There are these moments that we have all experienced, and mostly those who are designing board games.

The moment that your muse has shown you the right path to the creation of a new board game and reassures you that it will be an incredible one! Your most precious pearl! You create it, you test it, try to make it perfect and you love it as you develop a caring relationship that flows through the very existence of your creativity. 

And then comes the time that you have to show it to the publishers.. Those grand beasts who will judge it, measure it and question it according to their own standards. And you will be there, by its side, like a caring father to support it, to show its strengths and its particularities that make it something authentically different, while the “beast” on the other hand will judge it as insufficient and incomplete. But you have faith in your child and when it justifies your care.. Then comes the moment where you start discussing about its publishing. 

The “beast” then becomes the guardian of your game, while keeping its first ability. “Changes need to be made” it growls, and as a conservative patriarch it tries to make your child wear clothes that it thinks fit. 

Then your boardgame changes structure, theme, shape, become it knows better. And maybe it is true, since it has been around for a while and it knows its job. But you stand proudly by your child, even if it wears weird make up, not too fancy clothes and has its hair all mixed up – you still have to smile and support it again, while at the same time you also understand the “beast’s” vision to make your child memorable and unique. 

And you smile as you see it “parade” in front of the eyes of the people, who then cheer or disapprove it. And you look by your side and you see your muse looking at you enigmatically. Maybe you both live in another sphere, in another world..