I’m betting that when Siree Chamberlain played her first board game, she did not think she’d someday enjoy the hobby enough to make her own custom box pieces. But here we are, a number of addicted plays of Terra Mystica later.
I know many of us have thought about doing something like this, right? Well, maybe not like this…
There are actually great services cropping up for box organization and storage, such as laser cut wooden custom trays offered from The Broken Token. We’re looking to speak with them in a future article about their process and machines.
But this is more personal and more impressive to me, very cool DIY and indie spirit – a dedicated gamer, geeking out over a favorite game. Detailed too – right down to the small side containers that fit in the width next to the game board! It made me want to finally get in that play of Terra Mystica (and we did, and it was awesome!)
One of the neat things here (besides all the cardboard pieces going into their own custom slots) is the god power tokens in their own tray. Because when you need to select one mid game, you can just take the tray and decide while other people are taking their turn perhaps. This takes the function of those pieces in mind with the storage – made the game play better.
So many fun concepts here, including one container which holds the magic pieces on the bottom of power boards. Later, when the boards are in play, the lid to the magic pieces comes out as well.
I asked Siree if she’ll be going into business now, making these and she laughed that off. She indicated that it was a crazy amount of work. And she might never do it again. On the other hand, she’s pondering that great big box of Caverna…
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Ask the audience questions!
- 1) Have you ever done anything custom for your favorite game? (not necessarily box inserts) Painted all the figures? Designed new tokens?
- 2) Name a game you think could totally benefit from something like this!
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Now I want to play Terra Mystica again…
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Peter Vaughan
Game Developer at Breaking Games
Peter eats games for breakfast! Founder of First Play LA, Squirmy Beast and League of Gamemakers, and Director of Development for Breaking Games. First published designs include What the Food?! and Nightmare Cove, and development credits include Letter Tycoon, Boomtown Bandits, Sparkle*Kitty and Rise of Tribes.
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6 Readers Commented
Join discussionHighly cool! Rob Searing actually did go into business doing that … and he seems to have done a decent job.
I’d love to see this for Dead of Winter!
For Dead of Winter, look here. 🙂 https://www.searing.me/robstore
That Terra Mystica insert is fantastic, I need to get off my duff and try making one like that as well.
Not new, check out Game Trayz: https://www.gametrayz.com/trayz/terra-mystica.html
Not saying it was new. The game has been out awhile, I figured there are probably a few custom trays. Just celebrating someone getting into a game enough to make their own!
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