Bit Fetishists

The other thing you could use is tiddly winks, albeit they are round, they are quite small and might fit your needs.

Also check the bit resources category in the web links section.

-Darke

600 cubes? Wow, that's a lot of cubes! I just got a game called Wallenstein that has 62 cubes per player, and I thought that was a lot!
150 per player is quite a lot! Have you considered having "big" cubes that represent 5 or 10 "small" cubes? That could dramatically cut down the number that you need. Or is there any way that the mechanics of the game could be scaled down so that each player needs relatively fewer cubes? For example, maybe the action "place 5 cubes" can be scaled down to "place 2 cubes" and other things scaled accordingly. It's hard to speculate without knowing anything about your game, but my guess is that there's no "game math" that really pigeon-holes you into needing 150 cubes per player; I'm reasonably sure you could achieve the same game balance and decisions with a smaller game. Moreover, I would think that a game that involves that many pieces per player takes a long time, so a "smaller" game could also be shorter and punchier, which would help your chances of selling it, as well. But again, without knowing more about the game, it's hard to speculate too much.

Do let us know if you find a good supplier for wooden cubes, especially one that's States-side. It would be nice to get a lot of game components so I can stop raiding my games library to steal bits for my prototypes!

Thanks,

Jeff

Most of my designs at the moment are card-based, and there does come a point at which I have to look seriously at how many cards there are and if there are too many to make the game viable )I've had to abandon a lovely design because it used far too many cards and I couldn't find an elegant way to cut them back.)

But personally I don't think you can have "too many" bits! Hey, I've played Eagle Games, and they require you to spend a couple of days just putting the bits together before you even get to play the game! Indeed, I think it's worse when you open a "big box" game and find it mostly filled with air instead of bits.

I'd love to know how a game with 150 cubes per player can be over in an hour :) , but then I don't know much about the game. It does seem to me too that you ought to be able to make it work with fewer components (but see my comment above...)

Sorry I can't be more helpful.

I read your journal -- it sounds like the trade-offs made have made the game even better. Very cool.

It still sounds like you might have too many bits, though. :D

I'm very intrigued by the game, based on your journal entries. Have you described it in more depth elsewhere?

And...600 wooden cubes, of course?

Hee hee.

So you have to print out and cut out 600 chits? I'd almost rather buy the 600 wooden cube version! Or spray paint some pinto beans, I suppose.

I'd be happy to look at your rulebook, or you could consider workshopping it in the Game Design Workshop (although given that you've already playtested, it sounds like you might be past the point where that forum could help too much...) I don't suspect I can offer my group to playtest your game (for the same reason that you wouldn't offer me yours to playtest mine!), but if the game sounds promising, I might be able to reconsider that...although the 600 chits would still be a hang-up!

-J