Gaming with Science

#RockBuddies #Catlilli #Rocks #Geology #Igneous #Sedimentary #SciComm #BoardGames #Science Summary While at the Origins Game Fair, Brian sat down to talk with Catherine and Jonathan Croft, founders of Catlilli Games, about their new game Rock Buddies. (So new it hasn't even been Kickstartered yet.) In this interview, we get to hear all about rocks, how to make (and pitch) a interesting science gam...

#SETI #Aliens #Astronomy #BoardGames #Science Summary Today we're talking aliens! Or at least potential aliens, with SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, by Czech Games Edition. We are joined by Dr. Seth Shostack, the director of the real-life SETI Institute, which tries to scientifically answer the question: Are we alone? We talk about why and how we search for aliens, what makes SETI...

#Wingspan #ElizabethHargrave #Interview #Designer #BoardGames #Science Summary After 3 years of  comparing every game to Wingspan, we finally get to talk with the designer herself, Elizabeht Hargrave! We talk about her design process, favorite games and memories as a designer, current and future projects, and all sort of other fun stuff. And about birds, of course. (And butterflies, foxes, seashel...

#Domestication #TheFoxExperiment #ElizabethHargrave #Dogs #Evolution #BoardGames #Science Summary Foxes, wolves, and corn, oh my! We're talking domestication today, all revolving around The Fox Experiment and two Russian scientists' attempt to understand how we turned wolves into dogs. We're joined by Dr. Angela Perri, an expert in dog domestication, and cover what domestication is, how wolves bec...

#EndangeredRescue #EndangeredSpecies #PuzzleGame #GenCon #BoardGames #Science Summary In this special just-in-time-for-GenCon bonus episode, we sit down with Marc Specter and Ace Ellett to talk about their "Endangered Rescue" puzzle game series, including both the Lemur Leaf Frog (which we played) and Chambered Nautilus (which is coming out as this drops). We talk about this series's origins as th...

#Archaeology #AncientGames #Ur #Senet #Mehen #BoardGames #Science Summary We're looking deep into history today as we talk about the oldest board game with a known ruleset: the Royal Game of Ur. Joining us is Dr. Walter Crist, an archaeologist and expert in ancient games. We cover ancient dice sets, the meanings of games, centuries-old games made with graffiti, how Walter and colleagues are using...

#Microcosm #Micobiology #MicrobialEcology #NutrientCycling #BoardGames #Science Summary As the last(?) entry in our surprisingly large amount of content in our summer "break", we have a short and sweet creator interview with Dr. Fatima Foflonker about her newly released game, Microcosm. This interview was grabbed by Brian at Momocon (Atlanta), and covers a quick introduction to nutrient cycling, t...

#Minecraft #MinecraftBasalt #NeuralNetworks #ArtificialIntelligence #AI #TeachingComputersToGame #BoardGames #Science #SciComm Summary In our final minisode about teaching computers to game, we leave the tabletop behind and move on to Minecraft and even the real world. We're also back with Dr. Prithvi Akella, who helps us understand how Minecraft and other digital games provide more open-ended pla...

#Go #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #ComputerGaming  #BoardGames #Science Summary It's part 3 of our miniseries on teaching computers to play games. Today we're joined by special guest, Dr. Prithvi Akella, a roboticist and AI expert here to help us learn how to play Go, or at least how to teach a computer to do so.  Timestamps 00:00 Introductions 02:20 Background on Go 06:52 Neural networks 09:50 Trai...

#Chess #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #ComputerGaming  #BoardGames #Science Summary Welcome back to our miniseries on teaching computers to game! In our second minisode we talk Chess, arguably one of the most iconic games of man versus machine--which we lost thirty years ago. Chess is our poster child for brute-force approaches, where we use computers massive power to analyze millions of options and...

#TicTacToe #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #ComputerGaming #BoardGames #Science Welcome to the first of our four-part miniseries on teaching computers to game! For the next month we're going to have a short episode every week talking about some aspect of computers and gaming. This week we introduce the topic with Tic-Tac-Toe (aka Naughts and Crosses, aka X's and Os') and solved games. We talk about al...

#FloraVista #Gardening #Botany #InvasiveSpecies #BoardGames #Science #SciComm Summary It must be Kickstarter season, because we have another bonus interview about a new game that just went live on Kickstarter. FloraVista is a game about gardening and plants, so our hosts just had to have the creators on to talk about their inspiration, what sort of plants and botanists made it into the game, how t...

#ArkNova #CaptstoneGames #Zoos #Zoology #AnimalGames #WAZA #AZA #BoardGames #Science #SciComm Time to run a zoo! In this episode, we're joined by Ellen Weatherford (of Just the Zoo of Us) to talk about Ark Nova and all things zoos. Learn why running a zoo is probably best left to game imagination, what it takes to get accredited, how you can tell good zoos from bad ones, the enclosure preferences...

#PangolinScienceGames #TheMatingGame #SexualSelection #BoardGames #Science #Bonus Summary In this bonus episode of Gaming with Science, we’re joined by Dr. Andrea Roth Monzón and Dr. Andrew Thompson of Pangolin Games to discuss their upcoming Kickstarter project, The Mating Game. We dive into how they’ve translated complex evolutionary concepts like sexual selection and reproductive trade-offs int...

#Diatoms #DONA #Ludoliminal #Microbiology #BoardGames #Science In this episode we're going microscopic to talk about everything Diatoms! Starting from the game by Ludoliminal and going through the classic (and obscure) Victorian art form of arranging these beautiful glass-shelled organisms on microscope slides, our special guest Laura Aycock--collections manager at the world's *largest* diatom her...

#Cellulose #GeniusGames #InDefenseOfPlants #Plants #Botany #CellBiology #MolecularBiology #BoardGames #Science #SciComm Summary This mont we talk Cellulose and all things plants with special guest Matt Candeias, of the In Defense of Plants podcast. In this sequel to Cytosis, we dive inside of a plant cell in a worker-placement game that while similar to its predecessor also adds a lot of new mecha...

#Oceans #Finspan #OceansNorth #MarineBiology #Interview #BoardGames #Science Summary In this special bonus episode, we talk with Dr. Brynn Devine, one of the science consultants on Finspan. We get to hear what it was like helping the game's development, why monitoring fish and oceans is so crucial, how cold-calling can open surprising doors, and details on many lovely, lovely fish. Timestamps 00:0...

#Finspan #StonemaierGames #ElizabethHargrave #Wingspan #ScienceCommunication #Oceans #Fish #BoardGames #Science Summary In this episode we discuss the game "Finspan" by Stonemaier Games, and are joined by Emily Melvin, a PhD candidate in marine science at Duke University. In a game that's basically "Wingspan but with fish", we talk about the game differs from its predecessor, all whole bunch of di...

#Primates #Evolution #GreenButteryflyGames #Conservation #BoardGames #Science Summary Happy 2026, everyone! To celebrate Darwin Day (February 12th), we have a special 90-minute episode with Will and David from the Common Descent Podcast to talk all about Primates! We'll cover the new game by Green Butterfly Games, all six clades of primates it showcases, and tons of other fun facts about us an our...

#GeniusGames #STEMEducation #SciComm #JohnCoveyou #BoardGames #Science We've done several episodes on games from Genius Games (Cytosis, Periodic, Genotype), and now we get to speak to the man behind it all: John Coveyou, founder and CEO of Genius Games. John graciously sat down with us to talk about the beginning of Genius Games, the stigma of "educational" games, the challenges and joys of STEM g...

#NatureGame #NorthStarGames #Evolution #Ecology #Predators #BoardGames #Science #SciComm Summary Welcome to Nature, the next evolution of Evolution! We're joined once again by Dr. Thiago Moreira to talk about this reimagining of a popular game, including covering a lot of evolutionary territory we couldn't last time. We'll talk about why everything isn't actually turning into crabs, why anteater-i...

#Periodic #GeniusGames #Chemistry #PeriodicTable #Atoms #Elements #STEM #BoardGames #Science #SciComm Summary In this episode we get elemental for the game Periodic, with the amazing Dr. Raychelle Burks as our special guest. We talk about why the table is arranged like it is, why some elements are weird, what the groupings mean, why we should love *all* subatomic particles, how isotopes help solve...

#Daybreak #CMYKGames #Climatechange #ClimateScience #BoardGames #ScienceCommunication #SciComm  Things are warming up in this episode as we talk with Dr. Jacquelyn Gill about Daybreak, a cooperative game about combatting climate change while keeping society intact. We cover tipping points, carbon drawdown, ocean acidification, the clean energy transition, what fossil fuels actually are, and some a...

#genetics #genotype #GeniusGames #mendel #peas #BoardGames #Science This month we're talking about Genotype, by Genius Games, where you get to play a field assistant to the father of modern genetic, Gregor Mendel. We'll talk about who Mendel was, why his peas were so important to biology, how he got a bit lucky, and how many different ways there are to break a gene. (Also, why it's weird that some...

#Atiwa #Bats #UweRosenberg #LookoutGames #Extension #Outreach #SciComm #BoardGames #Science Overview It's time for bats! In this episode, we talk about Atiwa, a worker-placement game by Uwe Rosenberg based on a specific scientific study showing how fruit bats provide enormous ecological benefit to communities in Ghana. We're also joined by Mariëlle van Toor, one of the researchers involved in that...