by Sandro Blasich

It is a rather interesting story of how I came up with the idea for TEDOKU.

So, I finished a game for SPIEL Essen pitch and like every year I watched SPIEL Essen preview list and I saw a game that looked almost 90% as mine. It was so similar that I gave up on it and I didn't pitch it. That was a game with Tetris elements. However, since I like both sudoku and Tetris, suddenly an idea crossed my mind that I could actually combine those two elements in one game. As it usually happens, I had that idea in one of those rare quiet moments that you can have when you have kids: when you lock yourself in the bathroom 😊 So, I designed TEDOKU but I had no plans to pitch it at SPIEL Essen. I designed it for fun, just for myself like I said in my previous designer diary.

Basically, the first prototype was practically a final product. Everything just clicked from the beginning. It was easy to design it and it was even easier to make it.

During one board game night at my house, a friend saw a box with no name on my board games shelf and asked me about that game. I said that it was just a game I designed for myself. He was curious about it so we played it a few times and he really liked it. He told me that he thought the game was complete and ready for SPIEL Essen. I wasn't so sure but in the end I decided to pitch it and I managed to get some meetings at Essen for it.

And just like that I signed my first contract. I was very happy. I couldn't believe it but it seemed that I'm finally going to have a published game. As you know, it takes some time from the signing of the contract to the exact publishing date so it took several years for TEDOKU to be published. TEDOKU was my first signed game but in the meantime my other game got published first (Choconnect).

TEDOKU is a 'roll, flip and write game“ in which you try to fit special shapes called polyominoes into your own Sudoku-style grid. The result of a die tells you what to draw and a card flip limits where you can draw it. When drawing a shape you can rotate or mirror it in any direction. If you don't have enough space to draw it properly you must skip your turn. The game finishes after 20 rounds (after 20 cards have been drawn). Each player scores points based on the number of completed sectors, columns and rows in their grid. Also the replayabillity is huge because there are 27 cards in the deck and at setup you remove 7 cards at random. There are 6 pencils in the box but if you have more pencils you can play it with any number of players. The game is also great for solo play. TEDOKU is a small, cosy game but it's got a lot of substance due to a number of interesting choices that you can make. TEDOKU is also a perfect travel size game as well.

I'm very pleased with how Ares Games developed my game. Thank you Roberto Di Meglio.
And of course I must mention Matteo Ceresa, who made a great job with the illustrations and graphic design reminiscent of Japanese art. Thank you Matteo.

by Sandro Blasich

I've been designing board games for more than 10 years but it all started from fun. I had an opportunity to go to SPIEL Essen and I went and I felt like a kid entering the chocolate factory. I was completely blown away. I was there with a couple of guys that pitched their board games. So, I thought if they can do it, why shouldn't I at least try it too.

Thus I started designing more and more and I finished a board game that I wanted to pitch at Essen. That was in 2017. I had lots of meetings but I had no success. In my opinion, I had good games but nobody was interested enough to publish them. Little by little, I started to loose my enthusiasm for designing games and I told myself that I needed to take a break from game design but I couldn't, new ideas just came to me all the time.

Then, I designed a game just for myself. A friend saw it and he said that I have an excellent game. I didn't plan to pitch it but finally I did it and I signed the contract. However, it took several years for that game to be published (you will read about that game in my next designer diary).

Meanwile, a design group was organized in my hometown and we also had a panel discussion. That's where I met Vedran and we went together on the next SPIEL Essen. I didn't know that he was planning to open a publishing house. Then I showed him my prototype for Choconnect and he liked it. In 2024, he opened the publishing house Snovid Games and it debuted at SPIEL Essen with three games: Galebari, To be continued.. and my game Choconnect.

So, how did I come up with Choconnect? I often play board games with my two kids. One day we played the game Labyrinth and it crossed my mind that that game has an interesting mechanic which is very rarely used. Usually, I start with the mechanics and then I add a suitable theme when I design my board games. I was thinking what to do with that mechanic from Labyrinth. So, I thought of something like Connect 4 but different so that you put tiles instead of chips on all sides of the board and then you slide it so that everything changes all the time which means that you need to think ahead. And that's how the idea for Choconnect was born.

As the game is very abstract I needed to find a suitable theme and I though of my first time at SPIEL Essen and how I felt like a kid in a chocolate factory so a box of chocolates came to my mind. When I told my wife about that she happily approved since she's a proper chocoholic.

Choconnect is an abstract tile laying/pushing game where you are in the role of a chocolatier and you want to arrange chocolates in the best possible way. In Choconnect, you draw randomly a tile from the cloth bag (there are three different types of tiles) and you put it on the board. But the twist is that you can put a tile only on the outer part of the board and if there is already a tile you slide that other tile but it cannot go over the board. You want to make a line of chocolate tiles of the same type either orthogonally or diagonally. It depends on the type of chocolates (three in a row for dark chocolate, four in a row for milk chocolate and five in a row for white chocolate). Whoever succeeds in creating the line first wins the game.

Maja Benčić made a great job with the illustrations and graphic design so you have to be careful not to confuse my board game with an actual box of chocolates. Thank you Maja.