My girlfriend designed my most striking game

Stamp Showdown will soon be on its way to backers. Which means it’s time to talk about what’s next. And I have to say: this might be the game dearest to my heart so far!

Let me tell you about its origin story.

My girlfriend does not like board games. And that’s softly put. She hates when games leave no room for socialising and finds artwork often dull and not aesthetic. Somehow, during a long drive from the Netherlands to Denmark, she said “Maybe I should make my own game, so we can finally play a game together I like”. I was extremely surprised. And I challenged her to do so using a deck of playing cards.

Mechanics of the game

The next evening in the hotel we had a drink in the lobby and she got to work on the gameplay. She looked at aspects she does like in games: collecting things, quick turns and thinking ahead to gain advantage. It was a great starting point.

She immediately cooked up the foundation and laid out a market of cards on the table between our drinks. The idea: you have to make three collections: one of two cards, one of three and one of four. Each collection needed to be one of three types of matching sets.

We tried a bunch of things that evening. Different hand sizes, different drafting mechanics, swapping cards, and various ways the market resolved. By the end of the night we had a solid core. It was a fun, accessible and puzzly one!

From here on, I took over the development. I iterated and fine tuned the rules over many playtests with many people (big thanks to all the people at the Leiden Game Night meetup). People liked the puzzling and I added a little more interaction. It was now time to think about the aesthetics of the game.

Theme of the game

My girlfriend and I agreed the cards had to be funky and colorful, with a modern touch. We felt the theme would be crucial for making the game aesthetically pleasing. The tricky part was finding a fitting theme that also supported the game mechanics of collecting sets. Each type of matching set has its own place in the ranking order. For example, a run in the same suit is higher than a run in different suits. So the theme had to support this: a run in the same suit should be visually more appealing than a run in different suits.

This was difficult. But after months and months of brainstorming, we saw the light. What is more collectable and aesthetic to the eye than art? We found our theme! In Gallery Gambit, players are gallery owners competing to collect the most striking sets of art pieces coming from one of four influential art movements.

Now I took steps to bring the theme to life. I wanted to work with a local artist, and found Julia van Duijn. She took on the graphic design and illustration of the game. And she is also an avid board gamer! Together we brainstormed on funky and colourful art movements for the four suits. We landed on ♦️Bauhaus, ♠️Cubism, ♣️Fauvism and ♥️Pop-Art. Then we thought of thirteen subjects often depicted on paintings: One for each rank. When Julia shared the first artworks, I immediately loved them. And I am happy to share even my critical girlfriend couldn’t be more enthusiastic: Finally a fun and aesthetically pleasing game! You can find a first sneak peek of the cards below.

And that’s how Gallery Gambit came to life. I hope you’re as excited about it as I am. And did you notice how I already dropped the name of the game twice? Gallery Gambit. In the next update I will elaborate on why it has this name by explaining the gameplay and mechanics of the game in detail. Stay tuned!

- Robin