Another Portal Games Informant is here! This week we present few cool moments from the office including receiving First Martians sample from China, intense testing of Alien Artifacts (surprise! 😉 and a ton of random stuff! Have a great watch!

The plague which cast Detroit into flames transforms humans into mindless monstrosities which lust for killing; hideous slaughtering machines which make the mutes from the Death zone look like docile pets. The disease entirely burns off the brain, leaving just enough cunning to trace one’s victims. The memories are lost,

There were no zombies in the Neuroshima Role Playing Games. To be precise, there were no zombies, no mechs, and no dead children. We put into this game literally everything; it was 500 pages book that looked like witch’s cauldron. We put every single idea we had, and man, we

From day one after the release of Imperial Settlers I was openly saying that we have a 3-year support plan for the game – and by saying that I meant that we had three more factions already planned and would release them. And then we would see what happens. Today,

(article was previously posted at Board Games That Tell Stories in 2011) A long time ago in a far away galaxy, My Wife didn’t play board games. Then I showed her Cash & Guns and Citadels and she began to play games. My mates were jealous. My Wife played board

It was a couple of days ago. I was driving home and thinking about Crazy Karts. No idea why. Just the random stuff that comes to your mind when you are tired and drive a car. The idea of introducing a change in the rules came naturally. Instead of two

The weather has been pissing me off lately. For the past few years there had been no real winter in Poland and although I felt like I missed real winter, well, it turned out, I didn’t. I am not a big fan of low temperatures and all that crap that

We grew up reading Tolkien, Howard, Herbert, Dick, Lem… We were watching Willow, Blade Runner, The NeverEnding Story, Robin Hood… And yet, we don’t write books… we don’t make movies. We don’t make those things, because we make games. We make games that tell stories. Books and movies are a

My New Year’s resolution was super simple: I need to get back to writing regularly. I need to write every single Wednesday as I used to write in previous years. I need to make Board Games That Tell Stories blog active again. So here I am. Writing about New Year’s

‘You made a mistake. You underestimated it,’ she said. She sees the hype growing and she knows I am not prepared for that. She knows I made a mistake. I didn’t see it coming. *** I signed Cry Havoc (Battle of York back then) in 2013. It was three years

Today we presents you new article wrote by Michał Oracz, one of designers of Cry Havoc! Whenever I start working on a game, or on any project for that matter, I delve into it COMPLETELY. It’s not like wading in it up to the knees, or even up to the

Welcome to part 5 of our design journal series for Cry Havoc. Today we return to Michal Walczak, the lead developer for Portal Games on Cry Havoc. And one day, early in the morning, Michał Oracz came and blew everything to hell and back. Michał arrived at the company before me, he

Today we share with you the third in a series of design journals from Cry Havoc designer Grant Rodiek. Enjoy! When you license a game to a publisher, you need to recognize that you’re entering into a relationship. When you’re just the designer, you don’t have to listen to anyone’s feedback.

I am a huge fan of children‘s games. I have a big collection of board games for kids and even though my own kids got older and they won’t play with me anymore, I still keep these kids games in my collection. I won’t get rid of them. I will play with my grandchildren, right?! There are some real gems among

Grant Rodiek in his recent interview said: “You can make a game that is functional. It is relatively easy to make a game that works and is balanced.” These are the most honest and true words about game design I heard in a long time. Let us talk about submitted