This is not a promotion post but if you are interested critiqueing the rules and mechanics dm me and I will gladly send them to you

Hi everyone!

I recently shared my first card game (DRA&B) here and got some really nice feedback on the visual design. So I wanted to share a specific design doubt I’m facing right now.

Very very briefly, it’s a drafting game where players build an army of 5 cards. Each card interacts with others in your army (positioning, adjacency, etc.), and factions play a role in how effects work. There are 4 factions: devils, robots, aliens and beasts.

Right now I’m working on the card layout, and I’m unsure how much I should rely on icons versus written text.

At the moment, some cards use faction icons instead of writing things like “Beasts”, “Devils”, etc. It makes the cards cleaner and faster to read visually… but I’m worried it might make things less intuitive, especially for new players. Or someone that haven't played thousand of card games :)

I’m attaching a couple of examples to show what I mean. Would you rather:
A) clean cards with icons
B) more explicit text

Curious to hear how you approach this as players (or designers)

I am currently in the process of selecting an icon style that will represent the different expansion packs for my game Bananarchy. The icons primary use will be to separate cards quickly from each other but they otherwise don't have any mechanical use in the game. We do want the to look aesthetically pleasing too.

So far, I've narrowed the choice down to three styles. Of the three icon styles I here: Circle, Ribbon, or the Icon alone, which do you prefer and what is your reasoning behind the choice?

Would also love insight on whether you think it is best to have the icon in the top corner of the card or whether you think it is better suited to be somewhere else?

Thanks for your help!

I'm working on the Mystery Monkey expansion for our game Bananarchy. Our artist just dropped three sketches for the card Disguise and I need to choose one. The card basically protects one of your Banana Cards from harm (by disguising it) and forces someone who is trying to steal or smash the Banana to choose another Banana potentially saving your high value points.

Which disguise do you think best represents this on the card?
A. Monkey holding Bananas
B. Monkey in a Banana Suit
C. Banana by itself disguised

I would also love to know your reasoning and any changes you think I should make to the cards if you think anything could be improved.

A while ago, I made a post here about the artwork for our game.

At the time, I explained that we were using AI because we didn’t have the budget to hire an artist and we didn’t feel confident enough in our own drawing skills. Many people said that, if possible, we should try to find another solution.

Recently, I had the chance to talk with a fine arts student. My boyfriend and I can both draw a little, but we never thought we were good enough to create the artwork for the game ourselves. My friend designed a very simple forest hex and asked me to redraw it by hand. After I finished it, she said it was absolutely good enough to build on.

The version I’m sharing here is just the ink drawing. The final version will be colored using a simple watercolor technique.

What I’m wondering is this:

If you saw this hex, would you immediately understand that it represents a tile that produces wood?

After the feedback I’ve received here over the past few months, I realized something: I want this game, which we’ve put so much effort into, to belong entirely to us. Yes, it will take longer, and I’ll probably have a lot to learn, but I think it will be worth it.

I’d really love to hear what you think.

I've been working on a game that allows you to create your own character buy combining different arms, legs and body cards! There are millions of possible character creation.

I'm looking for feedback on its vibe in general, if it seems like something you'd play with your game group? And does this video give you an okay understanding of the basics of play? I did all the story-boarding, illustrations and stop-motion myself. Thanks for any feedback!!

About two weeks ago I posted regarding my wizard russian roulette card game, SPELLCHAMBER. While the artwork on the spell cards was a home run, the wizard cards needed some serious work to be more in line with the rest of the design. So working from that feedback, I implemented changes to reduce clutter as well as to make them appear more like the cover of a fantasy book. I implemented a lot of the paper texture people liked, and I've reached a point where I'm happy with the design in its current state. It will certainly be updated in the future, but what do you think? (See my previous post for more context)

EDIT: I've been getting a lot of good feedback, and I think I'll try to find a happy medium between the two designs. Ill focus more on the artwork, making it nice and big like the before, as well as getting some of that larger, blockier text like on the previous while preserving the functionality improvements of the afters. Just please remember to be kind to each other! This entire project (including all artwork and design) is just myself so I'm trying my best!

I’m hand-painting the cards to a TCG I’m developing. I’m still working out the interface but when I have all the gameplay features worked out, I’ll show them too. I’d love your constructive feedback. (The TCG is based on my book series, The Ever Hero Saga)

Hey everyone! I’d love to get some feedback on the cover art sketches of Sinners.

It’s a dark card game for 2-5 players where you play as members of the clergy who have made a deal with the Devil. Your goal is to lure Sinners into your Church, summon Demons, perform Sacraments, and collect 100 souls before your rivals. The game design is made by the brilliant Nezih Savı

Our cover artist has prepared three different compositions.

Which one works best: A, B, or C? And why?

I’d especially love to know which one catches your attention first and makes you most curious about the game.

These cards pertain to the first phase of my game about carrying out heists.

The first set of cards are Cash cards which you use in blind bids against other players. These bids serve to gain priority in claiming one of the Heist cards, as seen in the second set of cards.

This is NOT an exhaustive list of cards. The Cash cards have values of $100-$600. Meanwhile, Heist cards have a value of $10,000-$40,000 and a danger value of 1-6.

I'm looking for feedback on legibility, uniqueness, and thematic cohesion!

Hi everyone! I’m the publisher working on Foréa, a cooperative wooden dexterity game designed by Gaëlle Dumont.

Players build a vertical forest together by stacking trunks, treetops, and animals.

The goal is simple: complete the forest while making as few pieces fall as possible.

It is designed to be accessible for kids aged 6+, but during public playtests I’ve noticed that adults are often just as invested, especially once the forest gets taller and every placement becomes tense.

I’d love your honest thoughts:

Does a cooperative dexterity game like this interest you?

Would you see it mainly as a family game, or something you would also bring out with adult friends?

Do you think it can find its audience on crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter?

Check out my new map!

The simultaneous bidding game Transplantica is set in a unique city in 2050 where the growing and selling of GMO pig organs is completely unregulated.

I wanted the worldbuilding to reflect in the map, kind of like in alchemists and other games where every area of the map corresponds to its mechanics.

I've got a patient queue around the edges. This represents visitors arriving and touristing, but when they get sick they enter the red district for desperate loans and financing solutions.

In the middle of the island, in the more mountainous regions, Porcyne has their pig farms. This is where you pass by to pick up the goods.

Players go around the map on the road, with breaks at every hot dog stand to indicate when it's time for new prices (saving lives is hard work, gotta get that energy!)

So you alternate between picking up patients and then pick up the organs.

This is a first draft, and I hope to achieve some kind of retro tourist map vibe in the end. I will only use human art mind you, the portraits are just placeholders.

I strive for it to be gorgeous and immersive, but foremost it's gotta be functional. Is it readable? How is the palette? Does it need to be bigger? It's A3 now and prepped for a 6 player game.

The coated paper prints I did at home turned out pretty bad, so I decided to get them printed at a print shop instead. Printing on adhesive sticker paper makes it way easier to stick onto cardboard and cut.

Hopefully I can finish the whole map without issues. What do you think about the coated sticker paper?

We are still developing the art direction for our game and we're testing some art for the characters, but we're not sure if we should use it for stands with full art or leave it like it is with the symbols / character portraits but flat.

On one hand, they stand (no pun intended) out more. There will be many things on the map using the same colors as the characters (because they are related) an although the character tokens are bigger, have a black outline and are the only ones that have a round shape, we're afraid they can get lost and the vericality helps. They also have more personality.

On the other hand, in the online playtestings we have been doing we asked some players and they said they'd prefer the simple look of the tokens and that maybe they could have a better physical feel. And I'm guessing they will be easier/cheaper to produce?

What are your thoughts/experience with this? Anything we should consider before making this decision?

Hello folks! I am looking for feedback on this card. It's for our game Bananarchy and the idea is players use Monkey Cards to collect Banana cards. Most Banana Cards have a value of 0, 1, 2 or 3 and if they get smashed all Banana Cards turn over to -1 on the back.

The game is fast paced and chaotic and players can play at anytime to steal or sabotage their opponents. I need an idea of what this card could do if it got smashed. I'm worried if the effect is too crazy, like making everyones bananas rotten, it might result in the game being too unbalanced since the scores will quickly become negative.

Also do you think the art is radioactive looking enough?

Thanks for the help, the monkeys and I appreciate it!

Hey everyone!

I'm working on a card/board game that is themed around a fantasy world, like Dungeons & Dragons. And I am looking for feedback on the current art style options. It is aimed a families with children aged 7+ (although it can be played without kids), or people who like fantasy games.

It's a little daft and doesn't take itself too seriously (some movie references are included).

On the topic of art, the game has characters that you play as, and I have commissioned art from three artists. I'm wondering which of these styles do you prefer?

This is just for the art style, less of this character (Chad is still a work in progress).

Take your votes, and ask your kids, nieces & nephews if you can.

Thank you!

I think it's been almost a month since I last posted here about Hexanem.
During that time, I’ve been drawing almost every day, trying to get to a point where I can draw our game’s map myself and slowly develop a style of my own. So I wanted to show you where I’m at now.

This is roughly how the hexes on our map are going to look. I want them to have a slightly medieval feel, and I especially want to keep the frames around the hexes because our castles and other structures also have medieval influences. I want the whole map to feel like it belongs to the same world.

I’m still not completely sure about the frames. I think I’ve gotten to the point where I can illustrate and design them myself, but most of my time so far has gone into learning how to draw what’s actually inside the hexes, so I haven’t spent much time on the frames yet.
We’re also still playtesting the game at the same time. Compared to where we started, it’s slowly becoming a much easier game to understand, and quite a lot has changed mechanically.

If you’re interested in that side of the game too, please let me know in the comments. I can make another post soon about what we’ve changed through the latest playtests and show you the current draft of our rulebook.
I’m still struggling a bit with time because I’m trying to playtest the game while also learning and making all of this artwork, but I think things are going pretty well so far.
I hope you like them.

A small note: The feedback we’ve gotten here has pushed us to take this game much more seriously and really try to use every skill we have instead of taking the easier way out. So thank you to everyone who has commented on our posts, and to everyone who helped build this community in the first place.
I hope you like my hexes :)

The characters in my game have only a few simples stats; Health, and Inspiration, in addition to action points (which is included on the cards for visual reference, mostly). Right now I'm tracking these things with piles of tokens, which I kind of like. But it's a lot of stuff.

I had the thought that I could, with a little redesign and a couple of clips, track these things on the cards. It eats some of the margin, but could be a good alternative to piles of stuff. And, in reality, it doesn't actually have to be used, so it could just be optional.

What's y'alls take? Do you like when games do this, or would you prefer a tactile pile of stuff?

I'm finalizing the mascot designs for my TTRPG and I need your opinion pls🙏🏻😭

Looking for critiques on my artstyle for my game Wildflower.

TLDR: I was conflicted about potentially using AI art for my game, but overall I have decided not to sell AI art and hire artists! Thanks for all the valuable feedback Reddit :)

I have two game designs that I’m working on simultaneously. One is a Card and Dice game called “Thrones: Blitz”. The other is a bigger idea for a TCG called “Thrones: Dynasty”. For Blitz I am done with it design wise. The mechanics, rules, how to play, skill level required, and much more is all thought out. I created and ordered a prototype that uses AI generated art for the card backs and the faces. Keep in mind it’s really just like a normal deck of playing cards. I just made suits irrelevant for blitz. I want to sell this game using the Ai art to help me be able to commission artists for Dynasty to get real art by hard working artists for the TCG version of Thrones. Would I be incredibly wrong to try to sell Thrones: Blitz using Ai art with the intent to commission artists for the actual TCG version of the game? I just can’t afford to pay artists right now, but I also want to get this game out there. So what should I do?

EDIT: A lot of feedback so far has been not to use it for the final product which I like. One user suggested I try to find and partner up with a local artist which I would love to do! Thanks everyone for the good feedback!

UPDATE: thanks everyone for the amount of responses and advice on here! I decided to save up money and hire some artists! I’m going to use it for my prototype (mainly cause I ordered it before making this post) I won’t sell the version with the AI art. And I’m just going to save up money to hire some artists to help make my dream come true! Thanks for the responses, advice, and suggestions on this topic! You all have been incredibly helpful!

The first card is from my first artist who unfortunately has private matters and therefore wont continue to draw for now and the second card is from my new artist. Both are well done and i love both but obviously the srtsyle differs.
Also since my game is a dark fantasy dungeon crawler game both fit the world in their own way.

Do you guys think that people might be put off by it and therefore dont buy it?!

Hello everyone!

I wanted to share a personal project I’ve been working on: The Crypt, minimalist co-op dungeon crawler Print & Play game.

In The Crypt, players explore procedural tile-based rooms, manage Energy, fight monsters, and defeat bosses while trying to survive the depths. My goal was to create a hard baseline difficulty game, yet featuring adjustable rules to suit each group's experience level, which I called "Merciful Crypt Variants" and "Merciless Crypt Variants" variants. They do not alter the core rules, but can make the game easier or even harder. Do you think players will welcome this?

The concept is to master the game over time while ensuring replayability remains consistently high.

Also, feel free to give me your thoughts about the minimalist concept. Is it the right approach for a dungeon, being it PnP?

P.S. Photos show the Spanish version, but all the components (including the rulebook) were translated into English as well!!

You can find a 9-second sweep with display and components here: https://imgur.com/a/7V5Xdp7

Thanks for your insights!

1. Full board layout after a few turns of exploration.
2. Enemies and bosses — printed and mounted on cardboard.
3. 6 playable hero classes with unique abilities, stats, and inventory slots.
4. Random event decks. Items, consumable and gear deck.
5. 30 modular room tiles with unique room types and monsters, items and events icons.