Troy University in Alabama is looking for adjunct faculty with tabletop experience to teach online Game Design and Development classes.

Along with several sales and distribution positions, Learning Resources has an opening for a Marketing Coordinator to handle social media and influencer campaigns and support trade shows.

At Educational Insights in Gardena, California, there are opportunities for an Associate Marketing Manager, to manage PR, social media, and the company’s customer loyalty program, and a Product Manager, to lead conceptualization, manage vendor relationships, and collaborate with functional teams as required in the development of new products.

ThinkFun in Alexandria, Virginia has an opening for a Human Resources Manager.

Wizards of the Coast in Renton, Washington is recruiting for:

• Principal Game Designer, requiring significant experience and a passion for Magic, The Gathering.
• Creative Lead to help grow the company’s digital business (Magic, D&D, and Avalon Hill).
• Director of Communications and Publicity, skilled at both corporate and brand-level communications.
• Product Marketing Manager, supporting regional development and localization for MtG.
• Principal Game Designer for digital publishing, requiring at least 8 years of AAA experience.

Tabletop Tycoon in Londonderry, New Hampshire needs an Accounting & Bookkeeping Lead. Responsibilities include developing budgets, reviewing invoices, and managing workflows.

Games Workshop has many openings in sales and retail, also one for a Trainee Citadel Miniatures Designer and a one for a Visual Merchandising Manager. The former will sculpt minis. The latter will create product displays.

An unnamed United States board game manufacturer is looking for a UK Marketing Director, among who’s responsibilities will be managing two PR companies and an advertising agency.

Bezier Games is in need of an experienced, full-time Social Media Manager to generate buzz. The position is based in Knoxville, Tennessee.

Renegade Game Studios is seeking a Development Coordinator to manage the playtesting process from its San Diego office. The company is also looking for a Video Editor to help with 1-2 projects per month.

Atlas Games has an opening for a Marketing Coordinator in Duluth, Minnesota. The successful candidate must have industry knowledge, as well as skills in writing, editing, analytics, and task management.

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To support its fast-growing catalog, Renegade Game Studios seeks a Localization Coordinator (in Europe, to support European partners), a Marketing Coordinator (in North America, to support brand-building and social media), and a Game Producer (in San Diego, to push the development of new products).

In addition to a number of jobs related to its digital products and a few art-related positions (contract and in-house), Wizards of the Coast is recruiting for a Principal Product Designer. This job involves overseeing R&D design for Magic: The Gathering. Responsibilities include managing all aspect of a MtG block, contributing to strategic development and decision-making, and otherwise supporting the MtG brand.

Two positions are open at Paizo. One is for a Game Developer “to take responsibility for the creation, revision, and editing of content for… the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder, and associated product lines.” The other is for a Customer Service Representative to answer inquiries and troubleshoot problems.

Pelgrane Press has an opening for an Administrative Assistant but it’s no mere secretarial position. The job involves working with directly with customers, online and in-person, as well as managing supply-chain issues such as print buying and tracking warehouse inventories. Pelgrane is headquartered in the U.K. but remote work is OK. The work is estimated at 25 hours per week for a salary of US$1,500 per month (about $14/hr, no benefits).

Games for Change (G4C), the organization that promotes driving real-world change using games, has three openings: Senior Director (an executive leadership position), Community Manager (a part-time but front-line, point-of-contact between G4C and the whole range of its stakeholders), and Operations Manager (also part-time, and responsible for office and financial management, and maintaining institutional knowledge). All three are based out of New York City.

Ceaco (Gamewright) is looking for a Stock Room Assistant, part-time in Newton, Massachusetts.

At Lost Battalion Publishing in Upperco, Maryland there are openings for a full-time Graphic Designer and a part-time Game Manufacturing Technician.

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At the Mensa Mind Games this past weekend in the Virginia suburbs outside Washington, DC, member judges played through and selected the following games as 2017 Mensa Select winners:

Amalgam from Simply Fun—A game in which the players, as wizards, try to collect sets of potion ingredients but have to rely on their memories of the ingredients they’ve already collected.

Around the World in 80 Days from Iello Games—A Spiel des Jahres winner from years ago (Hare & Tortoise), reproduced based on the Jules Verne novel. Players race around the board, moving forward and back as they wish. However, they must carefully plan to arrive back in London with the least amount of cash left in hand.

Clank! from Renegade Game Studio—A dungeon delve fantasy adventure game built on deck-building mechanisms.

Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle from USAopoly—Another deck-building game, this one follows the novels with a series of cooperative games that get more complex and more difficult to beat as they progress.

Imagine from Gamewright—A party game where the giver-of-clues chooses an item from a card and then tries to illustrate the item by combining images and symbols with an overlay of transparent cards.

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White Wolf’s World of Darkness returns to digital with Vampire: Prelude (iOS, Android) and Mage: Refuge (iOS, Android) interactive fiction apps.

Support for Clank! has been added to the Renegade Game Studios Companion App (iOS, Android), providing “mini-quests” and a solo game mode.

GMT Games is working with HexWar Games on digital versions of Commands & Colors: Ancients and Commands & Colors: Napoleonics. Ancients will launch first in this summer, followed by Napoleonics in the fall or winter. At launch, the games will support PC and Mac. A couple of months later, there’ll be support for iPad. Android support will come eventually, probably.

The previous implementation of Dominion online is no longer. It has been replaced by one from Shuffle iT. Accounts, though, were transferred, supposedly with usernames and passwords intact.

Victory Point Games’ Hunt: The Unknown Quarry recently launched on Steam. It’s a “deductive combat game” for 3-6. One plays a monster trying to escape. The others are hunters. A whole group can play with just one purchased license.

Online accounts for Fantasy Flight Games, Days of Wonder, and Asmodee have been merged. If you had an account, you should have received an email.

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Renegade Game Studios is releasing Honshu, a game about map making in feudal Japan, in February 2017.

A game of Honshu is twelve rounds were players were map tiles are played in a trick. The player who played the highest valued map card gets to pick first from the cards played. Players’ maps are then expanded using the cards they have to raise their score. As with most trick-taking games, manipulating play order will be very important.

MSRP will be $25.00.

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Lotus is a beautiful looking game coming out soon from Renegade Game Studios. Brick and Mortar stores should have this on shelves by September 21st, with online retailers getting it a week later.

In the game you’re building flowers petal by petal using a unique card-laying mechanic. You’ll also need to control the most of these flowers using insects and special powers.

Lotus is for 2-4 players ages 8+, and should play in 20-40 minutes. It’ll retail for $30. I’m looking forward to getting my hands on this one, as it looks like something my whole family would enjoy.

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For those who don’t know, Mensa Mind Games is an annual tabletop competition open to games that are new to market within the last two years. Today they’ve announced the winners for 2016.

• New York 1901, Blue Orange Games
• Circular Reasoning, Breaking Games
• World’s Fair 1893, Renegade Game Studios
• Favor of the Pharaoh, Bezier Games, Inc.
• The Last Spike, Columbia Games

Sadly, the only game I’ve only played on the list The Last Spike, though I’ve heard good things about the rest.

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The annual Mensa Mind Games took place this weekend in San Diego. There, 325 judges played through 60 different games to choose the following Mensa Select Winners:

Dragonwood—A push-your-luck game of rolling dice and capturing fantastic creatures. Players may also along the way attempt to grab enhancements but when the two dragons are gone the game is over. [Published by Gamewright.]

Lanterns: The Harvest Festival—Which pairs set-collecting and tile-laying as players build floating displays of paper lanterns for the emperor of China. [Designed by Christopher Chung. Published by Renegade Game Studios and Foxtrot Games.]

Castles of Mad King Ludwig—Another tile-laying game, in which players attempt to build the most extravagant castle for the king. [Designed by Ted Alspach. Published by Bezier Games.]

Letter Tycoon—A word game in which players can also purchase letters and then charge other players to use them. [Designed by Brad Brooks. Published by Breaking Games.]

Trekking the National Parks—Which combines card play, a national map to track movement, and details specific to each of the 59 U.S. national parks. [Designed by Charlie Bink.]

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You can bring honor to your family by collecting lanterns and dedicating them to the royal palace without having to travel back in time to early 1900s China to participate. All you need is a love of paper lighting and the board game Lanterns: The Harvest Festival.

This tile-laying, set collection game is set in Imperial China. Players must put on displays of paper lanterns by placing tiles into the palace lake. Tiles are covered with colorful lanterns of a variety of colors.

Every player will then receive a lantern card based on the side of the tile they are facing. Collect enough card sets based on poker style combinations and dedicate them to receive honor.

Lantern card sets consist of combinations like three-of-a-kind, three pairs, and so on. The first person to make a specific card set dedication receives the highest amount of honor for that particular dedication. After that, honor decreases gradually with each additional dedication.

The idea is that, when you place a tile, you must think about what cards you need to complete a set, but you must also think about what your opponents need and try to avoid giving it to them.

Of course, the player that has earned the most honor at the end of the game gets to go home to a happy, approving family. Everyone else goes home in shame.

The game supports two to four players, ages eight and up. It takes approximately 25 to 35 minutes to get through a game.

Lanterns: The Harvest Festival by Foxtrot Games and Renegade Games costs $35 and is available at your local board game store.

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