January 2025

Welcome to the Indie Tabletop Newsletter, hear from independent tabletop games designers about their current and upcoming projects. Take a look at the games we’ve already self-published and our upcoming Kickstarters, maybe even get yourself a free print n play game. Learn more about this newsletter here.

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Our Kickstarter campaign for Supervolcano will launch at the end of January ’25 – you can check out the pre-launch campaign now. The game is a light-medium weight Print & Play for ages 14+. There’s a solo variant as well as competitive and co-op game modes included in the base pledge.

In the game, you play one of a number of power companies, contracted by the government to tackle an impending threat from a vast Supervolcano. Each player plays simultaneously to establish power plants and harvest super heated steam from deep inside the volcano.

Players must balance the challenges of building their operation and local populations, whilst keeping the magma chamber pressure under control. Fail to meet your quota and the resulting eruptions and quakes will see those precious populations disappear!

We also have a number of other planned launches for next year, including Voids 2.0, Murder at Marlborough Manor and a PNP Time Travel themed set collection game that is currently in development. You can also download and purchase our existing games on our webstore at teleporthole.com/shop

Supervolcano Kickstarter

Thrilled to finally share more details about a project PostCurious has been working on! Created in collaboration with TED-Ed, Pandora’s Legacy is an innovative gaming experience that combines elements of jigsaw puzzles, escape rooms, puzzle hunts, and legacy board games. TED Games will be launching Pandora’s Legacy in Spring 2025, and you can click the link below to follow the pre-launch page and be notified when the campaign goes live.

Being involved in this project has been a blast—the novel gameplay mechanics and the funny, engaging narrative have made it a joy to work on, and I know PostCurious fans are going to love it.

PostCurious’s creative director, Rita Orlov, is a panelist for The Next Stage 2025! January 17-19 The Immersive Experience Institute is hosting a gathering in Pasadena, CA for immersive creators, producers, technologists, academics, and enthusiasts. Rita Orlov (PostCurious), Lauren Bello (The Morrison Game Factory), Tommy Wallach (Mother of Frankenstein, Hatch Escapes) will be featured on a panel discussing narrative in immersive gaming.

Follow Pandora’s Legacy Kickstarter here

Happy New Year everyone! I hope 2025 is treating you all well so far. It’s an exciting time for Atikin Games, as I look forward to what I have planned for the year ahead. I am very happy to announce that 2025 will indeed be the year of Malus Hortus! I’m working diligently to get final blind play testing completed so that I can update my prototype copies and get them back out to previewers.

I’m hoping for a launch in March or April. For now, I’m not setting a strict date as I still have a house to renovate at the same time. If there are any reviewers out there who are local to Hampshire, UK and would like to preview the new version of Malus Hortus please get in touch as I am putting together a schedule for previewing my personal copy so I can drive it over to people and collect it a week or so later, this does of course mean I’m not able to give you a copy of the game as I have a limited number of prototype copies.

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It was a challenge and a difficult decision to make changes to the game after I had already sent out preview copies. Looking at the game as it is now, I’m very happy that I made that choice, it feels like a more robust game, with even more player interaction, I hope my previous previewers will feel the same way when they get to see the changes, wish me luck!

Please follow the Kickstarter preview page below to be notified on launch.

Malus Hortus

“There could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison” – Jane Austen, Persuasion

And yet, those two hearts were pulled apart from each other. But you can bring them together once again. In a world where we all want to believe in a love that can endure, Persuasion asks the players to follow Anne and Frederick as they spend time on their own various adventures before realizing that they do truly love one another. Bringing those two hearts back together again is a journey of luck, joy, and planning.

Players will find themselves thrust into the story with Frederick leaving a letter to Anne professing his love as he leaves to fight in the Napoleonic Wars. While Anne searches for her place in society. Challenges await as players must utilize their dice in clever ways finding times to pair them and other times to use them separately.

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Each turn 3 dice are rolled: 1 for Frederick, 1 for Anne, and 1 wild that can be paired with either. But players are limited to assisting Anne or Frederick on their turn, but not both. They will rely on combos to move values, modify rolls, and ultimately complete a number of challenges before the game ends.

Players will choose when to move on from a story element and when to complete extra spaces. Each story element will gain the players heart points which are ultimately used to determine the winner of the game. Be mindful of what your opponents are doing so that you can maximize your actions and win the hearts.

Persuasion also has a solo mode which challenges the player to complete the story in a set number of turns. Earning the highest possible score can prove quite challenging.

Persuasion will feel familiar to players who have played Pride and PrejuDice, but distinct as well. We hope that you will give Anne and Frederick a chance to grace your table and warm your heart.

Kickstarter page for Persuasion

As part of Relics: A Game of Angels, we’ve been publishing the six-part epic campaign titled The Chains of Ezekiel, where the personas discover that the humans have made a device that can trap and kill demons. Tracking these devices have led the personas to uncover evil billionaires, corrupt companies and dangerous cults. This December we’ve put out part five of the series: This Earthly Prison. The personas have tracked the device to its creators, but what is their intent? And what is this prison that they have built with the technology?

This Earthly Prison is a 20 page adventure. It includes five pre-generated characters so the adventure can also be run as a stand alone, or to add new characters to your series. It also comes with several very nasty demons to fight. You can grab it on itch or on DrivethruRPG.

Get it on itch

We have officially finished our Kickstarter with 81 backers! Soon it will be available on Dice Pen and PnP Arcade to buy! Right now, we are still accepting late pledges, so if you want a fun neighborly battle Christmas lights dice game to play, please check it out! Roll dice, color the lights, and battle your way to Christmas glory!

We hit three stretch goals! A solo mode, a snowball fight inside the game, and a Halloween and gingerbread edition of the game. These last two editions come out to backers tonight, hot off the press from my designer! As a first Kickstarter game designer, it’s been a wild ride, and I’d love to thank each and every one of my backers for supporting my game design dreams!

Please check out it’s fresh BGG page: boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/431455/the-naughty-or-nice-christmas-lights-competition – Happy holidays!

Kickstarter late pledge link

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