The most important is the last base, and I would very much like to be there already, to check it off, and breathe a sigh of relief, but it’s not that easy. It’s a long, many months process and a lot of bases to run to. It all starts with the prototype.

You get a prototype, it’s awesome, and you’re as fired up as Stannis’s fleet because you’ve just got your hands on a project that will turn into an awesome board game. You play it at the company’s offices, then with a few friendly focus groups, it’s good, everyone congratulates you on your luck, that someone sent you a really cool game. That’s base number one.

Thomas:

And then you realize: In life, there is one thing more important than football and board games: It’s life itself.

During the game between Denmark and Finland, Christian Erikson suddenly fell down on the pitch and had to be reanimated. He was fighting for his life. Thousands of people in the stadium, friends, and family, and millions of people watching at home, were shocked. Erikson was brought to the local hospital. After a while, rumors suggested, Christian was conscious, but no one knew for sure. About an hour later, the good news came out: Christian Erikson was awake and was even able to talk. A huge sigh of relief.

I couldn’t imagine the rest of the game would be played that night. But it happened. Players decided to play again. It was said, Erikson also wanted the game to continue.

It was great to see the fans of Finland and Denmark, sharing their emotions together. Shouting Erikson’s name. When the Danish team entered the pitch again, the Finnish players applauded for them. It was a terrible event, but there were some beautiful moments.

I once experienced myself, there was a situation with a fan who had to be reanimated during a match of my hometown club. It’s shocking, but at the same time, it’s great to see how many people want to help.

Of course, Denmark was shocked. There’s only one subject to talk about on the streets today. For the Fins it was a strange evening as well; This, being their first-ever match in a big tournament. They will never forget. But of course first of all it’s about Christian and his family. I hope they get through this and I wish them well.

Finland won the game 0 – 1. But who cares today. I hope Denmark will pick themselves up and play a fantastic rest of the tournament.
Tomorrow I will talk about board games (Eleven) and football again. Somehow it feels less important today.

Thomas Jansen is the designer of Eleven: the football manager game. Ignacy Trzewiczek is the developer of the game. They both will share their thoughts about EuroCup 2021 and also talk about the design or development of Eleven. Be with them every day during Euro! If you like football and board games, please, share the news about Eleven!

You can learn more about Eleven HERE!

Ignacy:

The whole world is watching—the opening ceremony and then the first match—the highest pressure possible. It’s the start of the four weeks worldwide event, the first of 51 games. It’s the hour you were waiting for your whole life. I cannot imagine what’s happening in the dressing room, what’s happening when you walk out of the tunnel and enter the pitch. What’s in your mind when you hear the crowd and realize this is it – the opening match of EuroCup, and you are in. The moment you will remember your whole life.

It’s your hopes and dreams. It’s all the fans, supporters, media, everyone’s hopes and dreams to be part of the great game, to experience something exceptional, to see goals, and saves, and tackles, and beautiful passes, and smart plays, and effort, and heart, and drama too.

It’s the first game. The whole world is watching.

Thomas will write and analyze yesterday’s match below, so let me diverse from Euro for a second and talk about the first game… in board games.

When I told my friends and playtesters that I signed a football manager game, they were more than intrigued. Many of them work with me on my designs for more than a decade. Martin was helping me in 2009 with Stronghold, and then in 2010 with Pret-a-Porter; Maciej, on the other hand, was my main playtester for Imperial Settlers. He also designed a solo variant for Imperial Settlers.

They have trust in the games Portal is doing. They are with me for years, being one of the most trusted playtesters I have. It’s a great team of geeks.

They are also football freaks. We play football every Monday forever. We share two passions – board games and football.

So as I said, when I told them that I signed a football manager game, they were more than intrigued.

This first game of Eleven was like opening the Euro. Excitement, hopes, dreams. Martin came to my house to play it. I set up the game, explained the rules, and we played.

That very evening, the first time I showed him Eleven, we played only one round. After the last phase of the round, Martin smiled and gave me that look. It said everything.

This look said, 'It’s really good.’
This look said, 'You lucky bastard.’
This look said, 'I’m in. I want to be in the dev team.’

We talked for an hour about the game and were super excited about upcoming months of work.

Eleven delivered. Eleven was everything Martin hoped for. Eleven is a football manager game we all waited for.

***

Thomas:

For me, Euro2020 started yesterday, right after work.

I like football. My main focus is on club football. Especially the smaller clubs. They were part of the inspiration for designing Eleven. The fight against relegation has intrigued me just as much as trying to become champions. I enjoy the stories behind a season of small clubs. Not being relegated at the end of the season can feel just as good as becoming a champion. I wanted players—when playing Eleven—to experience these dramatic emotions in one of the scenarios of Eleven. Just try not to relegate. Easy, right?

After a disappointing season with my club, I had to change focus. So, I went into a supermarket and bought the ‘Guide to Euro2020’. I read about all the national teams, star players, and stadiums. I really got excited. This is going to be great. I picked my favorite countries, mostly underdogs, and I was ready for the tournament. Ready to watch the first match between Italy and Turkey the next day.

Of course, Italy was the favorite to win this match. If it was about the national anthems, they are definitely finalists to me. What a great song! But it’s not. And Turkey has a dangerous team. They took 4 points from France during qualifying. They beat the Netherlands with a deserved victory. They are fast and deadly. Unfortunately for Turkey, as the first half progressed, the Italians got more and more dominant in the game, resulting in lots of chances. The Turks weren’t able to counterattack, which is normally their strength, due to the fast intervention of the Italians.

But Nevertheless, 0 – 0 at halftime. After the break, Italy got their well-deserved goal; unfortunately, it was own goal. I felt a bit sorry for Turkey because they defended quite well and were unlucky here. After the goal, it went loose. The Turkish wall collapsed. Full time: 3-0.

Italy has shown its strength, and I definitely think they will become the group winner. Although Turkey failed both in defense and attack against a different opponent, they may be able to play the game they like and still end up as number 2 in the group.

I enjoyed this game! I have seen worse at the start of a tournament. I am looking forward to tomorrow’s games!

Thomas Jansen is the designer of Eleven: the football manager game. Ignacy Trzewiczek is the developer of the game. They both will share their thoughts about EuroCup 2021 and also talk about the design or development of Eleven. Be with them every day during Euro! If you like football and board games, please, share the news about Eleven!

You can learn more about Eleven here: https://bit.ly/3xidfAg

’I don’t like it’, I said when Joanna approached me with her idea for the newest expansion for 51st State. 'Try it though, give it two or three weeks, see what happens. It won’t work, but you need to see it by yourself.’ I said and gave her green light.

It was early March 2020, and her idea for the expansion was a semi-coop variant for the game. Moloch attacks all players at the table, and they need to fight against each other, as usual, and additionally against Moloch cards. It makes perfect sense for the theme of Neuroshima world, but I really hate semi-coop games.

I had so many bad experiences with semi-coop games that I am basically done with this genre. It is tough to design a game that keeps everyone equally engaged for the whole game and to keep players who know that they have no longer a chance to win interested in the game.

So I said Joanna, I vote against the idea, but she should try it anyway.

COVID hit, we all ended up at home working in home office mode, and the playtesting process became super difficult. After few weeks, Joanna said she finally have it ready to show and that she built the prototype on Tabletopia.

I am not a fan of playing board games on the computer. Back then, in March or April 2020, when it all was new to us, I really was not a fan of the tool. But that was the only tool we had. So we played.

The test took us more than two hours. Operating on Tabletopia was a dreadful experience, talking over Skype, trying to understand the prototype, trying to understand Tabletopia, trying to keep my dogs silent for more than 5 minutes. It was 2 hours horror, but…

’It’s not that bad.’ I said. 'Maybe I was wrong. Keep working on it. You might have here something.’

Joanna worked on the expansion for another few months. We all struggled with playtesting, the brainstorming was difficult on Zoom, creating new versions of the prototype was taking much more time than the regular pen and paper method when you can scribble on the card, tweak one or two words and continue playtesting with the new version.

At some point, after months of work and many iterations, it was ready. It was much better than I expected. And what’s more, it was everything I would never create by myself. I would never create a semi coop expansion. I would never create an expansion with double-sided cards. I would never do an alternative co-op variant in 51st State.

Moloch changes the game. Adds a new angle. Throws at players new challenges and choices. It’s manifest of Joanna’s talent and manifest in general of diversity in design. The beauty of different approach and ideas. It’s like First Martians and On Mars and Terraforming Mars, three great games, three different methods, three examples of the power of design.

I was wrong when I said semi-coop is a bad idea. But man, I was so right that I let her work and do what she wanted. She did something I would never do.

So the bottom line, kudos to both of us, right? 😉

I remember this moment very vividly – Przemysław is sitting in my office, it’s 2018, a few weeks before the Detective release. The game is already printed and will soon debut.

’I want you to write me a spy thriller. Cold War era, players taking the role of CIA agents sent to Europe and dealing with some epic KGB operation. Would you be interested?’

He smiled.

***

At that moment, we were after the first demos of Detective at various conventions, and I was pretty confident we have something exceptional here. I knew we would need a follow-up. Changing the role of detectives into spies sounded really cool. New theme, new challenges, different angle and mechanisms.

***

Przemysław Rymer, the writer of the plot, was in heaven. He is a long-time fan of all those books by Frederick Forsyth, Ken Follet, and Tom Clancy. I guess I should also mention his fascination with the political history of Europe. He can quote books by Suworow or le Carre on the fly. He was born ready for this task.

He started building a plot. Based on real Soviet agendas and goals, set in real places and involving historical figures. He was the right man to create the most immersive spy-themed thriller the tabletop industry ever saw. Trust me, he took it seriously.

***

I got the script a few months later. It was around 30 pages long. I was reading it, and it was – believe it or not – sitting on Google at the same time checking the facts and names because the mix between the fictional story and real events and characters was just insane. It was a perfect immersive blend that took me to Europe in 70 in the middle of a secret Soviet operation.

I green-lighted it without any single comment. 'I love it,’ I just said, and we were able to move to the next stage. Make a game around it.

***

It took us months to write the Vienna Connection. Intense, immersive spy-themed thriller as nothing before seen in the hobby. I read a dozen books about the Cold War era and got into it deeply. The year 2020 was, for me, the Cold War-era year. Books, comic books, movies, TV shows, even podcasts! I consumed it all. I even began to run RPG games with my friends set in Berlin of that period. It was crazy.

***

I have a fantastic job. I work with super talented people and create games I always dreamed of. Vienna Connection is on pre-order now, and if you ever wanted to play as a CIA agent in operations against the Soviets, you must play it. I said it. You must play it. It’s great.

And Przemysław? A few months ago, at the beginning of 2020, I invited him to my office again. I asked him to write me another story. And, yes, he smiled again…

***

Link to Vienna Connection pre-order page: https://portalgames.pl/en/vienna-connection/
Link to Portalcon with new titles announcement: https://portalcon.pl/en
My vlog: https://www.youtube.com/c/PortalGamesStudio/videos