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Heeeeeeeeeello there!
I really want to not to post only once a year for the annual thread of smiling faces with a llama toy but let's face it, it is most likely not to happen
Shei and I we finished all the development for the upcoming games and we're really focused in the next ones so, that makes som room for write stuff here, but I can't promise.
Last year Spiel was... HARD. How hard do you ask? 1 week prior the Spiel, I was in a pop-punk-rock concert (Simple Plan & Sum 41) and I was jumping and having the best life when I landed wrong with the right foot and *crack*.
My right foot was fractured AND broken in that exact moment. I went to the hospital and -luckily- the doctor told me that we could plaster cast the leg... or don't, if I do not walk too much or do hard movements. You cannot fly with a plaster cast and that could ruin the trip to Essen.
And we had A LOT of stuff going on at Spiel (including the gala of the Deutscher Spielpreis for The Red Cathedral) and I opted for not having the plaster cast, walk on crutches and pray for not injure myself more (or at least trying not to) so... I traveled with crutches and I was in pain all the time.
Every 8 hours or so I had to come back to the apartment and put a bag of frozen peas in the foot to reduce the inflammation, my hand hurted so badly that I couldn even to hold a beer withouth noticing it. Through the halls, specially when it got so crowded people tend to hit you with their backpacks and kick in your crutches (not intentionally, of course)... cannot recommend to anybody to experience this
But it worth every minute we were there. It was amazing to feel again a 'normal' Spiel after the pandemic. So I went to do the same thing we do every Spiel. Last year I only managed to give a little present to everyone (to avoid passing an object in the middle of a pandemic) So, since the end of 2022 was 'normal' enough to do it... here it is our Llama for 2022: Fernanda!Tony Boydell and Suz & Eerko from BGStatsBranislav Berec from Nithrania - Game in a NutshellCandice Harris from BoardGameGeek(He's so prolific that he should have his own entry)Fridtjof Buvarp and his daughterOur boardgame heroes Inka Brand & Markus BrandLaura & José Luis from La MatatenaLincoln Damerst & Nikki Pontius from GameNight!Samu & Diana from Meeple FoundryMike DiLisio from The Dice TowerOur boss Andreas "ode." OdendahlSergio & Nancy from Análisis Parálisis and PrimigenioUli from Spielworxx
And two strangers. One the best Spanish female designer and a cripple next to her:
A blog about what we (Llama Dice) play and sometimes design.
Archive for Misc
- Uwe Rosenberg
- Friedemann Friese
- Michael Rieneck
- Tony Boydell
- Stefan Feld
- Inka Brand
- Markus Brand
- Josep M. Allué
- Matthias Prinz
- Perepau Llistosella
- David Esbri
- Joan Guardiet
- Dani Gómez
- Simone Luciani
- Tom Vasel
- Pedro Soto
- Martin Kallenborn
- Emely Brand
- Enrique Blasco
- Matthew Dunstan
- Jonny Pac
- Andreas "ode." Odendahl
- Théo Rivière
- Yohan Goh
- Dávid Turczi
- Isra C.
- Shei S.
- Jochen Scherer
- Javier González Cava
- Maria Blasco Arnandis
- Ferran Renalias
- Germán P. Millán
- Fabio Lopiano
- Orlando Sá
- Ramón Redondo
- Tommaso Battista
- Gerard Ascensi
- Meeple Foundry
- Toni Lopez
- Randy Flynn
- Mandela Fernandez-Grandon
- Edu Valls
- Fábio Lima
- Mín
- Elwen
- Juan Luque García
- Fridtjof Buvarp
- Mathias Wigge
- Peter B. Hoffgaard
- Spielworxx
- Primigenio
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Comments
Fri Mar 10, 2023 10:50 am
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Hello there!
I just came back here not for reviewing stuff that we were playing, rather than doing one of the post that I loved the most: The infinite post with smiling faces holding a llama toy.
Some of you already know, that every Spiel we bring with us a llama toy and take pictures of important people of the boardgaming world: Designers, Artists, Publishers, Reviewers... Every year we bring a different llama toy with us and all the people we assault, is really happy to participate.
You can see here big names in the industry such as Stefan Feld with Bernarda, Inka Brand & Markus Brand with Vicenta, Eric M. Lang with Benigna and Reiner Knizia with Paquita.
But that stupid thing that we love to do, was lost because of the covid in 2020 with the cancellation of the Spiel and the toy that we had prepared for that year had to wait her turn.
So I decided to upload the album of 2015 with Bernarda because I only uploaded 2019 with Paquita and 2018 with Benigna and why not, in those dark times, seeing a lot of people smiling and enjoying the fair soothed us. (Eventually, I'll upload the 2016 here too)
Then, 2021 arrived and Spiel was celebrated again! Yay! But with a lot of restrictions in terms of hygene and security. But wanted to do something similar that will be safe for everyone, so... this is what we did:
We crafted a ton of these little carboard tokens (individually wrapped) to hand them out to the people, ensuring in this way nobody else touched the thing. It's not the same, but at least we will get the same feeling.
And so we did! And took a lot of pictures! And we saw people smiling again! And... and... my phone gone crazy in January and broke the sd card where all the pictures were stored. I tried to recover them in March (for uploading them here) but it was impossible
But, for some reason my past me uploaded all those images to Google Drive as soon as we came back from the fair "For having them located when I decided to uploaded them" but present me forgot that until I found them 2 weeks ago!!!!!
So, finally, HERE IT IS SPIEL 2021 WITH A CHUNK OF CARDBOARD!Daniel Marco from Despistaos (Spanish famous rock band)David Esbri (Also head of publishing at Devir)Fran from DOJuegosEugeni Castaño And Jordi Castaño, his son (from El Palomar)Fridtjof Buvarp and Maija Buvarp (or Pauline Buvarp I don't know who is she because they don't have picture on BGG!)Our beloved Markus Brand and Inka BrandJavi from MishiGeekSergio & Nancy from Análisis Parálisis and PrimigenioThorsten from The Game Builders & our friend Andreas "ode." OdendahlUli from Spielworxx
And finally, as always, us <3
We're super ready for Spiel 22 and we'll do the same thing again. Even more, we already have prepared 22 and 23!
Thank you for reading!!
- El Palomar
- Reiner Knizia
- Richard Breese
- Eric M. Lang
- Stefan Feld
- Peer Sylvester
- Mac Gerdts
- Rory O'Connor
- Inka Brand
- Markus Brand
- Vladimír Suchý
- Perepau Llistosella
- Michael Menzel
- David Esbri
- Matthias Cramer
- Pedro Soto
- Óscar Arévalo
- Daniel Martinez
- Paco Yanez
- Andreas "ode." Odendahl
- Isra C.
- Shei S.
- Eugeni Castaño
- Ferran Renalias
- Eloi Pujadas
- Pau Moré Gómez
- Meeple Foundry
- Mandela Fernandez-Grandon
- Anna Lucini Canals
- Fridtjof Buvarp
- Maija Buvarp
- Pauline Buvarp
- Andreas Preiss
- Devir
- Spielworxx
- Primigenio
- The Game Builders
Mon Aug 22, 2022 11:36 am
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Hi everyone!
This is, one of the most shameful post I'd ever post here: Not a single post or thread during all 2021. Not even a self-promotion one at Spiel with all the goodness about seeing our Redca topping the Kosmos booth. Not even the post of pictures of gorgeous people posing with a Lama-toy substitute (which I'll post here eventually). Not even a post how amazing it was to see about 20 people queuing at Ludonova's booth to get Shinkansen: Zero Kei signed by Shei and me. Or maybe a post about how cool it was to be in the November issue of the legendary board game magazine Spiel box.
So my idea is to keep updated this blog as often as I could.
We're still here!
But yes, this is totally a new year's resolution that I don't know if I'll make it, but definitely I'll try.
See you tomorrow with the stuff played in the first week of the year (although it was only 2 days long).
Cheers!
Mon Jan 3, 2022 3:30 pm
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Wait, WHAT?
This year has been a hella of roller coaster. Not only for us, for the entire world.
If you don't attend to Spiel (and specially if you are used to) is one of the worst things that can happen to you in October (we didn't attend in 2017 because we ran out of our yearly budget for trips since we get married and traveled to Japan) and it was awful.
But this year could be one of the worst years to skip Spiel because we will finally see The Red Cathedral published but... there's no Spiel this year for no one.
But there's one more thing that is not getting in touch with amazing people, eating things that only can be eaten in Germany, the rush for the halls, the compulsive purchases that probably your back will suffer pushing through the airport your suitcase, there's THE THING. This stupid thing we did every year.
We took pictures from people of the boardgaming world with a lama (or alpaca) toy. And oh boi, we miss that very very much.
We uploaded here the album from 2019 with Paqui and 2018 with Beni, but never upload here the 2015's Bernarda and 2016's Vicenta.
So, to relief the urgency of sharing a huge collection of nice people smiling, here's the pictures we took in our very first Spiel. Hope you enjoy it!Sergio and Nancy from Análisis Paralisis and Ediciones PrimigenioGonzalo from Salt & Pepper GamesRichard Ham - Rahdo
- The Red Cathedral
- Martin Wallace
- Uwe Rosenberg
- Dirk Henn
- Richard Breese
- Phil Eklund
- Roberto Fraga
- Eric M. Lang
- Oriol Comas i Coma
- Ignacy Trzewiczek
- Stefan Feld
- Seth Jaffee
- Rory O'Connor
- Josep M. Allué
- Seiji Kanai
- Antoine Bauza
- Steffen Bogen
- Daniel Val
- Vincent Dutrait
- Pierô
- Vital Lacerda
- Xavier Gueniffey Durin
- Tom Vasel
- Óscar Arévalo
- Daniel Martinez
- Paulo Soledade
- Nuno Bizarro Sentieiro
- Andrei Novac
- Babis Giannios
- Manu Palau
- Michael Keller (II)
- Andreas "ode." Odendahl
- Manuel D. Cruz Díaz
- Viktor Peter
- Alberto Corazón Arambarri
- Primigenio
- Salt & Pepper Games
Fri Nov 13, 2020 8:49 am
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Hi all!
I know that I've got a couple of subscriptions and I only get visits when I tag a lot of played games but that's not the point. The point is that I miss write in English about my preferred topic ever: Board games.
I've been playing more than ever due to the confinement but I don't know. It's a strange feeling. I DO miss writing here but yet don't have the impulse to start writing.
And I love to talk about it here and chat with you all. Maybe too much extra-work from prototypes that keeps me away from writing hre.
Shei and I we're currently finishing some touches about a couple of boardgames that will be published in 2021-2022. We're in our finest moment as designers and that means a lot of work since we love to work close with publishers.
We do know that The Red Cathedral will be published sometime near September probably in USA too. So, this project started in 2015 finally will be released. What a ride!
Flowar will be postponed to early 2021, but with one good new! Mihajlo Dimitrievski will be the one in charge of the illustrations and cannot wait to see his work!
So as you can see, we're perpetually doing and playing things but, for reasons beyond my comprehension, I don't have the impulse to shout them out loud here!
Whenever I can share some pictures about The Red Cathedral I'll do for sure. It's easier just to show pictures rather than write about them hahha
Stay safe!
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Well the title is rather clickbaity since I bought two sets of Carcassone tiles at the thread: Hunt for second hand games for Spiel 2019: HERE
The idea was simple: Buy a set of basic game of Carcassonne to frame the tiles. The idea, also, is buying them as lower as you can since you don't need the score board, rules, box etc.
So thanks to & (and who sold me the tower expansion that actually won't be in the frame but it is in our collection)
And (with a lot of delay, you know, one thing is saying that your'e going to do a thing and another completely different is actually doing it) spending some isolation time, finally we made it! The Covid nightmare we're living in Spain mixed with the clear "Stay at f**** home" message helped a little bit.
So here they are the steps and the how-to:
The perfect size for this (including the enough deepness to hold the base+tile+standing meeple) is the Ikea's Ribba 50x50 frame:
Every Ikea item has its own instructions. So we took as guidance (to put every tile perfectly centered) those instructions to paste the Carcassone starting tile:
The original idea was playing a Carcassonne game ON the sheeet and then paste the tiles but since sometimes the map gets really ugly, we more or less designed a map in our taste. Once the map was designed, then we glued (with sticky tape) every tile to the instructions sheet. After that, glued some meeples in the tiles and some spare tiles in a sort-of drawing pile. It supposed to be a game in progress!!
Finally, with more sticky tape, glued the sheet (without any sign of being the instructions sheet) to the frame base to hold all the components
Close the frame (recycle the passepartout or use it in another frame) and there you go!
And see how it looks hanging on the wall
Saty safe everyone!
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Hi everybody!
In 2015 Shei and I started a thing when we travel to Essen for our very first time at Spiel. We brought a tiny llama toy that we planned to put on the top of games, things and so on but suddenly we took a picture of a designer with that toy called Bernarda and everything changed. We took pictures of designers, artist and people we know from the boardgaming world and it was super fun.
Then, we came back on 2016 and did the same thing with another different llama toy called Vicenta and many of them remembered that odd moment in which two stupid people with a smile in their faces asked them "to take a picture with Vicenta"
In 2017 we got married and didn't attend to Spiel, but in 2018 we came back again and took pictures with Benigna 'Beni' and it was amazing.
This is the 4th year that we do this thing, now with Paquita "Paqui", and we think that this will be a tradition every year we attend to Spiel but... do you know why?
At the end of the fair, we end with about 70 pictures of people smiling, doing shenanigans or crazy things with the toy and everyone looks happy and enjoying this wonderful boardgame world. Those smiles and faces remain us why we are here: To make people happy.
So here it is, the pictures we could take at the fair, enjoy them as much as we didUli Blennenman, master of SpielworxxSteven Buonocore from Stronghold GamesKlemens Franz & AndreaAntoine BauzaWhom I owe a proper goodbye!! Sorry Antoine!!Livia from MOZI GamesJoey Schouten from Inkwell Games
- Reiner Knizia
- Martin Wallace
- Wolfgang Kramer
- Dirk Henn
- Richard Breese
- Friedemann Friese
- Marco Maggi
- Francesco Nepitello
- Andreas Steding
- Tony Boydell
- Bruno Cathala
- Leonhard "Lonny" Orgler
- Ludovic Maublanc
- Ignacy Trzewiczek
- Stefan Feld
- Mac Gerdts
- Rory O'Connor
- Virginio Gigli
- Flaminia Brasini
- Josep M. Allué
- Vladimír Suchý
- Seiji Kanai
- Antoine Bauza
- Perepau Llistosella
- Gil Hova
- Klemens Franz
- Michael Menzel
- Vincent Dutrait
- Vital Lacerda
- Mariano Iannelli
- Michiel Justin Elliott Hendriks
- Matthias Cramer
- Simone Luciani
- Pedro Soto
- Jesús Torres Castro
- Paulo Soledade
- Nuno Bizarro Sentieiro
- Xavier Carrascosa
- Jacob Fryxelius
- Brett J. Gilbert
- Paco Yanez
- Jose Antonio Abascal Acebo
- Manu Palau
- Jose María Bellostas
- Matthew Dunstan
- Juma Al-JouJou
- Andreas "ode." Odendahl
- Isra C.
- Shei S.
- Asger Harding Granerud
- Daniel Skjold Pedersen
- Alexander Huemer
- Pau Carles
- Sami Laakso
- Alberto Corazón Arambarri
- Flo de Haan
- Ferran Renalias
- Eloi Pujadas
- Sophia Wagner
- Núria Casellas
- Elizabeth Hargrave
- Gerard Ascensi
- Stronghold Games
- Spielworxx
- MOZI Games
- Mont Tàber
- Inkwell Games
Mon Nov 4, 2019 8:56 am
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Well... that was an amazing SPIEL for us professionally and personally in which we have experienced a lot of love and kindness from every people we approached by. And sometimes it's something difficult to approach to someone and ask them to take a picture with a tiny llama toy, but we did it and it was a blast (You can check the pictures from Beni last year)
But today I'm going to show you the pornographic haul that we gather during the whole fair. The worst part is the one on Saturday we saw our purchases and said "We haven't bought that many this year, we can bought some more", tried to pack and realized that yes, we have bought THAT many
We already played some and this is what was our first impression:
Tee oder Kaffee
A small -very small- card game where you have to take sets to score them. Nothing sounds amazing and probably is a bit random, but we're addicted to it. Will be included in every trip due to its size and, at least with two, is quick and fun to play!
Skytopia: In the Circle of Time
I loved how the gears work and despite thinking that with more players will be cooler I enjoyed the first game of it!
Masters of Renaissance: Lorenzo il Magnifico – The Card Game
For me, can be the biggest deception of the SpielWill play it again soon and will decide but the first impression is a game that I didn't like (but the marble mechanism is really really cool)
Ingenious: Travel Edition
It's one of the biggest findings in the Math-trade thanks to my friend Thanasis! This is the travel version only for 2 players of Ingenious. And it's amazing because is really hard to find!!
Silver & Gold
I loved it! A kinda different "reveal and write" drawing in the cards. Phil Walker-Harding, I love you. I like this a lot!
Anubixx
We bought this one without even looking at the box because, you know, this format always is a winner but... this time is not. It has some good ideas, but we found playing this without having any fun like we have plenty in Twenty-one, Qwixx, Qwinto and so. A little deception. Will play through all the sheets twice and play with the family and then decide.
Paris: La Cité de la Lumière
My god. MY GOD. I loved it!!!!!! Through the production, to the artwork, to the gameplay, to the scoring... everything. This could become one of my 2 player favorites for sure!
Snowman Dice
We expected to have fun this one only with my destroyer nephew but we found ourselves playing it and laughing a lot!! This is very fun!!
Humboldt's Great Voyage
A 5 Tribes style game. I liked the first game (and the mechanic of where to start is one of my favorite things) but I'm not sure how many plays of it will do. But the first impression is very very good.
Ka Pai & Ka Pai: Ranu
Our first game of Ka Pai was kinda just ok. But the more we play it, the more we like it!! And the expansions are awesome; when you think you know how to play, that new score sheets breaks you. I liked it a lot!!
Elevenses
We found this game in the Matagot booth kinda buried in their big boxes and Shei grabbed it and said: LOOK AT THIS ARTWORK AND THEME. WE MUST BUY IT. So we did. And we played. Twice. And we loved it!! Will be included in our list for trips since the game only have a few cards and the sugar cubes could be replaced by any other thing.
L.L.A.M.A.
I don't know why I found fun in this game. It has 0 decisions and all the randomness of having a bad hand of cards... But I do like it! Will play it with my family to see if it worth to keep it.
Bloom Town
A very good game of city building for non-core gamers. I'm saying this because I felt that for us, we need more. I liked their scoring mechanism of scoring right at the moment you're placing the tile! This is a really fine game! But probably too light for us
And that's it. Now we're heading to Ikea to buy another shelf... so yes, we have a problem. A big problem. But what a blessed problem <3
- Samurai
- Saint Petersburg
- Reef Encounter
- Ingenious: Travel Edition
- Keltis: Das Kartenspiel
- Egizia
- Navegador
- Asara
- IOTA
- Codinca
- Elevenses
- Diamonds
- Manhattan TraffIQ
- OctoDice
- Flip a Bird
- Heir to the Pharaoh
- Rise to Nobility
- Majesty: For the Realm
- Perfect Hotel
- Claim
- CIV: Carta Impera Victoria
- Humboldt's Great Voyage
- TEAM3 PINK
- Claim 2
- L.L.A.M.A.
- Twice as Clever!
- Cooper Island
- Foothills
- Silver & Gold
- Snowman Dice
- Expedition to Newdale
- TEAM3 GREEN
- Bruxelles 1897
- Paris: La Cité de la Lumière
- Masters of Renaissance: Lorenzo il Magnifico – The Card Game
- Crystal Palace
- Lux Aeterna
- Tee oder Kaffee
- Bloom Town
- Skytopia: In the Circle of Time
- Fire!
- Newton: Great Discoveries Expansion
- Ka Pai
- Anubixx
- Ka Pai: Ranu
- Phil Walker-Harding
Thu Oct 31, 2019 7:51 am
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Hi everybody!
Currently we’re dedicated in full in finishing the last prototypes to get them ready for Spiel but in the meanwhile we’d been doing a lot of things. September and October are complicated days for a couple of Indie designers like us. Too much to do, too less time to spent. But we manage
One of things we’d done is posting on BGG news the making of Smoothies! It’s something incredible to see: Watching your little game being on the web page you’ve been using for everything in your boardgaming life is something to celebrate!
So if you’re interested in why an Smoothie can be a sustitive of Carbon dating, go HERE to find out! (Yes it is a clickbait but a funny one!)
The nice people of Button Shy Games had the idea of making a contest of a 18 card game which every card should be identical. We thought that we could design something different and so do we! Here’s the teaser trailer of Tony Card’s Pro Skater, a 1-18 players game! We have to admit, we’d been laughing with this one.Estoy gozando con esto como un cochino en una charca #TonyCardsProSkater pic.twitter.com/ACnTlH7tHZ
— Isra C. (@israperrillo) September 19, 2019
We have sent 10 questions to a couple of designers we truly admire and when they have the answers we’ll post it here as well in our webpage! We’re pretty excited about it!
Some of you know that we’re releasing 2 new games on Spiel this year: Smoothiesand 1987 Channel Tunnel.
Well, you can make your preorders for Smoothieshere: http://ludonova.com/en/preorder2019/
But for 1987 Channel Tunnel there is currently a live kickstarter campaing in which, not only you can get our game but you can preorder the 19xx complete series! We’re right now translating the making of articles that we wrote for the Spanish campaign. We think that everyone who want to read them should be able to so, we’re translating!
In the meanwhile, you can pledge in their kickstarter campaign (which it’s going pretty well!!) here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/looping/1987-channel-tu...
So when we have ready some of the articles for the campaign, we’ll post it here asap.
Thank you for reading!!
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Hi everybody!
Some of you already know that we do that thing when we go to Essen Spiel: We ask boardgame designers/publishers/stars to take a picture with a tiny toy of an alpaca (or llama, depending on the toy) and all of them agree with a smile in their faces. If this post gets more-or less relevant, will upload our picturesfrom 2015 & 2016 <3
These are all the awesome people of the industry that took 15 seconds of their time to make this couple of designers very happy.
I realised that I "can't" tag reviewers/influencers from here so I'll tag them out in Twitter in order to notice them.
Will post a big write up about Spiel 2018 soon, but since Shei & I are working in several projects at the same time, my amount of time to spend in writing things on BGG/LlamaDice is limited.
I hope that I can make this thread every year because this pictures we'll terasure them forever.
See you!
- Uwe Rosenberg
- Michael Kiesling
- Phil Eklund
- Andreas Steding
- John Yianni
- Tony Boydell
- Eric M. Lang
- Bruno Cathala
- Ludovic Maublanc
- Ignacy Trzewiczek
- Stefan Feld
- Rory O'Connor
- Inka Brand
- Markus Brand
- Seiji Kanai
- Klemens Franz
- Vincent Dutrait
- Vital Lacerda
- Tim Fowers
- Emiliano "Wentu" Venturini
- Paulo Soledade
- Nuno Bizarro Sentieiro
- Brett J. Gilbert
- Manu Palau
- Matthew Dunstan
- Francisco Gallego Arredondo
- Juma Al-JouJou
- Michael Keller (II)
- Sami Laakso
- 佐藤 雄介 (Yusuke Sato)
- Eloi Pujadas
Wed Oct 31, 2018 4:45 pm
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