Philly has a devoted community of board game players and creators. Game designers and enthusiasts regularly meet up at shops like Redcap's Corner and Board and Brew, both in University City, to network and participate in play-testing sessions.
The gatherings give creators opportunities to showcase titles they have in development and receive vital feedback from real players.
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These designers represent a creative force in the city's maker community, developing games that range from family-friendly adventures to sophisticated strategy experiences. Some game makers showcased their latest projects recently PAX Unplugged, the annual tabletop gaming convention.
From a Black-owned card game studio pushing the boundaries of social deduction games to independent designers reimagining classic fantasy themes, Philadelphia's tabletop creators are leaving their mark on the industry.
Here are four upcoming games to look out for, and one you can purchase online now, that showcase the diversity and innovation of the city's game design community.
Deceit is the goal in this 'UNO'-like game
Trickery and communication are the keys to the card game No Cap! from Capital Punishment Games, in which as many as 10 players attempt to assemble five-of-a-kind sets of cards.
Participants work together in teams of two. When a complete set is acquired, the player with the cards must covertly signal their teammate, usually with hand gestures. The other teammate must declare "No cap!" for the pair to get a point. Players on the other teams can shout out "Cap!" if they suspect another team has assembled a full set, which would earn two points for their team, instead.
"It's a competitor to UNO, but way more fun, and it's local to Philly," said designer Derrick Skipper, who lives in the city's Wynnefield Heights neighborhood. Skipper co-founded Capital Punishment Games, a Black-owned business that has been designing games since 2020.
No Cap! is available to purchase through Amazon and the game maker's website.
A family-friendly story about furry critters
Based on the children's book by Fran Hodgkins, in the board-game version of A Raccoon's Game: Seven Saves the Notch players race to reach the mystical forest with their critter characters.
By drawing cards and rolling a die, players navigate the board with the goal of collecting seven rings for their raccoons' tails to gain entry to the forest. Mat Wolff, the game's designer, describes A Raccoon's Game as a "lightweight" tabletop game that introduces younger players to more complicated concepts.
"Along the way, you need the help of your friends, and so you're going to learn some basic introduction to more complex gaming things like (card) hand management, strategic movement, resource gathering and sharing," said Wolff, who is originally from Texas and and moved to Philly in 2021.
A Kickstarter campaign for A Raccoon's Game: Seven Saves the Notch launches in the first quarter of 2025.
Build and grow a heroic character
In the tabletop role-playing game Crucible of Aether, players create characters who embark on adventures in a fantasy world in the midst of an industrial revolution. With every roll of the dice, characters evolve and amass new skills.
For instance, the adventures of a master sword fighter may require the character to moonlight as a cook or learn to ride a horse, gaining abilities that could be useful as the game progresses.
Lead designer Jackie Prince, a lifelong West Philly resident, called Crucible of Aether a "very big, very complicated game," that has been in the works for more than a decade. From player feedback, Living Metal Games studio has made the game more accessible and the story more inclusive of different identities.
The Kickstarter for Crucible of Aether launches in January, but anyone interested in testing it out can play a portion of the game now on Crucible's Discord server.
Run your own fantasy shop in a fantasy world
Adventure games often have shops where players can purchase items to help on their quests. But what about a game where you're the shopkeeper? That's the premise of Vintage Faire by designer Eric Sayag, who lived in Washington D.C. before moving to Manayunk.
It is an "area majority" game in which players compete to acquire the most territory in a shared space. In Vintage Faire, each player is a merchant, running a retail business, attempting to sell their wares and put the other players out of business.
Sayag, who organizes monthly board game play-testing events for local designers, did not say when Vintage Faire would be released, and a crowdfunding campaign is planned.
Solve a murder over cocktails
You've been invited to an elegant but deadly masquerade cocktail party in Murder on the Rocks, a whodunit card game by studio Misfit Mixers.
In Murder on the Rocks, one character meets an untimely demise at the hands of another during a blindfolded dance party. It invokes games like Mafia that involve deception and deduction based on other players' actions.
Based on clues from cryptic images on the playing cards and how you interpret and analyze the evidence, you must determine who the killer is.
The game is packaged in a cocktail shaker, and it comes with immersive elements used in gameplay, like blindfolds and two vials for coloring drinks. "It's a fun game to poison friends with," game designer Jillian Belli, of Spring City, Chester County, said. The Kickstarter for Murder on the Rocks launches "very soon," Belli said.