Magazine Madness 42: Senet Issue 17

The gaming magazine is dead. After all, when was the last time that you were able to purchase a gaming magazine at your nearest newsagent? Games Workshop’s White Dwarf is of course the exception, but it has been over a decade since Dragon appeared in print. However, in more recent times, the hobby has found other means to bring the magazine format to the market. Digitally, of course, but publishers have also created their own in-house titles and sold them direct or through distribution. Another vehicle has been Kickststarter.com, which has allowed amateurs to write, create, fund, and publish titles of their own, much like the fanzines of Kickstarter’s ZineQuest. The resulting titles are not fanzines though, being longer, tackling broader subject matters, and more professional in terms of their layout and design.

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Senet is a print magazine about the craft, creativity, and community of board gaming. Bearing the tagline of “Board games are beautiful”, it is about the play and the experience of board games, it is about the creative thoughts and processes which go into each and every board game, and it is about board games as both artistry and art form. Published by Senet Magazine Limited, each issue promises previews of forthcoming, interesting titles, features which explore how and why we play, interviews with those involved in the process of creating a game, and reviews of the latest and most interesting releases. Senet is also one of the very few magazines about games to actually be available for sale on the high street.

Senet Issue 17 was published in was published in the winter of 2024 and if the cover stands out for its singular look and stark simplicity which makes it stand out on the newsstand, it should be no surprise that the editorial talks about the importance of a good cover. The cover itself is an illustration taken from the board game Emberleaf and the editorial applies that importance to board games as much as its own cover. Which gives space to highlight the artist interviewed in the issue, ‘The Mico’, and the rich detail of his covers that ensure the games that he illustrates standout on the shelves.

As usual, ‘Behold’ begins the issue proper, highlighting some of the then forthcoming games with a preview and a hint or two of what to expect. The releases of note here Emberleaf, from which the issue’s front cover comes, a game about restoring a forest after it has been attacked by a villainous overlord; A Nice Cuppa, a mini-game about relaxing with a nice hot cup of tea amongst today’s travails; and A Wayfarer’s Tale: The Journey Begins, a roll-and-write game about exploring and charting new islands. The other opening sections of the magazine continue to underwhelm the reader, but for different reasons. The regular column of readers’ letters, ‘Points’, continues to be constrained to a single page, waiting for room to expand build into something more, but in this issue, the letters continue to show that the audience for magazine is wider than letters in previous issues have suggested, with letters from older readers and highlight the benefits of playing board games. With ‘For Love of the Game’ the journey of the designer Tristian Hall continues towards the completion and publication of his Gloom of Kilforth—and beyond. By now, very beyond. In ‘The Art of Success’ he asks how you can measure success when it comes to publishing board games. As he makes clear, it is not money, but rather bringing a project that he loves to the market and hopefully, successfully so. Besides comparing the process of creating board games to creating art, and whilst that is not a bad comparison, nothing is added to the conversation about games and the process of their design that has not be said before.

Every issue consists of two interviews, one with an artist and one with a designer, plus an article about a theme in games and an article about a mechanic in games, and of course, Senet Issue 16 is no exception. The tried and tested formula begins with ‘The Wolf Man’, Matt Thrower’s interview with designer and publisher, Ted Alspach. Through his company, Bézier Games, he is best known for titles such as Castles of Mad King Ludwig and One Night Ultimate Werewolf. The interview charts him from shifting from player to designer via expansions for the highly regarded railway game, Age of Steam, and then the Werewolf games. One interesting fact revealed in the interview is that Castles of Mad King Ludwig was actually inspired by the designer drawing maps as a Dungeon Master for Dungeons & Dragons and wanting originally to apply that theme. It is clear that Alspach is enthusiastic about his own games and seeing other playing them. It is an engaging affair as is the second interview in the issue by Alexandra Sonechkina, which is with the North Macedonian artist known as The Micah. ‘Monster Mash’ showcases his artwork with space given for him to discuss the origins and inspirations for the numerous illustrations he has supplied to innumerable board game designs. The monster illustrations for Monster Lands 2 are amazing, whilst despite his not liking drawing buildings, his cover to the board game Merchants Cove is rich in detail and really could have been benefitted from being larger so the reader could have better seen some of that detail. As with the best of the artwork shown off in the pages of Senet, the illustrations serve as mini-portfolio for the artist, intriguing for the reader to want to look at the games they are for.

Between the two interviews is Tim Clare’s ‘Boards and Borders’ which explores the contentious theme of immigration in board games. The article notes that immigration has actually been a means of spreading the play and popularity of board games, such as that of Mancala across India and the adoption of Mahjong by middle-class Jewish women in the twenties and thirties, but also points out although the subject matter for some board games would historically involve immigrants, the board games themselves do not address this, for example the building of the railways in the United States in almost any train game. However, other board games do focus on immigrants and the immigrant experience, more often than not in the USA, since the country experienced notable influxes of immigrants in relatively recent times. For example, Alea’s Chinatown explores the growth of the Chinese population in Manhattan in the late sixties following the relaxation in immigration laws, whilst Pandasaurus Games’ Tammany Hall sees the immigrant groups being used as bargaining chips and the means to garner votes and thus power by corrupt politicians in the late nineteenth century and again in Manhattan. Manhattan is major location for immigrant-themed board games since it was the key entry point for immigrants coming to the USA. The article does not shy away from challenging nature of the subject matter and highlights the artwork for later versions of Chinatown for perpetuating stereotypes. This is an interesting look at a theme that appears not be commonly explored in board games.

The mechanic is ‘pick-up-and-deliver’, one that is very much more commonly used in board games. ‘Delivering the Goods’ is the double-meaning title of Dan Thurot’s article about games in which the players pick up goods or passengers and transport them to specific locations. Mayfair Games’ Empire Builder series is the first series of board games to make use of this mechanic, but Lancashire Railways from Winsome Games followed by Age of Steam from Warfrog Games, both by designer Martin Wallace have continued and expanded its use. All of them see players not only laying routes between locations, but picking up goods or passengers and delivering them elsewhere. The structure has spread far beyond the romance of the railways to other modes of transport, such as sailing ships in Merchants & Marauders from Z-Man Games and starships in Xia: Legends of a Drift System from Lavka Games though. Oddly, no canals, though. However, what the article shows is that the further designers gets away from the simple elegance of the ‘pick-up-and-deliver’ seen in Age of Steam, the more complex their designs get, even up to the point where mathematics and mass-thrust ratios need to be considered in the early days of space exploration board game, Leaving Earth from The Lumenaris Group, Inc.

Senet’s reviews section, ‘Unboxed’, covers a wide array of titles as usual. They are led by a review of Undaunted 2200: Callisto, the Science Fiction version of the highly praised Undaunted series from Osprey Games. However, whereas titles in the Undaunted series have been awarded ‘Senet’s Top Choice’ in previous issues, not so here, though it gets a big review. Instead, the award goes to CMYK’s game of warehouse organisation, memory, and imagination, Wilmot’s Warehouse, which is bright, breezy, and very colourful, and sound a lot of fun. The oddest choice reviewed is Blackwell Games’ For Small Creatures Such As We, a solo journaling game in which the player controls and tells the story of a crew of a spaceship. It is odd because it strays into the roleplaying space rather than board games and thus feels out of place. This is not the only time that the issue strays into the realm of roleplaying though.

As per usual, the last two columns in Senet Issue 16 are ‘How to Play’ and ‘Shelf of Shame’. In ‘When board gaming meets therapy’, therapist Alex Roberts explores ways in which board games can be used as part of therapy, as vehicles via which patients can be tell their stories. This is a fascinating subject and consequently, a fascinating article, but again oddly, it uses not a board game to illustrate the possibility of organised play the author suggests, but a storytelling game, a roleplaying game. This is For the Queen, which is not a board game. Simply, there is a disconnect here between the title of the article and the content.

Lastly, the team behind Knightmare Live pull a game from their ‘Shelf of Shame’. This is Blood Rage from Cool Mini Or Not in which the players lead clans of Vikings in battles against monsters during Ragnarök to earn a place in Valhalla. They come away having enjoyed the game, describing as fun, but not in their top ten.

Physically, Senet Issue 17 is shows off the board games it previews and reviews to great effect, just as you would expect. The most interesting article in the issue is ‘Boards and Borders’ because of the difficult subject, but the issue is treated fairly, showing where it has been used to best effect and where it has been poorly handled in board game designs of recent years. Elsewhere, the missteps in roleplaying feel out of place, but otherwise, an enjoyable, if serviceable read.