Designer Diary: Monkey Palace | BoardGameGeek News

by David Gordon

Initial Brainstorm and Early Testing

In early December 2022, TAM and I received an email call for proposals for a game design using LEGO elements. We were fortunate to have been referred to the publisher Dotted Games — an Asmodee studio started by the owners of Bezzerwizzer Studio — by Bryan Bornmeuller of Office Dog (another Asmodee studio), who we had been working with on our game Crafting the Cosmos, which is due to come out in early 2025. Thank you, Bryan!

We were excited to have the opportunity and immediately began brainstorming ideas. TAM came up with an early idea, and he came over to my house to dig through my old bins of LEGO elements.

Jen Gordon, Ben Gordon, and Joshua Hilson tested a lot of early versions

Quickly we recognized a spark in the simple idea of collectively contributing to a central build while competing for points. We tested and iterated several times over the next couple weeks. We worked hard to make sure that our game and PowerPoint presentation touched on and conveyed key points the proposal brief had highlighted and submitted our proposal on January 19, 2023.

Seven-year-old twins enjoyed it!

Signing

Just a few weeks later, on February 6, 2023, Birgitte Bülow, the CEO of Bezzerwizzer Studio and Dotted Games, wrote that they were interested in the joint building of a centerpiece that would grow organically over the course of the game into a grand final structure. We scheduled a video chat and were able to walk her and her team through the design and answer questions.

On March 3, Birgitte informed us that we had made the short list. On April 3, Birgitte wrote us the most wonderful note, telling us that after their thorough review, they had selected our game! We were overjoyed and still to this day are thrilled and amazed to have been chosen.

David and TAM playtest with the wonderful Elizabeth Hargrave

Development

Birgitte let us know that there would be a very tight timeline. They wanted to target SPIEL Essen 24 for a release, but in order to do that, they would need to have all the components in place by the end of June 2023 — which left only three months for development!

Scientists at Rockefeller University

She introduced us to Jonas Resting-Jeppesen, their Head of Development, who we would quickly get to know and love. In April, May, and June, we worked closely, meeting once or twice a week with Jonas, fellow developer Jeppe Sand Christensen, and Jaume Fabregat, Board Games Lead from The LEGO Group, to sharpen the design and ensure it passed The LEGO Group’s standards. Jonas’ team tested the design several times a day, and it was also tested internally at The LEGO Group.

We worked on the systems, refined the rules, and tweaked the components. Incredibly, by the end of June 2023, Monkey Palace was ready.

David Gordon

A test during the 2024 New York Toy Fair

A big thank you to all the playtesters and the people who went above and beyond in our tests:

Amara Myaing

Amy Meckler

Ashwin, Dhaya, Sahana, and Neela Ramarajan

Betsy Cannon

Caleb Elias Reyes

Chris Backe

Dakota Amar

Elizabeth Hargrave

Forrest Cardamenis

Jacob Michalski

Jen, Benjamin, and Arielle Keiser Gordon

Jennifer Prestor

Jon, Galen, Jamie, and Milo Busky-Sherwin

Jon Lee

Joshua Hilson

Jonathan Gilmour-Long

Josh Gaylord

Kristina, Karl, and Linnea Hedbacker

Maggie Langhorne

Richard Wright

Rob McIntosh

Tun Myaing

Willa Tracy

(There were many additional testers on the publisher and The LEGO Group side.)

Thank you also to all our parents and family, who have been wonderfully supportive!

This document does not contain official text from The LEGO Group.

Dr. Reiner Knizia puts his mark on Monkey Palace at SPIEL Essen 24