In which we talk about the board (oh my goodness, the board!) and about preparing for Games Expo.
Hello everyone! It’s still hot hot hot here, and I’m melting. Although that could just be the glue stuck to my fingers… Well, as before, I’m Jess, part of the team and your narrator.
Tiles? What tiles?
Last month I told you all a little about how we were trying to make the game more gateway and less complex. Slowly we have been chipping away at the complexity, asking each time whether we really need certain actions or cards.
And out of that came the a crucial question about movement across the boards. You see, with a standard board (even a modular one) it was pretty easy to see where the literary terrors were. It felt a bit like a slog at times — oh, just another thing over here, then I’ll go back here… So we had a good look at games we really liked, and decided to try a version of Library Labyrinth with tiles.
Tiles were an instant hit. It was clear that it solved both the problem of movement, and the problem of getting the ending right. AND it allowed us to think about the theme of the game and why Dracula et al is climbing out of the books in the first place. Now we have a curse token making its way round the board between the tiles. Mill thinks it’s going between the bookshelves (like a kind of black smoke demon thing) but I think it’s actually moving between the text itself…..perhaps it’s in the footnotes of the books? Anyway, the curse is rotating tiles, introducing new horrors, and generally making it more difficult for the players to capture all the escaped terrors and return them to the pages of the book.
We’ve had quite a few playtests with this version, and it’s definitely the right direction to go in. One of the playtests was fantastic (the five player one, interestingly) and none of them have disappointed. Rotating tiles are a keeper!
Games Expo
If you’re going to Games Expo then please do come and see us there! We are stand 2-346, and we’ll have a homemade prototype of Library Labyrinth to show. I must say that cutting bits of paper with a knife is rather satisfying. I spent a very happy afternoon making those tiles!
We’ll also have copies of Disarm the Base to sell (my game from 2019, look it up on www.disarmthebase.com) and some copies of Plastic Currents, which is a game played with jellybeans on a greetings card. Because who doesn’t love jellybeans?
Next steps
Could you help us playtest? Please do! We have a Facebook group here. Also, please do remember to sign up on our pre-launch page: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dissentgames/library-labyrinth. Please share as far and wide as you can! We expect to actually launch over the summer.
Library Labyrinth 