The Board Game Design Lab

I’ll admit I was skeptical—board game design books often either drown in jargon or oversimplify to the point of uselessness. *The Board Game Design Lab* threads the needle by being *specific* without being prescriptive. Barrett’s narration carries the same off-the-cuff charm as his podcast, which works beautifully when he’s dissecting a designer’s ‘aha!’ moment but occasionally stumbles into tangential rants (his 10-minute detour on Kickstarter stretch goals could’ve been halved). The production is clean, though the lack of chapter markers for key sections (like the ‘10-Minute Design Challenge’) is a missed opportunity for listeners who’ll want to revisit these exercises. The standout sections? His breakdown of how *Wingspan*’s ‘egg miniatures’ solved a player-engagement problem is worth the price alone, and the ‘Bad Idea Workshop’ chapter—where he forces listeners to salvage terrible premises—is both hilarious and weirdly liberating. My one gripe: the audiobook assumes you’re already knee-deep in the hobby. Newcomers might struggle with terms like ‘action selection’ or ‘worker placement’ tossed around without definitions. But if you’ve ever prototyped a game (or abandoned one in frustration), Barrett’s mix of tough love and ‘just try this’ pragmatism will light a fire under you. I immediately dug out an old design after Chapter 3—and that’s the highest praise I can give.