Here are 100 books that The Kobold Guide to Board Game Design fans have personally recommended if you like
The Kobold Guide to Board Game Design.
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When I was in middle school, I’d spend much of my time in class daydreaming. Imagining myself in, say, a debate with someone I disagree with and going through a litany of scenarios where I’d try to convince that other person to change their mind. It’s a lot of fun. (My teachers would likely disagree.) When I grew older, I did more of that on my daily walks, and then about 11 years ago, I decided to start writing about creative ways to teach someone something they’re vehemently opposed to or just ambivalent about. I’ve published four books since then on this topic.
I bought this book when I first got into the field of data visualization. I wasn’t planning on learning how to create comics; I just wanted to see how someone from a different discipline—a comic artist—thought about position, color, meaning, and communicating a whole lot of things in a compact format.
The bestselling international classic on storytelling and visual communication "You must read this book." - Neil Gaiman Praised throughout the cartoon industry by such luminaries as Art Spiegelman, Matt Groening, and Will Eisner, Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics is a seminal examination of comics art: its rich history, surprising technical components, and major cultural significance. Explore the secret world between the panels, through the lines, and within the hidden symbols of a powerful but misunderstood art form.
My passion as a teacher and writer is to help students and others interpret, understand and enjoy architecture and the built environment, and to help them respond in their own designs to the complexities of place, people, and construction. I have chosen five well-established books on analysing architecture that are highly illustrated, avoid jargon, can be explored rather than needing to be read sequentially cover-to-cover, and have lasting value. They offer guidance for beginning students and a checklist for the experienced. They are books to be kept handy and repeatedly consulted. Of course, analysing existing architecture is invaluable in designing new architecture. I hope you enjoy them.
The first three books on my list concentrate on building form and space, with little about function.
The ‘pattern language’ is different, mapping human activities onto appropriate built forms, and advocating repeated patterns that have been found to work.
Christopher Alexander wants us to use the patterns in designing responses to situations, but they also help to judge how well-built spaces fit their contexts in analysing architecture.
Although Alexander maps activities onto his own preferred design style, the patterns are not inherently specific to any style or period of architecture.
Despite being written 50 years ago, this one-of-a-kind book is still fresh and relevant.
You can use this book to design a house for yourself with your family; you can use it to work with your neighbors to improve your town and neighborhood; you can use it to design an office, or a workshop, or a public building. And you can use it to guide you in the actual process of construction. After a ten-year silence, Christopher Alexander and his colleagues at the Center for Environmental Structure are now publishing a major statement in the form of three books which will, in their words, "lay the basis for an entirely new approach to architecture,…
I have always loved game design – I love doing it, reading about it, thinking about it, and helping others do it. As you can see in the list, I’ve learned that sometimes what helps game designers most is getting inspiration from other fields. I hope these books help you as much as they helped me.
All game designers struggle with what it means to be creative, and whether they are doing it properly. What It Is and its companion book, Picture This are very personal guides to what it means to be a creative person, and are full of inspirational stories and very practical tips to create your best work and not get in your own way.
"Deliciously drawn (with fragments of collage worked into each page), insightful and bubbling with delight in the process of artistic creation. A+" -Salon
How do objects summon memories? What do real images feel like? For decades, these types of questions have permeated the pages of Lynda Barry's compositions, with words attracting pictures and conjuring places through a pen that first and foremost keeps on moving. What It Is demonstrates a tried-and-true creative method that is playful, powerful, and accessible to anyone with an inquisitive wish to write or to remember. Composed of completely new material, each page of Barry's first…
I have always loved game design – I love doing it, reading about it, thinking about it, and helping others do it. As you can see in the list, I’ve learned that sometimes what helps game designers most is getting inspiration from other fields. I hope these books help you as much as they helped me.
A tremendous amount of what makes a great videogame happens at the millisecond level. In this realm that is invisible to most, tiny changes make for enormous differences in the way a game feels. If you would master the secret rules that make for a game that people can’t put down because it just feels so good to play, you are wise to read this book.
"Game Feel" exposes "feel" as a hidden language in game design that no one has fully articulated yet. The language could be compared to the building blocks of music (time signatures, chord progressions, verse) - no matter the instruments, style or time period - these building blocks come into play. Feel and sensation are similar building blocks where game design is concerned. They create the meta-sensation of involvement with a game.
The understanding of how game designers create feel, and affect feel are only partially understood by most in the field and tends to be overlooked as a method or…
I was born and raised in Mumbai, India, and as a kid I loved to read. But I never saw myself—an Indian girl like me—represented in children’s books before. I didn’t realize how much it affected me until I began writing my first novel at age 23. When I did, I wrote the entire first draft with white characters and set it in a western country. I believed my Indian culture and my experience as an Indian kid was not worth writing about. I was so wrong! Now, with the novels I write, I’m passionate about representation, especially South Asian representation because all kids deserve to see themselves and their cultures in the books they read.
Farah and her two best friends get sucked into a Jumanji-inspired mechanical board game called The Gauntlet of Blood and Sand and it’s up to them to defeat the villainous architect of the game and save themselves and all those trapped inside. This fantasy story set in a Middle Eastern and Bangladeshi-inspired world is nail-biting to say the least and Karuna Riazi’s lush prose with descriptions of taste and smell transported me straight into the story and deadly game (and also left me very hungry!). Besides, when there are red scorpions, grease monkeys, and sand cats who wouldn’t want to join in this captivating adventure?
A trio of friends from New York City find themselves trapped inside a mechanical board game that they must dismantle in order to save themselves and generations of other children in this action-packed debut that's a steampunk Jumanji with a Middle Eastern flair.
Nothing can prepare you for The Gauntlet...
It didn't look dangerous, exactly. When twelve-year-old Farah first laid eyes on the old-fashioned board game, she thought it looked...elegant.
It is made of wood, etched with exquisite images-a palace with domes and turrets, lattice-work windows that cast eerie shadows, a large spider-and at the very center of its cover,…
For me, games have always been a way of playing mathematics. Every game has a hidden piece of mathematics behind it, and if you can understand that mathematics, I’ve found that it gives you a real edge in playing the game. I travel a lot for my work as a mathematician, and I love to ask about the games they play when I visit a new country. Games tell me a lot about the culture and people I am visiting. My book is my way of sharing my passion for games and mathematics with my readers.
This science fiction novel always appealed to me because of its conceit that a society’s games are a reflection of its culture, ethos, and philosophy. Azad, the game at the heart of the book, is used by the Empire to determine the political, social, and economic structure of the whole planet. The prize for winning is to become emperor and to implement your strategy in real life.
I love the description of the game. It’s played on three huge boards that are more like landscapes than regular playing boards. Perhaps one might regard all the games that we have created and played on this planet collectively as Earth’s version of Azad.
The Culture - a human/machine symbiotic society - has thrown up many great Game Players, and one of the greatest is Gurgeh. Jernau Morat Gurgeh. The Player of Games. Master of every board, computer and strategy. Bored with success, Gurgeh travels to the Empire of Azad, cruel and incredibly wealthy, to try their fabulous game...a game so complex, so like life itself, that the winner becomes emperor. Mocked, blackmailed, almost murdered, Gurgeh accepts the game, and with it the challenge of his life - and very possibly his death.Praise for Iain M. Banks:"Poetic, humorous, baffling, terrifying, sexy -- the books…
I love to get kids fired up about true stories, using their imaginations and believing in themselves as future innovators, inventors, and creators. Crayola crayons inventor Edwin Binney's story is a fabulous springboard for exploring nature, color and creativity. I love to draw and make stuff just like Binney, so his story resonated with me. The more I researched, the more I admired how he listened to what people needed and looked to nature for inspiration. I am intrigued by the origins of everyday objects. Here are some books that inspired me when I was writing, and that have that fascinating a-ha moment that spurs on innovation.
I am fascinated by how everyday objects are invented, and in this book, readers will discover the real story of how the beloved Monopoly board game was created. The story is often misreported with the credit attributed to Charles Darrow, the man who popularized the game and sold it to the Parker Brothers. In fact, the game was invented by Lizzie Magie, who wanted to draw attention to financial inequality. The author challenges readers to decide – who was the real winner? Because, ironically, Magie sold her patent for only $500, while Darrow stood to make millions and appropriated the credit for the invention. But without the changes and improvements to the game made by the two of them, perhaps nobody would get to play Monopoly as we know it today.
In the late 1800s lived Lizzie Magie, a clever and charismatic woman with a strong sense of justice. Waves of urban migration drew Lizzie's attention to rising financial inequality. Suddenly she had an idea: create a game about the landlord-tenant relationship. But Lizzie's initial game vilified the monopolist. Enter Charles Darrow - a marketer and salesman with a keen eye for what Lizzie's creation could become: an enticing board game, and a staple of family entertainment in households across America.
Boldness, imagination, and ruthless competition combine in this riveting story that sets the record straight on the history of Monopoly's…
For me, games have always been a way of playing mathematics. Every game has a hidden piece of mathematics behind it, and if you can understand that mathematics, I’ve found that it gives you a real edge in playing the game. I travel a lot for my work as a mathematician, and I love to ask about the games they play when I visit a new country. Games tell me a lot about the culture and people I am visiting. My book is my way of sharing my passion for games and mathematics with my readers.
Anyone who recognizes the title of this book is probably a Risk player. It’s the name of a rather obscure territory in this strategy board game of conflict and conquest, one that I love playing with my kids. The game is an important motif in this Spanish novel by Figueras.
The book, set in Argentina during the 1976 coup, is the enchanting story of a young boy trying to make sense of a world during a time of extraordinary upheaval. It beautifully illustrates how a game can provide an escape from the horrors of real life. By the way, if you want a tip for playing Risk, my mathematical analysis of the game reveals that North America is the best continent to occupy.
In Buenos Aires, in the mid-Seventies, a ten-year-old boy lives in world of school lessons and Superman comics, TV shows and games of Risk - a world in which men have superpowers and boys can conquer the globe on a square of cardboard. But in the outside world, a military junta have taken power; and amid a political climate of fear and intimidation, people are beginning to disappear without trace...
When his mother unexpectedly takes the boy and his kid brother out of classes, she tells them they're going on an impromptu family 'holiday'. But he soon realizes that the…
I’ve been a writer all my life in one form or another, and I love to observe the world around me and the people in it. I’ve had a fascination with dusk, in particular, since I was a child. I remember having the most adventurous time playing with my sister and our neighborhood friends after dinner in the summertime and soaking in everything that time of day had to offer—from the beautiful colors of the sunset to the croaking toads to the smell of the freshly cut grass. Each time of day—sunrise to midnight—offers a sensory overload if you are open to it. These books I have recommended dive into that delight.
I love a book that encourages a family to come together and enjoy the simpler things in life like a beautiful starry night, and that is what Blackout by John Rocco does.
The city in this book experiences a blackout at night. Without all the gadgets, TVs, and other distractions, a young kid and his family find their way to enjoy each other and their beautiful city in the pitch dark of night under a blanket of stars. Although my family is very plugged in, we make the effort to unplug now and again, go outside, and enjoy the Texas night sky.
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author picked
Blackout
as one of their favorite books, and they share
why you should read it.
This book is for kids age
3,
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5.
What is this book about?
One hot summer night in the city, all the power goes out. The TV shuts off and a boy wails, "Mommm!" His sister can no longer use the phone, Mom can't work on her computer, and Dad can't finish cooking dinner. What's a family to do? When they go up to the roof to escape the heat, they find the lights--in stars that can be seen for a change--and so many neighbors it's like a block party in the sky! On the street below, people are having just as much fun--talking, rollerblading, and eating ice cream before it melts. The…
Growing up in a snowy, rural mountain town of less than 500 people, I became fascinated with humanity's will to survive the elements at an early age because I often had to do so myself. Add in a mysterious force or an escaped killer wandering through the hills outside a secluded cabin, and you've got my favorite thriller subgenre: Trapped and secluded. It wasn't until my third novel, The Excursion, that I realized my longtime dream of writing a survival thriller influenced by dozens of books and movies. Today, I live in a suburb of Denver, Colorado, but the mountains are close. And so are the secluded cabins.
Harkening back to the well-established trope of inviting several seemingly unrelated guests to a secluded location (I’m thinking of the movie for the board game Clue right now) and wrapping them up in a creepy mystery, Kiersten Modglin has delivered a secluded thriller with originality, delectable darkness, and a series of great twists.
I was enthralled by the constant sense of danger and did not see the ending coming. I’ll admit that as a writer myself, the premise of authors invited to a writing retreat intrigued me from the start, but I was so pulled in by this thriller that I finished reading it in no time. Great work.
You are cordially invited to visit the new Black Hills Manor Writing Retreat.
That’s how it all begins—with a simple invitation.
For five authors, it’s meant to be the start of a restful week, filled with free food, drinks, and likeminded company. But shortly after their arrival, things take an unsettling turn.
Broken property, missing items, and strange noises are just some of the odd occurrences that have each member questioning their companions. As suspicions mount, the authors are pitted against each other.
Whom can they trust in a house full of strangers?
With tensions rising, the writers find themselves…
