July update
Hello friends, It's been a while! It seemed like I had no news worth reporting amid the maelstrom of much bigger issues and the time warp of this pandemic. But now...I do have a few things you might want to know about. In this email:
Game updates
Upcoming Events: Gen Con online this Saturday
Recent press and podcasts
Bird of the Month: American White Ibis
Game Updates
Mariposas is on track to be released August 28. If you plan on buying it, please consider buying local. Game stores are really struggling right now. Many stores are taking pre-orders, so you can call yours right now and reserve a copy! (If you don't have one, my favorite local store ships. Their sales have been down about 40% during the pandemic.)
AEG has also started a Mariposas Facebook Group. If you post a picture of a butterfly, you'll be entered to win games from the AEG catalog! This is setting the Mariposas group on the right track to be just as lovely as the Wingspan Facebook Group, which has honestly been a highlight of the entire Wingspan experience for me.
My part of the Wingspan Oceania Expansion is pretty much finalized. It still takes a long time to actually physically make the game and ship it to distributors. So the release will be sometime toward the end of this year, possibly slipping into 2021. Stonemaier will put out more specifics when everything has been manufactured and is ready to go.
The Wingspan digital edition on Steam has been going through beta testing and revisions. I have very little involvement in this, but my understanding is that they'll release it first on Steam, then Switch, then mobile platforms, starting sometime in the next few months. It's looking great. Sounding great too -- they've included bird songs!
Upcoming Events
I've got three things scheduled this Saturday (August 1) for Gen Con (the huge game convention, now online) and Gen Can't (an always-online event for people who don't go to Gen Con...which decided to keep going even though Gen Con is basically its own Gen Can't this year). These are all eastern US time:
1 pm: It's the Year 2030: What Was the Last Decade of Gaming Like? Panel discussion with me, Mike Selinker, Alison Luhrs, and Matt Lees.
3 pm: Stonemaier Designer panel: me, Travis Jones (Pendulum), Hoby Chou (My Little Scythe), Ryan Lopez DeVinaspre (Rise of Fenris), and Ben Rossett (Between Two Cities/Castles)
7 pm: Board Game the Game Show: "Host Bruce Voge interviews a guest, but after the usual chit chat, changes the interview into a game show YOU can play at home. Does the guest prefer Tacos or Pizza? Pink or Purple? If you can guess the right answers, you can win prizes."
Recent Press and Podcasts
I wrote a longish piece about diversity and inclusion in board games -- originally on Twitter, then Jamey put it up on the Stonemaier blog. Check it out.
Wingspan won 8 Golden Geek Awards -- the people's choice awards on Board Game Geek. Every time this happens, there's lots of chatter about whether it should be possible for a game to sweep so many of the categories, and whether the game in question deserved it. I weighed in a little bit in this Twitter thread.
Wingspan also won a Dice Tower Award for game of the year, and I won for best new designer.
Ben Maddox from The Five Games For Doomsday podcast has been doing a fantastic series called Voices from the Solitude, interviewing people from the board game industry about how they've been affected by the pandemic. I did an interview with him for the series back in mid-April.
A lot of venues are doing more live chats and video interviews these days. You can watch some recordings of ones I've done lately:
a chat with Tom Vasel on the Dice Tower
Matt and Tom from Shut Up and Sit Down played Wingspan with me on Tabletop Simulator
Bird of the Month: American White Ibis
(photo credit: Matt Cohen)
We camped at Cape Henlopen State Park in Delaware twice in the last few months. The campground is a short bike ride away from a beach that's never crowded, and also from an absolutely beautiful wetland area. And in that wetland we had the pleasure of seeing big flocks of white ibis on several days. I'm such a sucker for weird beaks.
This bird's relative, the Australian White Ibis, has adapted to the human invasion of its territory by opting to scavenge through garbage -- earning it the nickname Bin Chicken. This has been one of the most-requested birds for the Oceania expansion, often accompanied by things like this parody documentary. Enjoy!
Stay cool (or warm), stay safe, and make some good trouble --
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❤️
Elizabeth