PLAAY CONNECT 04.16.26

We're getting into the "spring of things" with the release of the new boxed version of our horse racing game! And there's more stuff happening as well, read on!...

TONIGHT: PLAAY at the Races!

“Tah-tah-tah TAH-ta-ta-ta, TAH-ta-ta-ta, TAH-ta-ta-ta TAHHHHH...”(printed version of trumpet call at the start of the big horse race, click here for the actual audio...) Join us tonight for the official un-boxing of the new boxed version of our horse racing game, preview of the add-ons (card sets, PLAAY mat, etc.) and the launch of the game! 6pm MT, 8pm ET on the PLAAY Games YouTube channel!

• NOTE: We're expecting a relatively large surge of folks to order the game "out of the gate", so be advised that there may be a bit longer-than-usual wait time for your package to be processed, even if you order right away. Thanks so much in advance for your patience, we appreciate it!

Indi-CON Recap!

Heartfelt thanks to ST Patrick and his wife Jena for the amazing display of down-home hospitality and FUN at this past weekend's Indi-CON gathering! I hope to compose a recap of the event for the blog, but until I do, here are a few two-sentence highlights.

• Fishin' Game Fun! Me, Jerome Weisen, Micah Wimmer and his GF Mon and Ethan Musulin spent an hour at Lake Mukwonago Friday night, definitely one of the highlights of the weekend. I managed to snag the Wallhanger with a dwindling tackle box (re-roll of "4!"--got it!) much to the delight/chagrin of all!

• History Maker Golf Tournament: Many thanks to Charles Helms who organized this, it was sort of a "flex-tourney" where you played your two rounds at Augusta where/whenever it fit in your weekend gaming schedule. I played a foursome with Paul Salzgeber, Mark Russell and James Cast, wound up winning by five strokes with a six-under 138--which earned me the PLAAY Green Jacket!

• Kentucky "Big Race" Pre-PLAAY: I ran this Saturday night back at the hotel, as we just ran out of time at the event hall. We had a good crowd watching as Silent Tactic (6-1 odds) won the race comfortably, followed by Commandment and Further Ado. Renegade made a classic closer run at the end and might have pulled out the win if the race were one furlong longer!

Fun at IndiCON: (Left) Saturday began with a tour of the Early Ford V8 Museum, a memorable collection of antique cars, trucks, buses and, yes, even farm implements! That’s Steve Etzel next to a vintage Ford tractor, he’s holding up a photo from his phone of when he was a kid on his dad’s farm, sitting atop the same model tractor! (Right) Action from the IndiCON “Green Jacket” Golf Tournament, I’m wearing the Broncos jersey—clockwise from me, it’s Mark Russell, John Lowe, Charles Helms, James Cast and Paul Salzgeber.

Eau Claire PLAAY-Fest Update

If you haven't heard yet, we've officially expanded this event to two days! We'll have "old time baseball," a big fishin' tournament and Fury Sports! Here's the latest information about PLAAY-Fest...

History Maker Golf at D2D CON

After our Green Jacket Event at IndiCON, we'll have another stop on the PLAAY Gamer Golf Tour happening at "Digital 2 Dice Con" in Connecticut in a few weeks! Let us know if you want to play, so that we'll have enough game books and dice for everyone! We'll be playing the Connecticut River pro course, of course!

“Tennis Anyone?”

We've just released four new tennis sets for Let's PLAAY Tennis: 2025 Pro Men's and Women'sand 2026 Tennis Association Global Men’s and Women’s (fictional) cards. Props to Chad McEvoy who crunched the numbers and put together the ratings for these sets.

FREE stuff!

• Kentucky "Big Race" Horse and Jockey Cards: The derby is a couple weeks away, so the final line-up of 20 horses and jockeys has not yet been set. This free download includes the top 32 horses and jockeys, the top ten (1-10) are "locks" and the next five or six (11-16) are considered to be likely runners. That leaves about half the set competing for the final four spots. You can decide on who runs on YOUR game table! There’s also an expanded gate/track board that you can use to accommodate the larger field, both from the gate and as the race unfolds.

NOTE for a race this size, we’re suggesting breaking up the BACK group into THREE groups for challenge purposes instead of just two. Conduct a back group challenge in three phases...

PHASE ONE: Horses in 20 through 14 (gold background) challenge horses 13 through 10 (brown background).

PHASE TWO: Horses in 13 through 10 (brown background) challenge horses 9 through 7 (BACK group, green background).

PHASE THREE: Horses in BACK group, green background challenge horses in MIDDLE Group (bronze background).

News from the PLAAY Fictional Baseball Universe

You may/not be aware (we were not) that there is a long-running baseball publication called Baseball America. It started out as print publication in the 1980s and now has both a print and an online presence. On Tuesday 04.14.26 we received an amicable e-mail from their president advising us that they own the trademark rights to the name "Baseball America." We're currently discussing a possible licensing agreement that would allow us to continue to use the Baseball America name for our fictional baseball universe. However, if an agreement can't be reached that works for both parties, we will defer to them and forge ahead with our fictional baseball universe under a new identity.

Until we figure out which direction we're headed, our Baseball America fictional cards are no longer available. NOTE that availability of our "vintage" fictional sets (Century and Continental Leagues) are unaffected. Stay tuned!

THE College Hoops PLAAY-Down

...is currently out of stock, it will return once the horse racing game is out and the dedicated printing for that release has died down a little.

As we mentioned in our update a couple weeks ago, we've put together a free download of all the corrected cards for THE College Hoops PLAAY-Down. If you would like a printed copy of the corrected card file, we’ll snail-mail one to you; a $3 Miscellaneous Purchase will help with the postal and printing costs, thanks!

Coming Soon: The Global Soccer Cup Championships!

The every-four-years world-wide "soccer-palooza" is about to begin, with real-life games in our hemisphere this time around, exciting! (Have you seen the ticket prices, though!?) We're still working on the final ratings for the 48 teams invited to this year's tournament, but are expecting a release that's somewhere in late May, a couple weeks ahead of the start of the real thing in June.

Photo Finish

David Borst took this photo from his game table in downtown Indianapolis looking out over Lucas Oil Stadium, site of the real Final Four as he played the finals of THE College Hoops PLAAY-Down! "I’m playing your college set in tournament format. Going 64 to 1 using a hybrid approach. Just thought I’d send this photo along as maybe it's something you’ve never seen with your games. Hope you have a a good week and thanks for all you do!"

Thanks for reading, and for being part of our amazing community of board gamers! See you tonight for PLAAY at the Races!…