Nerdlab | Nerd like a Boss

011 – Co-Op Mechanics to Encourage Teamplay in Card and Board Games

January 18, 2019 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 1 comment

Hello fellow adventurers, In today’s episode, we are discussing at least 8 mechanics that can be used to encourage team play in cooperative games What is a Cooperative Card Game? A co-op game is by nature a game in which players work together as a team, usually against some kind of AI. In most co-op games […]

Keyforge – A Game Design Review of the Unique Deck Idea

January 16, 2019 / by Marvin / Article, Game Review / 0 comments

Hello fellow adventurers, today we are going to review Keyforge the Unique Deck Game (UDG) by Richard Garfield and Fantasy Flight Games. I spent quite a bit of time thinking about the core concept of unique card games and some of Keyforge’s new and exciting mechanics. If you prefer to listen to my review, I have also recorded […]

010 – Faction Design & Color Identity in Card Games

January 11, 2019 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 4 comments

Hello fellow adventurers, In today’s podcast episode we’re dealing with a topic that made me ponder and sometimes even despair during the last week. It’s about dividing game elements into logically connected groups. In other words. How can I divide my cards into different factions or colors? I was wondering if my game even needs […]

009 – Keyforge – A Game Developer’s Review of the Unique Deck Game (UDG) Concept

January 4, 2019 / by Marvin / Game Design, Game Review, Podcast / 1 comment

Hello fellow adventurers, and welcome in 2019. Let’s start this year by talking about the Unique Deck Game (UDG) Keyforge from Richard Garfield and Fantasy Flight Games. I spent quite a bit of time thinking about the core concept of unique deck games and some of the mechanics of Keyforge in particular. Therefore, I decided […]

008 – Goal Setting for Game Developers

December 28, 2018 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 0 comments

Hello fellow adventurers, The new year is approaching fast. We are going to use this weeks episode to talk a little bit about goal setting and why it is especially important for game developers. Topics: Goal Setting / Life Planning Why is goal setting is so important for game designers? How to set goals as […]

007 – Health Mechanics in Board and Card Games – Part 2

December 20, 2018 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 0 comments

Hello fellow adventurers, In Episode 7 of the Nerdlab, we will focus on health tracking in card games. This is the second part of a 2 part series on health mechanics. In the last episode, we analyzed the different aspects of health systems and formulated some questions you could ask yourself in order to find […]

006 – Health Mechanics in Board and Card Games – Part 1

December 13, 2018 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 1 comment

Hello fellow adventurers, in Episode 6 of the Nerdlab, I will talk about health systems in board games and card games. This is the first part of a two-part series on health systems. My goal for the first episode is to analyze the different aspects of health systems and to provide you with a bunch […]

005 – Emergent Narrative & Storytelling in Board Games

December 5, 2018 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 1 comment

Hello fellow adventurers and welcome to the Nerdlab – Where we transform our gaming passion into incredible game designs and learn how to nerd like a boss. In Episode 5 of the Nerdlab, we will talk about storytelling. What is a story and why do we want one for our games. Today you will learn […]

004 – Building an Encounter System Part 3

November 28, 2018 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 0 comments

Hello fellow adventurers, in Episode 4 of the Nerdlab we will talk about the third and final building block of exceptional encounter design. In the first part of this 3 part series, we identified how to ask dramatic questions to our players by creating interesting conflicts and real decision points. In the second part we […]

003 – Building an Encounter System Part 2

November 21, 2018 / by Marvin / Game Design, Podcast / 0 comments

In Episode 3 of the Nerdlab we will talk about the second building block of encounter and combat design. Last week we identified how to ask dramatic questions to our players by creating interesting conflicts and real decision points. This week we will talk about fireballs and crushing blows. In other words: how to design […]

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