypes/Crowdfunding Projects to keep an eye on:

Pack and Paddle (Kids Table BG) – this project is live on Kickstarter until May 28th! This game is from the same designers of Fromage and Search for Planet X both of which I’m a big fan of. This is a family friendly game  of canoeing in the outdoors and having the best camping experience, and I’m already having fun just looking at it.

Flockers (Odd Bird Games) – this project is live on Gamefound until June 5th! This game has fun art, and it looks like there will be little down time as there are only two actions you can take. So go check it out, find your flock, and get into a crisp V formation.

Fall Dawn (Dustiny Games) – this project goes live on May 19th! I’m jumping the gun a little bit on this one since the Gamefound page is in preview mode, so if you want to actually get details about the game you’ll have to go to their website or socials. It looks like a fun take on a competitive card based dungeon crawler, and I’m interested to learn more as it launches!

Games we were playing this month:

Forest Shuffle (Lookout Games) – This was a game we played for the first time at Dice Tower West, and immediately found ourselves with a copy. The game is very quick to teach and get into, but the constant cycling of cards from your hand, to the clearing, and potentially back to your hand is extremely satisfying.

Sushi Go Party! (Gamewright) – I love this variation of the original game because it adds a lot of variety and extends the player count up to 8 players. The game is quick even with 8 players, and sometimes when your trying to pick a longer game Sushi Go comes off the shelf while you’re trying to make that decision.

Cryptid: Urban Legends (Osprey Games) – With our newfound addition of Cryptid to our library, my wife and I dusted off our copy of this 2 player push and pull asymmetric game. I originally got this game back in 2024, and it has been fun to break this game back out and bring it with us on our picnics again.

Project Aleutian Art Update (May 2026)

Time for another peek at the artwork for Project Aleutian! Things are starting to get locked in, but there are still a few aspects of the graphic design that continues to be tweaked based on feedback. We are getting close with the artwork with the artwork for less than 10 cards left and less than 20 total identified art pieces left. We are on a good pace to meet our goal from December of having all of the card art done in June. The next update in June will be another revision to the timeline and longer-term projections.

The Antibyss Remark – No. 011

Prototypes/Crowdfunding Projects to keep an eye on:

Yotei – Deluxe Edition (Mighty Boards) – this project is live on Kickstarter until May 5th! I love the art on this and the gameplay looks very accessible.  The word “charming” is used a lot by others to describe this game, and I don’t think I could agree more.

Oakspire (Lucky Duck Games) – this project is live on Kickstarter until April 28th! I’ve talked about a lot of critter based games, but this one also appeals to my love of production style games. The interesting twist on that style of games are the community actions that are shaped by player choices during the game.

Pantheauction (Out Standing Games) – this project is live on Kickstarter until April 20th (tomorrow)! This looks like a fun auction and bidding game from a small passionate team. The thing that grabbed my attention was the fun blending of art deco visuals with the traditional Greek pantheon into one unified and fun theme.

Games we were playing this month:

Cryptid (Osprey Games) – I just traded for this game (my first trade not at a convention) and we’ve already played it a few times. It is very fast to setup and fast to teach, and as a deduction game really pushes you to that great brain blast feeling as you cross a bunch of things off. Unfortunately, if one person accidentally screws up about their logic rule the whole game breaks.

Calico (Alderac Entertainment Group) – I first played this game a few years back, but just acquired a copy. This one has quickly become one of my wife’s favorites and the cozy theme of cats and quilts seems to appeal to a lot of people. Another one with relatively simple gameplay, but it can really break your brain as you try to make the perfect quilt.

Bohnanza (Rio Grande Games) – I actually found this game when reading “Hobby Games: The 100 Best” back in 2018. The art is just plain fun, and my wife and I mostly play the 2 player variant. There is a fun risk and reward feel in variant that isn’t in the normal version. We also enjoy the normal version that involves trading too, but it a totally different feel.

Die Cutter

I had some updates a while back to some of the hardware I have around the house for making new prototypes of Project Aleutian that I thought would be worth sharing (for those interested in making prototype games themselves).

A month or so ago I ended up purchasing a used AccuCut GrandeMARK 2 die cutter. My main requirement for a die cutter was that I could fit a die large enough to cut out all of the cards on an 8.5”x11” (letter) size piece of paper. This does limit the options some, others I was looking at were the AccuCut MARK 4, AccuCut MARK 5, and Sizzix Big Shot Plus. They were big enough and it took some diligent searching to find a good deal, and I got really lucky finding one for a couple hundred dollars.

For the die, I purchased a custom die from a local small business, Autobend Laser Steel Rule Dies, who were great to work with, reasonably priced, and had a super-fast turnaround. From when I confirmed the purchase to when it was at my door was less than a week. I couldn’t really believe it. The custom die also set me back a couple hundred dollars, and that seems to be mostly driven by the size.

Now that I have both the die and die cutter in hand I can now cut out a full page of mini euro cards (14) in a few seconds. My old method was using a guillotine cutter (Swingline) to cut out the cards individually and a corner punch (Sunstar Kadomaru Pro) to get the rounded edges.

For a full game of Project Aleutian (about 270 mini euro cards) I can cut the full set in <30min with the die cutter where my old method took a couple of hours. This has two main benefits. The first is obvious, the time savings. The second is that it makes me more willing to make big changes and print them out for testing. I didn’t realize how much I had started to dread making bigger changes because of the amount of work it would take to get it to the table and looking nice until I had the die cutter to make it so easy.

I really wish I had invested in one earlier, and I wanted to share my experience for those of you out there on the fence (or maybe you didn’t even know die cutting was an option). So far, I only have a custom die for my mini euro template, but I plan to eventually get custom dies for other card sizes.

Antibyss_Card_TemplatesDownload

I do have card templates for letter size paper that I like to use down below. They have the main card area and a 3mm bleed around each card that helps with alignment front to back. I primarily use Inkscape or Affinity Designer 2 for the card layouts, but any vector graphics software should be able to open an svg file. Also, here is the dxf file that I used to order the custom die. This goes with the MiniEuro_CardTemplate_45mmx68mm.svg template above.

Antibyss_MiniEuro_dxfDownload