Language Selection

Get healthy now with MedBeds!
Click here to book your session

Protect your whole family with Orgo-Life® Quantum MedBed Energy Technology® devices.

Advertising by Adpathway

Sail the Red Tides, Hyperjump through the Galaxy, and Fear Betty "Two Bricks"

9 months ago 34

PROTECT YOUR DNA WITH QUANTUM TECHNOLOGY

Orgo-Life the new way to the future

Advertising by Adpathway

by W. Eric Martin

Gen Con 2025 is ten days away as I write this, but while the focus of many gamers is on what's happening in Indianapolis, designers and publishers are continuing their activity elsewhere, especially on crowdfunding sites.

▪️ Homestead Hyperjump! is the first release from the wife, husband, and son team of Lyndsie, Mike, and Liam Doyle, who are crowdfunding and publishing this ambitious debut title as Ship & Star Games.

Here's an overview of this 1-6 player game:

Homestead Hyperjump! is an epic co-operative space adventure game set at the dawn of the 25th century. Players assume the role of Homesteaders, intrepid pioneers from across the Sol System whose unique backgrounds and experiences make them ideal candidates for service aboard an experimental Homesteader-class vessel, a cutting-edge starship commissioned by the United Interests of Sol to explore the vast, uncharted galaxy.

Equipped with newly discovered hyperjump technology, you and your crew will navigate anomalies and chart dozens of sectors across three distant star clusters. Along the way, players will encounter strange phenomena, face dangerous foes, and make critical decisions that could shape the fate of humanity.

Each session of Homestead Hyperjump! immerses players in a galaxy brimming with life, danger, and discovery. Your choices will define the journey as you make first contact with alien civilizations, navigate perilous anomalies, and uncover the mysteries of uncharted space. With more than thirty narrative-driven scenarios, sixty branching paths, and countless decisions to make, no two games will ever be the same.

Choose from six key roles — captain, engineer, tactician, doctor, scientist, or pilot — and build your crew from eighteen characters, each with unique abilities essential for survival. Together, you'll manage your ship's critical systems, balance resources, and overcome escalating threats like space madness and hostile forces.

The future of humanity is in your hands. Will your crew rise to the challenge and discover a habitable world to claim as your own — or die trying?

▪️ Another first-time publisher crowdfunding its debut title is Tortugas Games LLC, with the game being Red Tides: A Tale of New Caribbea, a 1-4 player design from company co-owners Nick Raynor and Jon Micah Tyson:

Red Tides: A Tale of New Caribbea is a co-operative boss-battling naval strategy game. You and your fellow pirate captains begin with small ships, basic cannons, and a humble crew. Over the course of ten rounds, you hunt merchant ships, gather plunder, upgrade your vessel, and face increasingly powerful foes — including the dreaded Pirate Lords. Your ultimate goal is to take down the tyrannical pirate king John Davies and his monstrous flagship, The Dead Drifter.

Combat features tactical movement and dice-driven volleys at different ranges (long, medium, close), with opportunities to board and seize enemy ships. Plunder gains you cannons, gold, and upgrades, while faction-specific powers and fate dice add strategic flair.

The game escalates across three acts from scrappy survival to epic naval warfare, culminating in a final showdown.

▪️ In a break from the pattern, UK publisher Kaioss Games is crowdfunding its second release — but before we get to that, I wanted to look at Kaioss' first title, the 2024 game Betty Two Bricks from company co-founders, the daughter-and-father team of Diana and Steve Read:

You're a mobster working for the biggest boss in town, Betty "Two Bricks", but your work ain't the bee's knees and you've made the big cheese unhappy — so unhappy, she sends you a brick in the post. Can you get your gang together and finish three grifts to beef up Betty's power in the city before she sends her second brick?

Betty Two Bricks is a Roaring Twenties-themed party card game for 2—6 players in which you need to glom, cheat, and bluff your way to victory in a race against your fellow players.

I'm not normally one for mob humor, but Betty "Two Bricks"?! I'm dead...probably from a brick-related injury.

Side note: In the U.S., the name "Betty" peaked in popularity in 1931, probably as a result of the copious news stories about Betty "Two Bricks". All the parents were like, we want a child who will take no guff, so they gave their girl the toughest name around.

▪️ While their first release was a 2-6 player game, the Reads' second title is a two-player dueling game of sorts: The Fable of Mabel on the Witch's Table, which is being crowdfunded through the end of August 2025:

The Fable of Mabel on the Witch's Table brings playfulness, cuteness, and unmitigated chaos to your tabletop as this two-player board game asks you to do the impawssible: give a cat instructions.

In a simple tug-of-war battle, you must herd Mabel the Cat across the board so that she can push magical trinkets off a witch's table. Each fallen knickknack earns you points, but don't go feline smug as some thingamajigs can subtract from your score.

We all know cats. Commands are mere suggestions to their fluffy ears. It will be hard to purr-suade Mabel to pounce when your opponent plays the cat nap card. Whatever you do, don't waste too much time as cat-astrophe looms; soon the owner of the table shall return, and they'll not be pleased by all the mess the two of you caused. (Mabel's too cute to blame.)

Read Entire Article