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Christopher Chan-BLM

@xopherchan.bsky.social
410 followers 254 following 618 posts

Art director by day and board game designer by any other time (Stalk Exchange, The Night Cage, Portents), let’s talk design and make our hobbies better, he/him, BLM

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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 27/02/2026
Fun is not a monolith. You may not know exactly what kind of fun your game wants to be when you come up with it but it’s critical to understand the intended experience before you pitch it.
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Reposted by Christopher Chan-BLM
Rami Ismail (رامي) @ramiismail.com · 15/07/2025
Bye forever, WeTransfer.
WeTransfer TOS says they can use all your uploaded content for genAI
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Reposted by Christopher Chan-BLM
Cardboard Edison @cardboardedison.com · 17/01/2026
HEY BOARD GAME DESIGNERS! We're updating our reports on publishing contracts! If you've signed a game with a publisher in the past 5 years, let us know (our Gmail is our name) and we'll send you the anonymous survey. See our past reports here: cardboardedison.com/reports And please spread the word!
Snapshot of the top portion of three of Cardboard Edison's reports on board game publishing contracts.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 19/11/2025
I am up early and ready for PAXU. Who will I see there?
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 15/09/2025
It’s official! Today is my first day at Kids Table Board Gaming. We’re going to make so much cool stuff!
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 18/08/2025
Yes! The way we use “Theme” to talk about how we style and set games frustrates the heck out of me because it mostly disregards what they are about and how we evoke that experience at the table. 🎲✂️
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 11/08/2025
This is such a delightful homage!
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Reposted by Christopher Chan-BLM
Marceline Leiman is Racing Dinos @marcelineleiman.bsky.social · 07/08/2025
#BlockCollective is a volunteer-run community with the united goal of sharing resources and information, disrupting bigoted spaces, and serious engagement on the topic of trans rights. Please join us as we help shape the boardgame industry into a safer and inclusive space. 🎲✂️ discord.gg/D7E6gqwrRF
Block Collective logo.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 29/06/2025
This is a great article. After reading it I fixed problem in a rulebook I hadn’t even realized was there. Fragile elements in a modern game rulebook do not need to be subtext, they are opportunities to set expectations about a game’s tone and intent.
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Alderac Entertainment Group @alderaceg.bsky.social · 04/06/2025
🎲✂️ Designers how well do you really know your game? We’re updating our pitch guidance and want to highlight the key questions a designer should be able to answer when submitting. Our working list attached : What would you add? #boardgames 🎲✂️
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 30/05/2025
When you make your own garden veggie cream cheese you can put as many garden veggies into it as you want
A sliced bagel on a plate on a black table in the sun piled high with finely chopped vegetables, loosely held together with some cream cheese.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
Finally finished a complete draft of a rulebook I started 2 months ago. It's never taken me this long to put together rules for something I'd pitch but travel, iteration, and a lot of self-doubt really drew this one out. I'm going to have a root beer float or something to celebrate now. 🎲✂️
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 16/05/2025
Coming back to a game after a long break makes it a lot easier fix balance issues and to identify the stuff that was unnecessarily balanced. 🎲✂️
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Sen-Foong Lim @senfoonglim.bsky.social · 10/05/2025
Check out our interview with @xopherchan.bsky.social from a few weeks ago: youtube.com/live/6soJZXz...
youtube.com
Pitching Via Video w/ Christopher Chan
YouTube video by Meeple Syrup Show
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 18/04/2025
If your Self-Doubt asks, "Is 7 prototypes enough?" when you're packing for a convention the answer is always: "Yes, shut-up." 🎲✂️
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 08/04/2025
Late w/my @unpub.bsky.social 2025 recap, but in the darkest timeline a little light is always relevant. Spending 4 days with this roving village of game designers is one of the most joyous events of the year for me. I’d trade all the spring/summer holidays for more. And it only works b/c of you.🎲✂️
A selfie with me on the left and an incredibly talented team from the game jam.Curt demonstrating a tabletop dexterity game about playing HORSE during the ProAm game jam. A selfie (probably shot around 2am) of Ian, Muzzy, Hunter, and me playing Riichi mahjong.Playtesting one of my weird Hex variants. This one’s called Triplecross and it will probably melt your brain.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 29/03/2025
Hey Unpub goers! I’m set up at K6 with Threading the Needle (my mahjong garment worker game). I’ll be here until 6:30. Stop by! 🎲✂️
A table with a series of boards and player aids set up on it with mahjong tiles. The table cloth is blue hexagons and the Unpub ready for players sign is raised.
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Meeple Syrup Show @meeplesyrupshow.bsky.social · 26/03/2025
🎲✂️ Tonight at 9 PM ET on the Meeple Syrup Show, the triple threat @xopherchan.bsky.social talks about pitching via video. @drayerink.bsky.social is travelling, so it'll just be @senfoonglim.bsky.social at the helm! Join the chat at www.facebook.com/MeepleSyrup or www.youtube.com/MeepleSyrup
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 26/03/2025
On the road to Unpub! Not saying I didn’t pack a rotary cutter and a bunch of hole punches but not saying I didn’t either.
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Dr Brian MacDonald (Brains on Games) @brainsongames.bsky.social · 21/03/2025
After playing it at #Breakout with @xopherchan.bsky.social , my copy of #StalkExchange has arrived. I pulled out an old dice bag to make the greenhouse bag a little bigger.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 20/03/2025
So far, every single interaction I’ve had with the Canadian equivalent of the DMV has been much faster and easier than anything I ever had to do in the states.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 16/03/2025
Day 3 at Breakout was basically all demoes until the con was over. It was an honor to share my published stuff this so much the convention. On the prototyping side I only got 2 playtests of my own stuff in but I’m proud to report I played 6 other designers games. Looking forward to next year!
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Daniel Newman // New Mill Industries @dnlnwmn.bsky.social · 16/03/2025
hey @xopherchan.bsky.social look what was on the front page of BoardGameArena today!
screenshot of the landing page of BGA, showing Stalk Exchange by Christopher Chan, which I playtested a few times early on. Super cool to see.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 16/03/2025
Day 2 at Breakout 2025 has been really busy for me. I did 2 panels and 2 demo sessions today. One where I moderated a discussion on games in education and one on game design 101. It’s been a delightful experience so far and, as usual, I forgot to take pictures at all today.
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John PrAther @angrytetris.bsky.social · 11/03/2025
You're telling me I can play a @xopherchan.bsky.social game in my browser? Stalk Exchange on BGA!
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 04/03/2025
Had my first meet up with a new playtest group in Toronto last night and got to try out a new investment game I’ve had in a drawer (yes, another one). I’m tentatively calling this one Witch Way. It’s loosely inspired by Trax and is basically a train game for people who don’t like trains or math. 🎲✂️
A paper prototype on a wooden surface. A grid of squares mostly diagonally bisected into 2 differently colored triangles and surrounded by cards pitching cauldrons with various resources hovering above them. Some of the squares have path tiles on them, each with a white and a black line. Those lines connect to each other and the cards on the outside. It has a hand written mark up that says “start” in the top left.The same paper prototype at the same angle as before but labeled “end” and mostly filled in by path tiles with only one cauldron card on the outside. Cauldron cards are collected on one edge of the frame.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 01/03/2025
I was cleaning out a folder and found this old board for Stalk Exchange and got all nostalgic. That game branched at least 4 times as I was figuring it out thanks to the most regular and frequent playtest schedule I’ve ever had. Community like that is truly special. Don’t take it for granted. 🎲✂️
A hand holding a rumpled and folded sheet of letter paper with a hex grid and a score track around the edge along with some ranking columns at the bottom.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 01/03/2025
Finally back from GAMA after a spot of car trouble. I'm looking forward to doing follow-ups, and working through a big, inspiration fueld post-con to do. And I definitely, definitely will not put any of that off to watch every @cardboardedison.com finalist pitch video.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 21/02/2025
One of my old teachers is getting into game design and needs to find a playtest group. Does anyone know of any groups I could direct them to in Rochester, NY? 🎲✂️
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 19/02/2025
My first sighting of Stalk Exchange at Barnes & Noble! (It’s even right next to The Night Cage!) 🎲✂️
Some crazy person (the author) standing next to an end cap in the board game section of a barnes and noble pointing at board games. One hand points at the Night Cage, the other points at Stalk Exchange.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 18/02/2025
A bit of obligatory self-promotion. Stop by and see me at GAMA next week if you want to learn a bit about pitch videos! 🎲✂️
a promotional graphic from GAMA expo that reads "making game pitch videos for non-video making professionals" followed by two head shots, one of George Georgeadis of Oniro and one of Christopher Chan of Tree Horse. February 23-27, 2025. Gama.org/gamaexpo. Kentucky international Convention Center, Louisville, KY
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 17/02/2025
I’ve been reading a lot of job descriptions lately and just had this moment where I to wondered what the description for “freelance board game designer” would look like on a job board. I’d write one but it’s 1AM and I don’t feel like warding off imposter syndrome so how would you describe it? 🎲✂️
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 11/02/2025
I snipped open my first bag of milk this morning! Am I Canadian now?
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 10/02/2025
Best mail I’ve gotten in a while! I’m so excited to dig into this one @amabel.bsky.social
A hand holding a copy of Carboard Ghosts by Amabel Holland over a polished brown stone surface.
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Amanda Panda 🔜 BGG Con, PaxU @panda8ngel.bsky.social · 06/02/2025
🔴Live now! I'll be unboxing, teaching, playing, and then reboxing Stalk Exchange by @xopherchan.bsky.social from @theop.games with @bookofnerds.bsky.social 📺 www.twitch.tv/panda8ngel
From Start to Finish: Stalk Exchange with John
Thursday, Feb. 6, 2025
11 AM PST / 2 PM EST / 7 PM UTC
Twitch.tv/Panda8ngel
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 05/02/2025
Cardboard Edison judging has begun and I’m so excited to watch these pitches! If you entered, I hope you know you’re the fun thing I’m doing to put off the other less fun stuff I should be doing for the next couple weeks. 🎲✂️
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 02/02/2025
Played a game of Spirit Island today and the friend I was playing it with pointed out that it pulls off a magic trick: you always feel like you’re going to lose but you mostly win. For a 2-3 hour co-op game, that’s a solid design goal. I’m fine w/losing, but winning invests me after that much time.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 31/01/2025
Today was the last day at my job AND the last week before I move to Canada. It's scary, but for the first time in 10 years I don't have a contract to prevent me from freelancing. Hit me up with your art direction, illustration, and/or game design gigs! www.chrischan.land 🎲✂️
chrischan.land
Advertising | Chris Chan Art Director
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 29/01/2025
I am entering my disco era. Send me your recommendations.
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Amabel Holland @amabel.bsky.social · 08/01/2025
Hey, the first chapter is available as a preview on the website if you want an overview of the book's whole deal, and the vibe.
Years ago, I read something that changed how I thought about games. In a roundabout way, it changed my life.
I would love to share it with you, but it’s gone. It was a post on a trashy trans Tumblr blog, and it was scrubbed away in late 2018 along with all the other joyously unclean things in an attempt to make the site more palatable to investors, advertisers, and credit card processors. Maybe the most important thing I have ever read, a real On First Looking Into Chapman’s Homer sort of thing, and it’s gone forever because a cell phone company thought the weird horny website would finally become profitable if it wasn’t weird and horny.
The post was written by a trans woman who was a board game designer, and it was about how badly games model romance and intimacy. Games are really good at modeling combat, she argued. You can measure someone’s hit points or exhaustion or morale, and you can whittle that down – track someone’s willingness to continue fighting. But when games try to model something as ineffable as attraction or affection, it is rendered as a kind of combat: whittling down the opposing side’s “emotional hit points”, or doing enough tasks (giving gifts, choosing the right dialogue options) to increase their mathematically-measured affinity for you. It’s a clumsy model at best, a clear example of everything looking like a nail when all you have is a hammer. At worst, it plays into the toxic idea of someone being “owed” affection or intimacy because they’ve spent x number of dollars or spent y amount of time with you.
Her conclusion, as I remember it, was that games don’t yet have the tools to model such things, and they might never get them. Because games, and board games especially, reduce everything to something tangible and measurable. Something as slippery as political influence becomes a wooden cube in your color. Happiness is a piece of cardboard scooting up a track. Games are blunt, obvious things, a collection of yes/no binary states and strict r…
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 08/01/2025
I just bought some print ads I worked on years ago off of ebay. It's equal parts annoying that I never got a physical copy from the agency and cool that people would want to sell them.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 07/01/2025
Oh hi! I’ve got a little article in this year’s best practices and I hope you give it a read!
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 03/01/2025
As someone who mostly takes notes on a phone, I’ve forced myself to keep my design journal for the garment workers game purely physical and to use cursive when I write in it. I don’t know if this is helping or hurting the process, but it is making it feel more personal and specific. 🎲✂️
A page of cursive text in a lined journal. Mostly about math.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 02/01/2025
Cardboard Edison is one of the finest awards in unpublished game design. Even if you don’t win you walk away with a lot of high quality feedback and bunch of pitch materials for your game. Do yourself a solid and submit a design this year!
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 27/12/2024
I'm really terrible about posting anything during the holidays— and you can be, too! It's really ok. Spend time with your loved ones and tell the world about it later, or not at all!
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 05/12/2024
I made it to Philly. Let’s play some board games!
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 05/12/2024
It’s 4am, my alarm isn’t supposed to go off for another hour and I can’t wait. I’m on the road to PAXU. See you there, friends!
A selfie of the author sitting in his parked car about to drive off to PAX. He’s bundled up, open mouthed with excitement and… is that a mustache? Why does he have a mustache?
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 01/12/2024
I stopped by Millennium Games to do some Xmas shopping and was surprised to see them displaying Stalk Exchange! Seeing your game out in the wild never gets old! 🎲✂️
The interior of a games store. I’m standing next to the assistant manager posing with a copy of Stalk Exchange in front of a display of Stalk Exchange.
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
Do I keep my Movember ‘stache for a passport photo? And if I do, do I have a good excuse to keep it indefinitely afterwards?
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Christopher Chan-BLM @xopherchan.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
We were trying to name a puppy, but ended up making plans to watch Jojo’s Bizzare Adventure with my mother-in-law over Christmas instead.
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