Friday, June 22, 2018

Gen Can’t is coming back and with a new PnP contest

Last year, I discovered Gen Can’t, the Unconvention for everyone who can’t attend GenCon. It was fun to be a part of the event and the best part was the library of games that their PnP contest created.

I played a decent chunk of the games and there are some I still want to get around to trying. I would recommend the winner, Welcome to Dino World, and the finalists to anyone. 

So I checked in on the Gen Can’t website, where has been in hibernation for ten months, to find that they have announced a new PnP design contest. This time, the good folks who organize Gen Can’t (who no doubt would make an interesting subject for a documentary on Netflix) are teaming up with Jason Tagmire and Buttonshy Games to have an 18-card PnP contest.

I kind of adore Button Shy. They were a big step for me to get into print and play and I feel that they’ve done a good job pushing the concept of micro games into full-sized games that just have a few components. Cunning Folk, Avignon, Circle the Wagons, all games worth looking into and I have very high expectations for Sprawlopolis. 

So, I am pretty stoked about this contest. While I have been having a surprising amount of fun with nine card PnP games lately, eighteen cards seems to be a really good point for micro games having enough parts to really do stuff. And still easy to make.

At the same time, I’m a little sad to see the Roll and Write contest be left the annals of history. After all, with zero construction requirements, those PnP games were accessible to anyone with access to a printer and some dice. That allowed for maximum participation.

Still, Gen Can’t did that last year. Doing it again would be a little tired. Besides, everyone can still and download over forty games from last year. 

Gen Can’t has had a Mega Karuba event, which I’m sure it will have again, where all the draws from a game of a Karuba are played out and everyone who wants to can play at home. Maybe this year, someone will do the same with Welcome to Dino World.

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