I haven’t been as active in the forums lately. The last few months I’ve been heads down working on something pretty ambitious with a few other designers on MakerWorld.
We’ve been building a modular board game system called PlayGrid. It’s basically a shared 10×10 tile platform that multiple games plug into.
Before we actually launch, I’d love to get your thoughts:
How important is replayability vs. quick novelty?
Do you prefer quick 20–30 minute games or longer strategy sessions?
What would make a printed board game feel “premium” to you?
Genuinely curious what this community would want to see from something like this.
Appreciate this space a lot. It’s where I got a lot of early feedback when I was first uploading.
Let me put it this way: printing a board game like this is time-consuming and expensive because you have to buy specific coloured filament. So it’s an investment in fun. I want a better or equivalent experience to that of products you can buy regularly. It should have a certain depth of gameplay, not something where you think after 10 minutes, ‘That’s it?’
The most important thing, whether it’s a 30-minute game or longer, is to have fun and think: ‘Wow! That’s something new. It was worth printing it out.’ To give an example: I would be very disappointed with a variant of Battleship.
So, to answer your questions: More like replay value. Time doesn’t matter, as long as there is a certain depth in terms of strategy or twists. Personally, I don’t care about premium, because what matters to me is having fun playing the game.
Of course, this is just my personal opinion, not right or wrong, just what I look for in board games. Generally speaking, what an awesome project.
I think I would prefer re-playability over novelty . If I am investing time into learning a game I would like to play it more than once.
I tend to like short to maybe hour long games. I personally would rather play a few games than invest a whole day to playing. If am playing a long game, I want it to be a role playing game or maybe a war-game.
I am not sure what makes 3D printing premium. I think the value comes in the use. If I am using the object I print, it gains value.
Personally I have never been a large fan of modular games. A combination chess, checkers, backgammon set never seem as pleasant to use as a dedicated board and piece set. I do think that there can be a lot of room for a print and play board game still though. It seems to me that most board games really could just be printed on a piece of paper (or nice cardstock) but the game pieces are hard to 2D print. Being able to printed out a board on my paper printer and print out the game pieces on my 3D printer should let me have almost a perfect combination. Well, kind of. Dice don’t seem to print well yet (at least not in a way I feel confident that they work anyway) and nothing quite beats the feel of a premium cardstock printed card or what have you. Still, if I could buy a board game for under $20 and print it out for another $10 or so I can see it could be pretty well worth it.
Great feedback. While it doesn’t always need to be premium, we totally hear you with with it needing to be something that you can’t buy off the shelf and that it needs strategic depth.
We try to lean on the replay-ability. If the family doesn’t want to get it off the shelf, it’s not going to be a great game. I think we have some strong games in this space, but certainly a roadmap for even more in-depth games.
I agree about playing a few games rather than just one long drawn out game. It has to hold everyone attention and not get too drawn out. I know many monopoly matches that go on for way too long and then it ruins the game for everyone. lol
Totally fair on the modular comment. We hope that this is something where you get to finish a game and then quickly set up for a total different game so there is something for everyone.
It’s true the games can be printed on paper, but I think there is a bit of a wow factor when bringing a printed game to a party or family get together. Some of it is just the novelty of it, but there are also fun things you can do with tiles, like flip, stack, rotate them, etc.
Interesting points on replayability and shorter sessions — I agree a game people want to bring back to the table matters more than one-time novelty. The print-and-play idea with 3D printed pieces sounds practical too, especially for keeping costs low. I also like the point about “wow factor” at family gatherings. That mix of strategy and accessibility reminds me a bit of how Ok Win keeps things simple but engaging enough to return to regularly.
