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Pierre Canuel's Free Print&Play Games
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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I designed this GeekList to have in the one same place all my free P&P games displayed. That gives you the opportunity to share with other users what you think of my games, your critics, variants, or any item that you think could be of interest regarding my games. I could have done that directly on my website, but I don't have neither the time nor the knowledge to implement it...  So, this list is yours, thank you for using it and sharing. You may comment each game individually or the whole list as you prefer. Pierre Canuel www.substantiel.net/gamesNote: games descriptions were added on 08/21/06 upon request 
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Posted Thu Nov 30, 2006 9:17 pm
Edited Sun Jul 29, 2007 12:27 pm
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1.
Board Game: Höyük
[Average Rating:7.54 Unranked]
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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Hoyuk - 3-4 players - av.90mn/game - 2hrs+ crafting time
Placement/strategy/+ some negotiation
The term Hoyuk in Turkish refers to the mounds made from ruins of ancient settlements. This game is inspired from the very 1rst cities which appeared some 9,500years ago in the Near-East.
Each player represents a Clan which settles its Families with other Clans to erect a new village. The game is played without a board. A miniature version of a village is built directly on the table using square pieces representing houses. The aim is to manage to have strong Families in each Block of the village and thus receive more Victory Points than other players.
This is rather a heavy format game for a Print&Play standard, but it worth it. Have a look at yourself on the game's webpage where you can download a 1 page description of the game.
www.substantiel.net/hoyuk
Hoyuk is the 2007 recipient of Parthenay Game Designer's Trophee (see comment bellow).
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2.
Board Game: Gosix
[Average Rating:6.65 Unranked]
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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Gosix - 2 players - 15mn/game - 5mn crafting time
abstract strategy game
This is a super easy strategy game, but rich enough to provide you hours of gaming fun.
The board is made of 7 hexagons as shown on the picture. Pawns are placed upon the angles. When the 6 angles of an hexagon are occupied, it belongs to the player who has the most pawns connected to it. The winner is the one player who won 4 hexagons. The trick is, whenever you win an hexagon, you'll lose all your pawns directly located on the given haxagon. Thus, you could have your opponent win an hexagon and manage to have him/her lose lots of pawns at once !
Rules and material on the webpage:
www.substantiel.net/en/gosix
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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"Racket Faeris" - 2-6 players - av90-120mn/game - 2hrs+ crafting time
negociation/strategy/bluff
This game is set in a medieval fantasy city where Trolls, Elves, Dwarfs, ... are competing for the elections of the local Representatives. Each player represents a Mafia group, trying to bend the result of each ballot to his/her advantage. Each player has allied and hostile political parties, and must promote the allied ones while kicking the hostile ones out of the City Council.
Don't be mistaken, this game has nothing to do with politics, at least in the noble meaning of it. Here is just back stabbing, broken agreements, and moving alliances.
"Racket Faeris" was among the 14 finalists (out of 200 competitors) at the 2003 Boulogne-Billancourts game design contest. It is the game for which I get most of congratulation emails.
The current version might be more limited for 5 or 6 players, but works great with 3-4. There is a version being tested now that would make this game equally playable from 2 to 6 players.
Rules and material on the website
www.substantiel.net/en/raffut
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4.
Board Game: Macadam
[Average Rating:5.78 Unranked]
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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Macadam - 2 players - 15mn/game - 5mn crafting time
abstract strategy game
This game could be an abstract representation of a basketball game : 2 fields, 2 goals, 8 pawns on each side; the aim is to bring one of your pawns on the opponent's goals, or invade his/her field with 6 pawns or more.
Your first games will be fast. One player will find a better trick and will score by surprise. But as you will play more, you will learn to spot and defuse your opponent's attacks. The game becomes then more like a martial arts fight, where fighters try to push the other one on the ground. It is a succession of quick moves automatically blocked. But eventually, quick move after quick move, the one player that could keep the best "balance" will either succeed to score a goal or invade the other field. Some have found this game limited, because of this aspect of quick attack/parade. I personaly find it rather interesting : you are often the cause of your own problems in the game : if you don't let your opponent to your goals, he/she will be stuck on your way to his/hers !!
This game can be played online on http://superdupergames.org (thank you Aaron !)
Other advantage : Macadam has been designed to be played on the ground with minimal material to find, or by using an existing chessboard.
Check out the rules:
www.substantiel.net/en/macadam
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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Xochintlan - 2-5players - 10mn/game - 1hr crafting time
tile placement
Xochintlan (meaning "the garden" in Nahuatl), is actually rather an abstract strategy game onto which has been applied this Aztec background.
The principle is simple: 3 groups of 8 square tiles (Birds, Lezards and Monkeys), 1 "central" square tile (the Human), and cards showing patterns of 5 squares. Each player has a different pattern of 5 squares to make. The winner is the 1rst player who could realize his/her pattern using only 1 type of tile AND including the Human tile.
This game received very good critics on french speaking websites (but not on BGG), as a fun and quick "appetizer game".
I should soon be able to put online a version using hexagons i/o squares (the fun is multiplied by 1.5 !!)
Rules and material
www.substantiel.net/en/xochintlan
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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Abrekodibru - 2-8players - 20mn/game - 1hr crafting time
This is an adaptation of a traditional cards game named in France "the liar", transposed in a "magicians" athmosphere. Each card is a syllable of the famous spell "abracadabra" and players are magicians trying to design new spells using these syllables in a given order. At some point you won't have the right card anymore and you'll have to lie. If you're discovered, you'll receive a "Hairy Toad" as a penality. But you can also fake to lie while playing the right card and those accusing you will get Hairy Toads! It's a funny game, especially because players must spell out the cards they play.
Unfortunately, there's no english version of that game yet available. I have a problem adapting this game to english, because some syllables might be pronouced differently, and some cards bare the syllable ... "bra" ...
In case you know some french, please check out this page:
www.substantiel.net/abrekodibru
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7.
Board Game: Solarii
[Average Rating:6.00 Unranked]
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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Solarii - 2-5players - 2hrs/game - 3hrs crafting time
The heavy weight always-to-be-improved baby. This game was designed in 1997 as a mix of CCG and traditional board game on a sci-fi theme. People had fun to play it. In 1998, a prototype was requested by 2 different publishers, which chose eventually not to publish it. In 2003, it passed the first selection step at Boulogne-Billancourt's game design contest (80 out of 200 competitors), but didn't reach the finals. Well, in 2 words, Solarii has some potential, but it's heavy, and some aspect could be balanced.
If you like long games, sci-fi, strategy, Solarii is definitely for you, but you'll have first to craft it !
Also, the cards were using originally drawings from a french sci-fi comic book, but I couldn't have the authorization to keep using the drawings when I put the game online. I had to replace them with poor B&W 3D pictures of mine, which doesn't help making the game attractive.
My plan is to brake the mould and try out a .2.0 version of it. Something easier, faster, with less factors to manage. Will see....
Check out the current version :
www.substantiel.net/en/solarii
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8.
Board Game: 6x5
[Average Rating:5.00 Unranked]
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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6x5 - 2-5 players - 15mn/game - 1hr crafting
6x5 is an abstract version of Xochintlan, listed above in the GL. It uses colored hexagonal tiles instead of square ones. It also has a slightly different set of rules, and offers more variants.
Rules and components :
www.substantiel.net/en/6x5
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Pierre Canuel
Norway
Tromsø
Norway
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The Gamers Constellation - 15mn/game - 1hr crafting
Another version of 6x5, derived with this "astronomical" background.
The game uses 24 Star Tiles (divided in 3 kind of 8 Stars) and one "Moon" tile. Each player must create a different Constellation that must include 4 Stars of the same kind, and the Moon tile.
At the beginning, there's only the "Moon" tile in the "sky", and players add one Star tile each time on their turn. The winner is the first player who has his/her Constellation to "appear" in the sky.
Rules and components:
www.substantiel.net/constellation
Note : After having inserted this game in the BGG database, I realized there's another game named Constellation, from Hans van Halteren and published in 2003. The two games look very similar in many aspects... Mine is derived from the original "Fountain of the King" that I originaly designed in 1995, which transformed into Xochintlan, then 6x5, and now the Gamers Constellation. I thought this was a great and original idea ... well, my bad !
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Posted Mon Aug 21, 2006 9:40 am
