Floodgate Games

Gaming Experiences Above the Table

Ian Birdsall - Marketing Manager, Floodgate Games

What makes a memorable gaming experience? Is it when your combos create a huge point-swing that gets you the win? Is it gathering with friends for a shared activity over some snacks? How much of these experiences are the games themselves versus the interactions and stories that we come together to tell? Ben Harkins, Floodgate Games founder, would tell you that he loves making games that give people that “aha!” moment. For some, that’s figuring out the puzzle to find the best scoring opportunities. Others find the player engagement around the table to be the high point of their gaming sessions.

Moments that make the best stories are crafted from these shared experiences – often, what’s happening above the game on the table is just as important as the rules to the game itself. Floodgate Games has been expanding its catalog to include games that ease players into crafting a story of their own. They’ll have their own a-ha moments while solving a tricky puzzle together. With the launch of the brand new game Décorum, and recently bringing Fog of Love back to shelves, these engrossing games ask players to take a small step away from the game on the table and throw themselves into the experience. Instead of putting it front-and-center, any roleplaying becomes emergent as players become more comfortable with the core gameplay and settle into the characters’ motivations. Fog of Love, originally published by Hush Hush Projects and acquired by Floodgate in 2021, has been reprinted along with all new expansions to explore in this “romantic comedy as a board game.” Players create characters and run them through the wringer of crazy yet familiar situations and attempt to figure out their respective destinies as they emerge from the other side. Will they stay together? Will they grow apart? It’s up to the players to decide as they work through the love stories.

The newest expansion, Love on Lockdown, offers a tongue-in-cheek look at the situations that arise in a relationship when you’re stuck spending every single moment together because you can’t leave the house. Will you become apathetic and just decide to watch the same movie every night, or will you explore your reckless side and throw caution to the wind for some excitement?

Speaking of being stuck inside, how would your partner feel if you painted the kitchen green? Maybe threw out your favorite blacklight poster? In Décorum, you’ll find out… passive-aggressively, of course. Décorum is a cooperative game that simply asks the players to decorate the house so everyone is happy. The trouble is, different things make each of these characters happy and they’re not exactly the best communicators. Each player has secret objectives that they cannot share but must fulfill, along with everyone else because you win or lose as a team! Other players can react, but without giving away details of why they felt that way.

Décorum will have you loudly exclaiming “I hate that lamp” by round five, pulling your hair out as you try to figure out a way to solve the puzzle of satisfying each player’s objectives, and high-fiving across the table when it finally comes together!

Fog of Love and Décorum are both available now at ACD, Alliance and GTS. Striking box covers and straightforward gameplay easily guide your gamers into creating their own everlasting experiences at the table.