Episode 254 - The Perfect Player Color
February 5, 2026
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they played recently, including Jisogi: Anime Studio Tycoon and Applejack. Then we talk about different player colors in board games, including what color we like playing in games and why.
Check out our new Valentine's shirt design!
Intro: 0:00
Announcements: 0:46
Recent Games: 1:43
Player Colors: 22:06
Outro: 33:58
Bloopers: 35:02
Games mentioned this episode:
Applejack: 12:20
This episode was sponsored by Grey Fox Games. Use the code "BLITZ2026" to get 10% off your entire cart.
Board Game Blitz's theme song was composed by Andrew Morrow.
Transcript
[00:00:06:23 - 00:00:46:22]
Hello and welcome to episode 254 of Board Game Blitz, a podcast about all things board games that you can listen to in less time than it takes that one indecisive friend to pick their player color. Board Game Blitz is sponsored by Grey Fox Games. This week, we’re talking about player colors! First, we discuss a couple games we’ve played recently, Jisogi: Anime Studio tycoon and Applejack. Then, we talk about all things “player color” including our favorites and why we think certain options are more typically available or popular in board games. And now, here are your hosts…
Ambie: Ambie
Crystal: and Crystal.
[00:00:46:22 - 00:01:09:23]
Ambie: First up, have an announcement, quick announcement. I made some new merch, yay.
Crystal: Yay merch!
Ambie: Yeah, so Valentine's day is next week. If you're listening to this when we release and you might still have time to get it, but I got, I made a Valentine's day merch with like two blitz meeples. They're blitz meeples because it's purple and blue, Crystal's purple and I'm blue. And they're holding arms or hands or, do meeples even have hands? I don't know.
[00:01:09:23 - 00:01:14:28]
Crystal: You know what? That's an episode topic right there. Do meeples have appendages?
[00:01:16:02 - 00:01:28:28]
Ambie: But yeah, they're like holding their arms to make a heart in the middle of them. So yeah, you can get that.
Crystal: It's so cute.
Ambie: For Valentine's day, you might still have time for shipping for Valentine's day or it doesn't have to just be Valentine's day. Meeples can do hearts anytime.
[00:01:28:28 - 00:01:33:12]
Crystal: You could wear a shirt with Ambie and I's meeples loving each other all year long.
[00:01:33:12 - 00:01:39:16]
Ambie: Yeah, but yeah, you can get that merch at merch.boardgameblitz.com and we'll have the link in the show notes too.
Crystal: Yay!
[00:01:43:29 - 00:03:55:24]
Ambie: Recently I played Jisogi: Anime Studio Tycoon, which I got off of Kickstarter. This is a anime themed, well you're an anime studio themed board game. You're making an anime. So this is designed by Rodrigo Esper, published by Esper Game Studio. Art is by Gou Eisuke, Thomas Romain, and Senkawa Teien. There's a lot of good art in the game.
But yeah, so Jisogi is about, it's a worker placement game where you're making an anime. So in the game, you own like a studio and you have these workers that are different cards. You start with dead inside workers. Like they, I guess they're like tired out and they're dead inside, but you can upgrade them to like-
Crystal: That's what it calls them is that they're dead inside?
Ambie: Yeah, they're called dead inside. So there's different types of workers. There's artists, a writer, a producer and a director. The director is kind of like a wild one. They can do any action, but like the artists can do the art actions. There's different actions on the board. So there's a shared board that has actions that you can do. Animate and outsource are like artists ones. You could write or research those are writing ones. And then there's staffing and networking is the producer ones. And then strategize is like, everyone can do that one. And then the director is like a wild worker that can do all of the ones, but like otherwise they're color coded. The writer is blue and could only do the blue actions or the wild black action. So like they have their specialties basically. And then there's upgrade staff too that like have special powers. So one of the actions is staffing and you can upgrade your staff. So like get better powers or hire new staff. You can have up to six people total. You start with four, but they cost money. Just like, you know, it is a worker placement game and it does have lots of money. Or like, all right, you, you have little money and you're trying to make money, but things cost money.
The way the spaces work is they're placing a little disc that represents your worker onto the space. And if it's empty, then that's good. You can do the action. Some actions cost money, just like the action itself costs money. Like I think staffing costs money, hiring people and strategize also costs money. But if there's already a worker on there, then it costs one money extra to do the action. And if there's two or one more workers on there, then it costs two money to do the action. So like you kind of want to plan which actions you want to do first based on what you think other people might do or take. Or you can also go into debt, which is what I like doing.
[00:03:57:05 - 00:04:54:00]
Ambie: Not in real life, but in this, you can go to debt. You get, you get a loan and then you have to pay back the debt or not pay the back the debt, and it costs points at the end of the game. But in the game, you're trying to make anime to get reputation, which is your points. And you get money for releasing anime too. There's four rounds in the game and each round you can release one anime. So you can at most release four animes, but it's really hard to release four anime because like each round you'll only have, you start with just four workers. And so you can just get four actions. And in order to release an anime, you have to have, there's these tiles of setting, plot and twist. And so they have different things like here, the setting is folklore horror. And then the plot is a powerful legendary creature brings terror. And the twist is a body transformation curse. So like first you're going to have to like gather them from the supplies with the writer and you can put them on here. And then you need art too. So you need to animate it. And so you need all three of these, but like one action with a normal writer will get you one or two of them.
[00:04:55:00 - 00:07:24:02]
Ambie: So you kind of need like a lot of actions. The upgraded writers can do more. The upgraded people, they get bonus stuff when you go to the actions. So like an upgraded writer can get three, but you also want certain colors. They have different genres that are different colors and different shapes and different icons. And when you release the anime, there's these big cards. I forget what they're called, but they talk about like the type of anime-
Crystal: like the theme of the anime?
Ambie: The trend or something. So there's a trend board that says it's like the upcoming trend, the active trend or a fading trend. And there's, so there's going to be three of these and it tells you like which genres it can be. So this one, for example, it's a period drama and it has two purples and a green. I forget exactly what those mean, but like that means that if you have of your setting plot and twist, if two are purple and one is green, then it matches it exactly. But in order to publish an anime in this, if this were like the active trend, that means like that's what people are watching now, right? It's trendy right now. Then you have to match at least one of these. And like, that's how you get the score too. The number of matches multiplied by your art is like your base score. And then you get bonus for certain things. And if you match it exactly, you get a bonus.
Actually there's the rules have changed since the Kickstarter version. So we played with the original rules and then also we played with the updated rules. I think I like the updated rules more. It has the updated rules on BGG. With the original one, like the first person to release under here, it didn't have to match exactly. You would get like a bonus points for their anime, but with the updated rules, it has to match exactly. So still the first person though. Yeah, you will kind of want to be like the first to release the animes. And then you also get, can go for these bonus cards that give you extra points. Like the bonus cards say things like release three animes and have them all be different types or like release three animes and also be in debt or something like. So if you fulfill that objective, then you get that point. And those get a lot of points too.
So yeah, basically you have to do a lot of things to release an anime and you have to keep doing it. And it's hard to get all the anime. So like it felt really thematic. Like I haven't played a thematic- I haven't played that many like Euro type worker placement games or like strategy games in a while because we tend to play lighter games now with kids and shorter game nights. So it was cool playing like a more thematic one again. And it did feel thematic because I'm a studio making anime and like I could try to make like a really good anime that matched the trends and like has a lot of art and like gets a lot of points, but that would take multiple turns. And then like I can't release as frequently or.. I made anime every turn the last time I played, but like it sucked. Like the first one was only like one point.
[00:07:24:19 - 00:07:40:25]
Ambie: It's like a really bad anime. So yeah, that felt pretty thematic. And like also going into debt, like I know, well, I've seen an anime about writing manga and like making anime. So I've learned about making an anime from that kind of, from watching an anime about it.
[00:07:41:22 - 00:08:11:26]
Ambie: But like it's a lot of work.
Crystal: Very meta
Ambie: Yeah, very meta. It's a lot of work and they're just working a lot and don't get much money. It's like, so it felt like that because I'm starting out and just like working a lot with the dead inside people and like I going into debt and like, okay, just trying to like, okay, I have to release like this is when we need to release. Got to get on schedule. And yeah, so it felt thematic with that. And the art is really neat too. So yeah, I enjoyed Jisogi: Anime Studio Tycoon.
[00:08:11:26 - 00:08:39:08]
Crystal: I think it is worth mentioning for those that are not aware that you almost never back Kickstarter campaigns. Like this is not something, like some board gamers are like, you know, getting a new Kickstarter game on their doorstep every two seconds, but you are very deliberate in which Kickstarter games you choose to back. So when you back something, like I pay attention because I'm like, oh, okay, this means, like it means something.
[00:08:39:08 - 00:08:54:22]
Ambie: I guess that's also why I was like very impressed with the component quality of it because it's a Kickstarter version, I guess. I mean, the art is really good, which is going to be in the regular version too, but like it's got like some acrylic things and like wooden tokens for everything. And I like those and like double-
[00:08:54:22 - 00:09:07:05]
Crystal: Yeah, and those double layer boards look really nice. I think if anybody's not watching this episode on YouTube, definitely head over to our YouTube channel to see all the components that Ambie's been showing off because yeah, they do look really nice.
[00:09:07:05 - 00:09:32:17]
Ambie: But yeah, the reason I backed it was because of the theme. Toby and I both like anime. So yeah, it's a theme that both of us are into and then it sounded like the mechanics were good too. And yeah, so I play it, I'm happy because I did enjoy it. And I thought it worked well with the theme. Like I used to really play like thematic heroes. I used to like those a lot and I still do. I just don't play them as often. So it was nice, nice getting to play a thematic euro again. That's Jisogi.
[00:09:32:17 - 00:10:06:23]
Crystal: And I feel like of anybody that I know that like I think their Kickstarter bias is definitely a real thing where people who have backed a Kickstarter kind of almost feel like a weird obligation to like the game. But I feel like with you that definitely is not the case. Like if you did not like this game, you would be like, oh, this is not good. But you are genuinely stoked about this. So I think that's really exciting. I'm glad that a game with a theme that was so interesting to you turned out to be a really fun game. And I don't know when, but I hope I get to play with you sometime.
[00:10:08:00 - 00:10:32:27]
Ambie: Yeah, I guess the one sadness about it is that like they updated the rules. And then so it has like a different, like part of the components are like showing what you get when you do something. And so like they have a new thing to print out for that. So it won't have to like print it out and it won't be like the nice cardboard component thing that it has. And I think they had new versions of the cards too. There's some cards that you get, which I haven't, we haven't played with those yet, but yeah.
[00:10:32:27 - 00:10:43:23]
Crystal: Well, if there's anybody that can make a printed out version of something look decently nice, it's probably you. So I bet you'll be able to make things look lovely enough.
[00:10:44:25 - 00:10:48:02]
Ambie: Yeah, when we played it, I just like wrote on a paper. I was like, okay, proxy this.
[00:10:49:13 - 00:11:21:13]
Ambie: But it did not look pretty for that one, but yeah. I'll eventually print out like the actual files they have, I think.
Crystal: Okay.
Ambie: Hello, this is future Ambie here. After recording this podcast this week, there was a new Kickstarter launch for Jisogi version 1.5 and it also includes an upgrade pack for the Founder's Edition, which is what I have. So I have backed that to get the upgraded components printed nicely, but yeah, that's I think ongoing now. So you can check out that Kickstarter. I had no idea it was gonna happen. So good timing on my part, I guess.
[00:11:21:13 - 00:11:58:09]
Crystal: Well, I was recently introduced to a game by somebody in the Blitz discord. Shout out to Jared. And it's funny, I've now been playing board games online with a bunch of folks in the Blitz discord, like basically every week for multiple years. And over the course of that happening, I think the people in the Blitz discord, even those who maybe only have listened to the podcast some, like maybe, you know, who aren't necessarily an every episode listener, they've kind of gotten to know what types of games I enjoy.
[00:11:59:21 - 00:20:49:01]
Crystal: Jared apparently has figured me out because he, for like, it wasn't a matter of me not wanting to, but for weeks it just wasn't happening. He kept saying, "Hey, there's this game on BGA "that I wanna teach you." And we just weren't getting to it, weren't getting to it. And then we finally played it somewhat recently. And that game is Applejack.
Applejack was published in 2022 by the game builders and then Stonemaier designed by Uwe Rosenberg, who I imagine many of you have probably heard of. Yeah, I don't know, Jared clearly just like has my vibe because as soon as I started playing this game, it was instantly like, "Oh yeah, I love this." Like we were barely into it. And I could tell that it was just one of those games that for me is like, "Oh, this is a good fit." So I told him, I was like, I can see why you wanted me to learn this. And it felt really like kind of nice and lovely that just like the people in the Blitz discord have gamed with me so much that they just know what to recommend to me at this point.
But I will admit Applejack thematically is not that like exciting. Like it's like, "Oh, it's tile laying and they have apples on the tiles." And that's kind of it. So like, I don't know if that's why, like this one hadn't hit my radar. So in Applejack, this is definitely one of Uwe Rosenberg's lighter games. This is not on the heavier side for the types of games that he designs. Every player has a player board with a bunch of hexagonal areas on it that you will be placing tiles into. And then the main board in the center of the table has a spiral path on it that you place a die, a six-sided die onto and that die is what moves around the track. It is like almost reminiscent of some other Uwe designs where like time is a factor or where you're moving things around a track and things change based on where things are on the track. But this one works differently because the die is not a particular player. It's just kind of the tracker of the game. And when the die moves to the next space, it indicates a bunch of different things. It indicates both what player is going next because each player is indicated by a particular shape on the board. So like if you're the circle player or the square player, when the die gets to your shape on the board, you take a turn. So it's not necessarily clockwise turns in the game. It's based on what symbol the die is covering on the board on that particular turn.
And as the die moves, it will pass certain things on the main board that will determine when and how things on your player boards will score. So what are you trying to collect and why? All of the tiles that you will be picking and then placing onto your player boards contain a few different things. They contain little hives, which have numbers on them to indicate how much honey they cost and how much honey they can produce. They have apples of seven different varieties, which are all indicated by color and also little, there are visual design element things that are slightly different about them as well. So if you have color blindness issues, there are other differentiating factors between the seven different types of apples. And then there are flowers as well. And when you place tiles on your board, one of the things I love about this game is this is one of those games where there are no real rules as to where you can place tiles on your player board. You can place them next to other things or not next to other things, kind of willy nilly, a little free form there. But what you are trying to do ultimately is line up the beehives that are on the sides of the tiles to match up with other hives on the sides of other tiles and also form groupings of all of the different colors of apples. So you want tiles that have like colors of apples to be touching one another. And some of the tiles will have upwards of four different apples on them of different colors, whereas some tiles might only have one or two apples. So considering there are seven total different varieties, you have a lot of different groupings that you're trying to make happen at the same time, basically, because ultimately you do want to have groupings of as many different types of apples as possible.
Because when the apples score, the pip value showing on the die that is on the main player board, when a particular apple scores, you will subtract the number of apples in the grouping that is largest for that apple type. You'll subtract the pip value currently on the die on the main player board, and then you will score based on the remainder. So if I had, let's say four tiles all next to each other, and there were three blue apples on all of those tiles and they were all touching one another, but then it was round two kind of of the little spirally board. And so the die had a two showing on it. I would only score one point for that particular apple color when it scored in that round. But again, these scoring things are not happening like all at once. The spiral board has the apple varieties kind of interspersed throughout all of the different turns. So you can kind of plan in advance like, oh, okay, after my turn, the red and the green apples are gonna score. And then after Ambie's turn, the pink ones and the orange ones are gonna score. And so the way you pick up tiles and choose what you want to place on your board is on the sides of the player board, there are little sections of different tiles that you can choose from. And where the die is also determines which tiles are available to you to choose.
I just, I don't know how Uwe does it, that like one singular thing determines a whole bunch of other things, but it just, it works really well here. And assuming that you have at least two tiles to choose from based on where the die placement is on the main player board, you have to pick one. But if there is only one available tile in the two slots that are next to the die, then you get to refill the whole board with more tiles. This is one of those things that I'm realizing that like describing it audibly is kind of difficult to visualize. I wish I had a physical copy of this game, I need to buy it. I desperately want to now that I've played it online. But basically you pick tiles, you put them on your board, and then you score apple varieties. And then when the die gets all the way around to a certain place on the board, the flowers on your board will also score. And those are kind of a nice, easy way to get some points because the flowers don't have to be next to one another like the apples do. And they appear on a bunch of the different tiles, including some with apples and some without, which is nice.
Another thing that's interesting is that the honey in the game is both your points and your currency. So when you place a tile, you have to pay the amount that's showing on the hives on that tile. And all of the hives have the same number on them and that is the number you have to pay. You don't have to like add them together. So if the hives on the side, I'll say seven and there's three of them, you don't pay 21, you just pay seven for that tile. But then if you line those hives up next to other hives that are already on your board, whatever the lower value hive is that's touching, you get the honey back from those hives immediately. Yeah, so it's one of those things where you're trying to decide like how much money do I wanna spend on tiles versus how much I'm gonna get back versus how do I make groupings of apples versus when are those apples going to score?
It's one of those games that has a lot going on that you wanna think about, but that mechanically, it's so simple. You would literally pick a tile, place a tile anywhere on your board you want. Like in theory, if you wanted to play this with a three-year-old, you could tell the three, like obviously the three-year-old is not gonna do well, but mechanically the game is approachable in that way that you could like, okay, pick which tile you want, put it on your board, here you go, that's it. But there's so much to think about in where you're placing your tiles, how you're placing them, which ones you're buying. I am in love with this game, Ambie. Like I cannot tell you, like Jared nailed this one for me and I am like, why are more people, did people talk about this game when it came out and I just missed it? Like it's an early game.
[00:20:49:01 - 00:20:50:17]
Ambie: I remember hearing about it, I remember seeing the cover.
[00:20:50:17 - 00:22:02:04]
Crystal: And it is like a little like, it looks like a Johnny Appleseed character on the box, like sitting under a tree holding an apple, but oh my gosh, it's so fun. I truly think this is, like I'm actually gonna put this in my head next to Queenz: To Bee or Not to Bee because that's also a game with flowers and honey. I'm just gonna say these two games where you are producing honey are underrated and more people should play them. I'm just gonna now start grouping them together because thematically they're slightly similar. So that's how I'm gonna remember to tell people about them. But I love this, I will be playing it a lot more in the future. I will be buying a physical copy of it. And yeah, I'm just so stoked that I got to play it and I hope more people are able to give it a try. Not that Uwe Rosenberg really needs the hype, right? Like I'm sure Uwe's probably doing fine, but this one for me might be my favorite Uwe game all of a sudden, which yeah, I know, right? That's a lot to say, but I just, the vibes are good and the gameplay is satisfying and I love it.
[00:22:06:15 - 00:22:18:04]
Crystal: For our main topic today, we're gonna be talking about player colors. Ambie, when you open up a game box and somebody says, "What color do you wanna be?" I know the answer to this, but what color do you choose?
[00:22:18:04 - 00:22:20:22]
Ambie: Blue, as we mentioned with our merch.
[00:22:20:22 - 00:22:59:13]
Crystal: Yes, you are the blue meeple and I am the purple meeple. If purple is available, that is the color I prefer. Although I'll already caveat that with the game group that I played with every week pre-pandemic, there was another woman in that group who was more obsessed with being purple than I was. And so if I was in a game with her, I just gave it up. I was like, she was one of those people that has to be a certain player color. Like we'll move your pieces if you are purple kind of thing. And that's part of the equation, right? We'll get to that, but-
[00:22:59:13 - 00:23:00:08]
Ambie: I do that accidentally sometimes.
[00:23:00:08 - 00:24:51:08]
Crystal: Yeah, it does happen, right? Especially if you're playing a long gaming session where you're playing multiple games in a row and you've been different player colors. There is something to be said for consistency in helping your own brain remember what you are, especially as those of us get older and start, you know, our short-term memory isn't quite as good as it used to be. But yeah, I was basically like, she can be purple. It's fine. Cause she was not gonna be any other color. But I think most players, not all, but most players do have preferences in which player color they want to be. And there's a lot of different reasons why somebody might choose one player color over another. But it has been nice, I think in, you know, recent years past like decade or two to see more options in player colors in games. Typically in both board games and even video games from the late 20th century, especially, like if you had four players in a game, generally the player colors were going to be red, blue, green, yellow, always. Like that was it. Like you never saw other options for the most part. I think there are reasons for that. Like there's a lot of different reasons why those were the main player colors and it relates to primary colors and printing capabilities and ink and other things of that nature. Some colors are a lot harder or more expensive to produce than others. And some are more easier. Pigments are simpler in some colors than others. And so to some degree, I understand why there was kind of some like almost standardization, but I'll admit I'm bored. If I see red, blue, green, yellow, and those are the only options in a game at this point, I'm like, really? Like you couldn't have done anything a little more creative than that, really?
[00:24:51:08 - 00:24:57:27]
Ambie: Yeah, if those are like the four player colors, now it seems like it's an older game. Like that makes me think of older games.
[00:24:57:27 - 00:25:01:19]
Crystal: Yeah, it doesn't feel as modern of a choice anymore
[00:25:01:19 - 00:25:16:13]
Ambie: And if it's a modern game with those colors, I feel like it would usually be like a muted color or like a shade, like a pink and then like a light green and like not just like plain red RGB red, like one red.
[00:25:16:13 - 00:26:45:23]
Crystal: Red red and blue blue, right, like kind of those things that we all think of. Of course, then I say that out loud and I realized that when we all see blue, are we seeing the same thing? That's a whole other, right? Like we only know our own perception of things. And so what I think is blue might not look like blue to you, kind of a deal, but because of light and wavelengths and all of that jazz, we do actually know that a lot of things that we perceive generally are perceived the same way by others.
I agree though, it feels like an old fashioned choice. I think part of the reason that the industry has moved away from that, in addition to printing capabilities and the availability of other colors is definitely a factor, but I also think accessibility has played a role, you know, as more information and knowledge about the different types of color blindness has become, I think more well known, the most common form of color blindness is red-green color blindness. And so if two of the player colors are red and green, then there are players who will have trouble differentiating. And while somebody without color blindness might look at those two colors and say, they look very different, for somebody with that form of color blindness, they can look nearly identical. So I think it's really nice when publishers not only make options that are just a little bit more aesthetically pleasing or popular potentially, but also more accessible to other gamers.
[00:26:45:23 - 00:27:11:08]
Ambie: Well, you did mention like video games. In video games now, you can like choose a lot of customization, but with board games, you can't really do that because like, if there's four players, they're not gonna publish, they're not gonna print, manufacture a bunch of different player colors, because that's expensive for a physical product. So there's just gonna be four colors. So they're gonna pick like, maybe we'll have like purple and pink and whatever, like there's gonna be four colors that you choose from not infinite, like with video games.
[00:27:11:08 - 00:27:29:00]
Crystal: I'm trying to think if there are any exceptions to this, but basically the player count of a board game is in and of itself, the limitation in number of player colors. I don't know if I've ever seen a board game where there were more player color options available than actual like player count, right? Like if it's--
[00:27:29:00 - 00:27:30:16]
Ambie: Yeah, I'm not sure if I've seen that either.
[00:27:30:16 - 00:27:41:15]
Crystal: Cause I'm thinking of games with even large player counts, like the Wits and Wagers kind of party additions that can go up to like 10 people. They have 10 different color sets, right? But not more than that.
[00:27:41:15 - 00:27:44:04]
Ambie: If they had more than they could say it goes to 11.
[00:27:45:02 - 00:28:08:19]
Crystal: Right, it's like, why wouldn't you at that point? And of course then there are reasons why you might still cap the player limit, but it does feel like if the player colors were available, people would immediately say, why doesn't it go to 11, right? If you had 11 player colors as an option, just like for the variety, I think people would actually get upset about it. They'd say, why do you say it's only for 10?
[00:28:10:05 - 00:29:07:21]
Crystal: Yeah. I think that for me personally, I do have some psychological kind of like affinities or associations with certain colors that I don't like. Like red is often associated with anger or like bad feelings. Yet I know that a lot of board gamers love playing red. It's my least favorite and it always has been. And I'm curious like what that says about me, I guess, like that, like this option that other people really like choosing is a thing that I, I honestly think part of the reason I move away from it is because other people like it so much. In addition to me not like vibing with the color red, other people like red. And so I am just like, I don't ever wanna choose red because I don't wanna have that conflict with another person who is picking the same color as me. I think I'm averse to that to some degree.
[00:29:07:21 - 00:29:15:09]
Ambie: Yeah, well blue is a pretty popular color. And so I do sometimes have like other people pick blue and then we get in a fight. No, I'm just kidding.
[00:29:16:07 - 00:29:18:22]
Crystal: And then we get fisticuffs.
Crystal: And then we, yeah.
[00:29:19:20 - 00:29:20:29]
Crystal: It's a duel to the death!
[00:29:22:05 - 00:29:35:17]
Ambie: I think most of the time now I like let them have it or whoever like picks it first usually. I don't game with people who care too much about the color currently, I think. Like I think even my kids don't really care. They like all the colors.
[00:29:36:17 - 00:29:42:18]
Crystal: That's awesome.
Ambie: I mean, I let them pick first, but they focus more on like the character than the color, I think.
[00:29:42:18 - 00:30:18:27]
Crystal: Well, that's actually like, I mean, that's a good point, right? In some games, color isn't the only factor. Like often color is part of it, but then there might be a character associated with it. And again, this actually is a good point because for me, if the characters are gendered in any way, even if it isn't meaningful within the game itself, I enjoy playing female characters. So I guess like if all of the characters were male presenting except for the red and the red was the female character, I would probably want the red. I think that supersedes my color preference.
[00:30:18:27 - 00:30:26:20]
Ambie: Yeah, I tend to pick female characters too. In Robinson Crusoe, they were double-sided. So you could like, no matter what character, you just flip over to the female side.
[00:30:26:20 - 00:31:19:10]
Crystal: I love games that do that, but I think that's gonna give you kind of the option. But it definitely stems from childhoods spent playing video games where almost every protagonist was male. And as a woman, it's really nice to just be able to play a woman. Like I do remember the whole thing with Metroid when I was a kid and finding out that Samus was a woman and like the whole world's collective mind exploding that this cool, badass, sci-fi character was a lady. Oh my gosh, like everybody lost their minds. And Metroid as a series, I think has been more popular in general. This is a personal opinion. I do not have any science to back this up, but I believe it has been more popular with female gamers than other games within the same genre because the protagonist is female. And that does make a difference.
[00:31:20:17 - 00:32:03:02]
Crystal: When publishers are deciding what player colors to put into a game, like of all of the decisions that you have to make when you're publishing a game, the player colors does kind of feel like one of the less important ones, right? But I do, I like that publishers are being more thoughtful about every aspect of their games when they're publishing them nowadays. And I think that that makes the board gaming experience just a little bit more deep and nuanced and better in general. And so I will say, I can't remember offhand what it was, but I know that I've encountered at least one game where the player colors were white, black, brown, and tan.
Ambie: I was gonna mention that!
[00:32:04:10 - 00:32:18:07]
Crystal: And I was angry, like more angry than a person should be about a thing like that because I was just like-
Ambie: I think all of those colors are ones that I tend not to want to pick.
[00:32:18:07 - 00:32:37:02]
Crystal: Yes, I don't want anything colorless, essentially. Like I don't want bland. I want bright, I want vibrant, I want something visible. And if all of the options are blah, I'm so sad about it. And I genuinely don't know what to pick. Cause I'm just like, I don't want any of you.
[00:32:38:05 - 00:32:39:14]
Ambie: I think I prefer black.
[00:32:39:14 - 00:32:44:01]
Crystal: I think white would be my preference cause it's kind of the brightest in general.
[00:32:45:02 - 00:33:00:08]
Crystal: I hate Browns and tans in games, like least favorite. I will take anything else over brown or tan. And if I ever see somebody reach for those colors first, I will admit I'm like, what's wrong with you?
[00:33:02:07 - 00:33:07:11]
Crystal: Like in a funny way, not like a serious way, but like, why would you choose that?
[00:33:09:00 - 00:33:11:27]
Ambie: So yes, let us know if you choose brown.
[00:33:11:27 - 00:33:58:17]
Crystal: No, genuinely, if you're a person who enjoyed, like who wants tan or brown, tell me why. I want to know. Cause I do think that maybe there's something there that I'm not getting. Obviously we could take this discussion in a much more scientific route. Like we could really dive into color theory and more into psychology. Like this is kind of just our general thoughts on things. I would be willing to do a deeper dive into it in the future if this is something that interests people. So if you all are interested in a deeper dive into color and how it relates to board game player choices, let us know. Maybe we'll pick it back up again at some point. And I also would love to hear what your all's favorite player colors are, just cause it's always fun to hear.
[00:34:00:00 - 00:34:53:28]
Ambie: And that’s it for this week’s Board Game Blitz. Visit our website, boardgameblitz.com for more content and links.
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Our theme song was composed by Andrew Morrow.
Until next time,
Well I don't know what I should do
Cause you got green, so I guess I’ll be blue
Bye everyone!
Crystal: Bye!
[00:35:02:28 - 00:35:21:19]
Crystal: For todit- Bleh bleh bluh bluh. Okay, perfect. Good, great, awesome. Yay. Getting it out of the way quick.
Ambie: I was worried about not having bloopers but we're good!
Crystal: And we'll bluh bluh bluh, blah blah blah. Okay, perfect, got it. All right.
[00:35:21:19 - 00:35:28:24]
Ambie: Support the show by leaving us a rating and review on your podcast provider or by purchasing the... blah. It's new.
Crystal: Yeah, it's different.
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