I have always been intrigued by the piecepack game system. Piecepack is a set of game pieces that can be used to create any number of different board games. The games created for piecepack are often abstract, but they don’t really have to be. I have tried my hand at creating a couple of games for the piecepack over the years, but I have never really done anything with them. I am not a terribly inventive game designer, but I have created a couple of games that I have thought were pretty fun.
I had shared some of the games I created in the past, but I never really published them widespread. I was digging around in my game directory on my hard drive today, and I came across two of the games I created. I think both are more complex than they need to be, and they both rely on pieces other than what comes in a piecepack set. I thought I would share them here for anyone who was interested.
The first game is called Welcome to GEM (2-4 players about 30-45 minutes). In this game players try to extract gems from a planet using gem extraction lasers. The game uses a piecepack, and a bunch of glass beads or pennies or some other marker. The game is not terribly difficult to pick up on, but I can see where it could get a bit confusing. you score points by extracting the most gems, the most gems in a single turn, and a few other ways. I created some player score boards/play sheets to go along with the game.
The second game is called The Royal Feast and the Court Jester (2-4 Players about 20 minutes), and it has an insanely confusing set of movement rules (there is a bit about rotating tiles). Basically, this is a game of positioning. You are trying to get your pieces into the correct place at the end of your turn so you can score. Players have a choice of a number of actions each turn that they can take. The theme of the game is that the nobles from all across the land gather for a big feast, and they each bring there own serving people with them. They want to get served the best way possible, and screw over the other nobles. I think the theme is pretty good personally, and the game play is not bad…if you get past the fiddly bits. I created a score board for this game as well which you can find at the bottom of the rules sheet.
If you are a fan of piecepack please try out these games. I may get inspired to clean the rules up a bit and make them better games.