Interstellar Pig and Chaosmos

Interstellar Pig is a book by William Sleator. In the book, the main character Barney goes on vacation to a beach house, where his new neighbors befriend him and, throughout the course of the novel, play many games with him of the board game Interstellar Pig. A game inventor as I am, I had to create it in real life to play.  And so I did.

In the game, everyone is trying to get the Piggy card in their hand by the time the game ends. If they have the Piggy card, they win. The board consists of different planets, and planets can have different atmospheres, gravity, light, and temperature. Everyone gets a hand of cards, which could include weapons, thermal suits, light sources, breathing apparatuses, and so forth. And one card out there is the Piggy.  When you land on a planet, you can look at the cards there and even exchange some of them for the cards in your hand.  You take turns moving around, and you can combat other players to get their cards, all trying to find the Piggy.  If you have the Piggy, you can either keep it in your hand, or hide it on a planet and hope that no one lands there and takes it, in the hopes that you can get there later to get it back.

There are the equipment cards as mentioned before, but there are also event cards which trigger if you roll a certain side on the star die, and character cards. At the start of the game you choose a character you want to be, and that determines your IRSC (your IQ) as well as what atmosphere you breathe and what temperatures you can stand.

It was fun, and my brother Ryan is super excited to come visit so that he can play it again.  Because of this, I decided to look at it again and maybe tweak some things.  So I looked up Interstellar Pig again on Wikipedia, and saw near the bottom this: "A board game released in 2015, chaosmos, seems to have the same premise as the game from the novel."

What the wha?  I wa planning on maybe sending in this game to publishers.  But now it looks like there's a game that has already been published that IS Interstellar Pig?  So I looked it up on Board Game Geek.  The game, Chaosmos, is rated fairly high.  But check out the description of the game from the website:

The universe is about to collapse, and your final hope lies in an ancient mysterious artifact, the Ovoid. Whoever controls this "cosmic egg" can shape the birthing of the next universe according to their own agenda. Players are secret agents from a handful of surviving worlds, zipping from planet to planet in special “amnion suits” that allow for interstellar travel, space combat and planetary landings.

Each planet has its own envelope of cards. When you arrive on a planet, you decide which cards you want to take and which to leave behind. Knowledge is the most powerful resource in the game, and being able to predict the cards your opponents possess at any given time is a powerful advantage as you build up a handful of weapons, tactical gear, vaults and traps, as well as cards that counter your opponents' cards. The best players will keep their hand fluid, constantly changing tactics while they search from world to world for the Ovoid or find a safe place to stash it.

Balance your hand of cards, spend your turn actions wisely, and cleverly use your special alien powers to stay one step ahead of your opponents. When the Chaos Clock reaches zero, only the player who possesses the Ovoid will become master of the new universe.

Sound familiar?  If you scroll down on that page, there's even this: "Chaosmos is unofficially, but faithfully, based on a fictional board game described in William Sleator's novel Interstellar Pig."

So... Somebody beat me to it.  Somebody had the idea, implemented it, and got it published.  What does this mean for me?  It means: a) I want to play Interstellar Pig right now.  b) I also want to try out Chaosmos. c) I need to get on the stick when it comes to getting my game ideas out there.  I have a lot of good ideas, but I need to get them play tested and sent out to publishers.

Now, is that the only reason I make games?  No.  Why do I make games?  Because I can't help it. I can't stop myself. I love it. It's my passion, my greatest hobby.  Even if I never sell a single game, I'll still make them, and play them.  There's an inherent joy to it.  But on the side, yeah, of course it would be good to get some of them published.

In a few weeks when Heather and I have a free weekend and when Eric and Ryan come down to play, my version of the Interstellar Pig game will be one of the ones we'll play (as well as Elysium and Istanbul, which neither of them have played yet).  I am also hoping to play the latest version of Cosmere, which is a card game I created based off of Brandon Sanderson's epic fictional universe, which he calls the Cosmere.  Look forward to it.

Next week: I talk about my game Cosmere, and give a bit of back story and details about it.  Plus, some files for the latest prototype cards. For now, here's a video of Tom Vasel of The Dice Tower doing a review on Chaosmos: