Obligatory 2015 Kickstarter Post Part I: Honorable Mentions

Okay, I have finally broken down and created my 2015 Kickstarter list!  This will be the first in a series of posts that will feature the Kickstarters that I am interested in.  These games are ones that haven’t been shipped out to their backers as of the writing of this post.  This means that their campaigns may be still going on, completed, or even haven’t started yet.  Also, for this list I didn’t look at any date for the campaigns as all I’m really looking for are games that haven’t been shipped.  One of the games on the honorable mentions has been rumored for a couple years and still hasn’t even had its Kickstarter!  This first post will focus on 5 honorable mentions (as well as some other cool looking ones that didn’t quite make the cut) that just missed out of my top 10 list.  Without further ado, here are my Kickstarter honorable mentions.

The first honorable mention to make it onto my Kickstarter list is Consequential.  This game is designed by Chris Cieslik and will be distributed by Asmadi Games after the (supposed?) Kickstarter.  This is a co-operative game with an app portion that will be used heavily for the story portions of the game.  Cieslik has been working on this game for quite some time as it was first mentioned around Gen Con 2012.  Here we are 3 years later and there are just some tenuous mentions of a Kickstarter coming up soon.  I hope that this game will be up soon and will do well because it looks quite interesting and could be another game that integrates applications with success.  The only reason it is so low is because my interest seems to be waning further as this game continues to taunt without any real substance behind it.

The next game that is interesting on the Kickstarter front and gets an honorable mention is 7^th Continent.  This game is by Ludovic Roudy and Bruno Sautter and will be distributed by Serious Poulp after its Kickstarter.  This game has really been going around BoardGameGeek with its very interesting looking mechanics and theme.  This game is inspired by the Fighting Fantasy series of gamebooks which really creates a game that will be much like a choose-your-own-adventure experience.  I find this idea to be very fascinating and am looking forward to see how it works.  I will hold off on this game until it hits retail because I really want to see how it plays and what others are saying about it before I take the leap.  So far the buzz is great and I love different themes/mechanics in games so I think this could be a winner.  They are obviously looking to have a successful Kickstarter (which starts 9/29/15) as they already have at least two slated expansions entitled The Forbidden Sanctuary and The Icy Maze.

The next Kickstarter game to receive an honorable mention is Above & Below.  This is a game designed by Ryan Laukat and distributed by his company, Red Raven Games.  This is a game that uses set collection, card drafting, and storytelling as its primary mechanics.  Ryan is truly a triple threat as he has designed this game, done all of the art for it, and is releasing it himself.  This game looks absolutely beautiful and it seems to really do a great job in marrying storytelling with an actual game!  I’ve seen other games that use storytelling as a primary mechanic but don’t seem to have any actually game along with it.  Above & Below will hopefully be one of those rare games that uses storytelling and is a fun game as well!

The fourth game to make its way onto my Kickstarter honorable mention list is Shadows over Normandie.  This game is designed by Yan & Clem (they also designed Heroes of Normandie) and distributed by Devil Pig Games and Iello.  This game is a war style game that uses grid movement, dice rolling, and hex-and-counter mechanics.  I am not normally interested in these types of games but this one really grabbed me.  The mechanics are interesting and the theme is awesome!  This game finds a group of soldiers who got split from the main army and find themselves fighting a cult of Nazis who are bringing up Cthulhu horrors.  I like the mashing of the World War II theme with the Cthulhu theme.  It appears to be a great game with a sweet theme and that is enough to make this list.

The final game to make it onto my Kickstarter honorable mention list, and thus just miss the top 10, is Millennium Blades.  This game is designed by D. Brad Talton, Jr. and distributed by his company, Level 99 Games.  This game wasn’t one I knew much about when it first popped up on Kickstarter but it quickly became incredibly interesting to me.  This game takes the idea of collectible card games and turns it on its head.  In this game you’ll draft cards, use hand management and set collection in an effort to gain victory points during card battles.  This makes the game essentially a commodity trading game that strives to be a CCG-simulator.  This idea is very interesting and I can’t wait to see the final product to see if Talton was successful in his ambitious Kickstarter.

These are the 5 games that just missed my top 10 but I felt deserved honorable mentions.  Below I have the names of 12 other games that just missed the honorable mentions but still look very cool.  Check them out if they sound cool to you!

- Apocrypha Adventure Card Game

- Blood Rage

- Foe Hunters

- The Guardians: Explore

- The Others: 7 Sins

- Posthuman

- Prime Time

- Raiders of the North Sea

- Rome: Rise to Power

- Salvation Road

- Super Dungeon Explore: Legends

- Zombicide: Black Plague

Thanks so much for taking a look at my blog!  This is just the first in this series and the next one will feature games 6-10 of my top 10 Kickstarter interests.  Stay tuned to find out what they are.  As usual, if you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them.  Until next time, game on!