Publishing Advice #21: Writing Designer Journal / Diary

People were writing diaries and journals from hundreds of years. It was an excellent way to record their efforts, feelings, events; to tell a story of their lives and to help themselves to remember important things!

From time to time people are publishing designer journals to tell stories of their creations! So creator journal is not only a personal thing but a mixture of designer's efforts, progresses, struggles, issues, lessons learned, successes, thoughts and emotions but focused around his idea or project. Often designer journals are for the public to help and teach others and to promote the game, and on this kind of form of creator's journaling, I'll focus now!

Publishing Advice #20: Deceptive Love in Game Design

It's natural that mother loves her baby. And it's quite common that creator loves his creation! While loving a child will be fruitful and will bring a lot of joy, loving our inventions will give us nothing, or even worse - can be harmful! I'm not saying to hate our designs! I'm not stating that liking what we are doing or what we created is bad! I'm writing about a kind of love which stops us from making better games.

Gaming with Kids #4: How to Play Games Having 2-year-old Child

I guess you had many exciting games with your family and friends. In the peaceful environment, you had a great time. That's such a simple life! But did you ever have a child coming around in the middle of play to start messing up? Did you have to deal with a little board game destroyer?

Gaming with Kids #3: Children in Adult Gaming Groups

Board game groups give an excellent opportunity to play new games, meet amazing people and have lovely relaxing evenings! You can play there all sort of games! From quite light and easy to more challenging brainers.

A while ago I started running a Board Game Group in Thornbury, England. It's definitely a group for adults, and most of the games we play are not suitable for children. Anyway, I started thinking about my kids! Is there a place for them in the adult tabletop gaming group and how they can benefit from it? And on the other hand how not to upset other people and make sure they can fully enjoy their time? I'm aware that children's level is lower than adults and playing with them can be annoying. How to balance that?

Publishing Advice #19: Game Testing in Schools

It's obvious that game testing is an essential stage in the board game development. I don't need to convince anyone to agree with this statement.  Great feedback from different groups of people is crucial and will help us to ensure that our game is best possible! For family and children games one of the most relevant group is children!