PLAAY in Big D: BGG.con Update 11.22.25

Our time in Dallas is about to wrap up--one more day at BGG.con and then we head back to Denver. It's been a hectic week, for sure. I thought I'd better put down some thoughts right now, I may not have time once we get back, what with Thanksgiving activities and the holiday sale. So here we go...

Here’s Sam, manning the booth on “opening day” (for exhibitors) at BGG.con, Thursday 11.19.25.

Shout-outs to PLAAY Gamers Jesse Cheng and Joseph Dowell (and his wife Michelle), who were "in the house" for the entire convention. We got to spend some extended, quality time with each of them. Another long-time PLAAY gamer, Albert Taylor, was here on Saturday, it was good to catch up with him. He has been working tirelessly on a new Battle Royale/Royal Rumble add-on for Face To The Mat pro wrestling that might be available as soon as next year. We were also pleasantly surprised to meet some "Silent" PLAAY gamers, people who have already found PLAAY Games but who identify more with the general board game hobby than specifically with ours.

Most of our time was spent demoing the Studio Sp1cy games, Draft Duel, Myth Mash and Cat Party. All were very well received. We had several multi-player games with Draft Duel which was really fun. Clearly, people who like fantasy football connect easily with what we're doing with Draft Duel. Probably three-quarters of the people who played Draft Duel wound up purchasing at least one copy.

Here’s Sam demoing Studio Sp1cy’s “Cat Party” card game.

I found/made time to play some of the PLAAY NOW titles that I felt would be well-received by the BGG crowd. I floundered at Lake Mukwanago with the fishing game (the easiest lake we have!), reeling in just eight pounds of fish (mwah-mwah-mwaaaaaahhhh) and had a memorable game of Mister President playing cooperatively with Jesse Cheng. We resolved the Natural Disaster crisis down to the last card on Day 8. At that point, we had the crisis WELL in hand--but we were at the "Huh?" Approval level; so we decided to go for National Acclaim status by acquiring both blue dice and basically "looking busy" for a couple of days to beef up out approval rating. By Day 11 we were on the president's golden list, all we had to do was resolve the last card. That's where things unravelled. We just weren't able to muster up the needed political capital with enough reserve to assure the president's approval--as the days tick by, approval becomes harder to get. Bottom line--in trying to feather our nest, we wound up getting fired. Hey, that's politics, right?

I don’t know what we’re smiling about—we just got FIRED!!

The sports games have gotten a good workout, especially History Maker Baseball. Of course, atop the list of "things to do" at BGG.con was the conclusion of the Commissioner's Surprise Hockey Blast tournament. We brought the Final Four hockey teams with us to Dallas. In the semi-finals, New Jersey continued its Cinderella Run upsetting favored Edmonton 4-3. Leon Draisaitl scored twice for the Oilers, but the Devils were able to shut everyone else down. St. Louis edged past Pittsburgh 2-1, with Pavel Buchnevich the star for the Blues (two assists, numerous defensive plays). That set-up a championship game between the Devils and Oilers that goes into the books as one of the most epic hockey game I've ever experienced! Joseph took the Blues, I took the Devils. I'll try to be brief...

Hockey Night in Dallas at BGG.con! Blues vs. Devils, color-coordinated hockey trays courtesy of Travis Jansen!

New Jersey scored in the opening minute, Hamilton. Five minutes later, St. Louis' Jake Neighbours was whistled for a minor, and the Devils went on the power play. It was the most disastrous power play in the history of hockey, with the Blues scoring not ONE, but TWO short-handed goals--in a two minute span! (FWIW, we calculated the odds of this happening in Hockey Blast to be around 40,000-to-1.) St. Louis later got an unassisted goal from Neighbors at the 13-minute mark to make it 3-1.

The second period started out "deja-vu all over again"--same lines, same result: an instant New Jersey goal, Hamilton assisted by Brett and Hischier! But the Blues responded with a trio of goals to increase the St. Louis lead to 6-2. It seemed that the carriage had turned back into a pumpkin for the Devils.

Luke Hughes put one in the St. Louis net in the second minute of the third period, making it 6-3. That's when things got nasty. New Jersey's Kovacevic delivered a cheap shot against the Blues' Holloway, ignored by the refs. Less than a minute later, the Devils' Kovacevic broke free down the ice, pulled down from behind by a frustrated Buchnevich. That resulted in a penalty shot for New Jersey, but Hischier's screamer was deflected by Bennington and--as we noted on the score sheet--"the fans headed for the exits." Any who did, though, regretted it...

Jack Hughes got the puck back and slammed it home in the 8th minute and Haula followed that up less than minute later with a wrist shot from the top of the crease. Suddenly, it was 6-5! Whaaaaa!?

Hard hitting and puck digging for the next half-dozen minutes. Two (questionable?) calls put the Devils on back-to-back power plays as the game hit the thirteen-minute mark. Buchnevic and company killed off both penalties. The whistle came out again almost the moment the second PP expired--this time against the Devils! St. Louis had multiple opportunities, multiple shots--but couldn't get anything past (New Jersey goalie). The power play expired just before the final minute arrived with the Blues in possession of the puck. (NJ goalie) left the game for the extra attacker. Turnover!...the Devils with a chance...Hughes to Hischier to Haula to Bratt--the shot...GOALLLL! Just past Binnington's outstretched glove! Tie game, 6-6! Wow!

After the ensuing face-off, the final seconds were skated out, and we're headed to overtime.

You'd think the refs would swallow the whistle in a high-profile situation like this--but, noooo! In the opening minute, Brayden Schenn was tagged with a minor, and the Devils made quick work of it on the power play, Hischier getting the championship-winning shot off a feed from Haula. And the Devils' improbable comeback was complete, down four goals in the final period. Amazing.

Worth noting that 6 of the game's 7 power play opportunities were awarded to the Devils!

Saturday afternoon both Sam and I participated in BGG's Game Designer Panel. Sam's slot was 1 to 2:30 with fellow (young) designer Reed Ambrose. Mine was at 3pm with (um, "veteran") game designers Alan Moon and Eric Lang. Honestly, I felt a little out of my element. But I will conceded that I have approached the game business/hobby from an angle dramatically different than the norm. So, if nothing else, I did feel like I brought a unique perspective. The discussion was wide-ranging, from game favorites to design tips to the impact of AI on board games. After the discussion included, I had discussions with a couple of the audience members who were unfamiliar with the sports sim game genre. SO interesting the different perspectives!

Final “city scape” for our game of Rolling Heights, the cap on each building indicated the builder: (purple) Michelle Dowell, (yellow) Joseph Dowell, (black) Sam Avallone, (green) Keith Avallone. Yes, Michelle won. Handily. By a LOT.

Despite being busy all day at the exhibitors hall, we still had/made time for some after-hours gaming. BGG.con has a similar expansive game library as Dice Tower West. "After hours" gaming included Unmatched, a "street fighting" game (I was Bigfoot, Joseph was Robin Hood) and a VERY cool resource management game called Rolling Heights. (I finished in last place, but I did build a very cool sports stadium!).

Final thoughts...

We went into this with the realization that 99% of the folks here would have pretty much zero interest in sports games and that our mission was to seek out the 1% who do--that would be about 30 people. I'd say, mission accomplished. Bonus: several of the new acquaintances are from the Denver area. We will be meeting up with them again soon, in Colorado!

Well, time to start getting packed up for the return trip. It was a wonderful (exhausting!) time at BGG.com! I'm sure I've forgotten some things--will tie up the loose ends on our pre-holiday sale stream.