This is a small part 2 of sharing my experience at TOBE 2026 (Taiwan Original Boardgame Expo). This is a photo dump. Throughout my three days exhibiting at the fair, I had very little time to visit other booths or try other designers’ games. I basically demoed my games at my own booth 8 hours straight for three full days. I had a little time in the mornings before the doors opened to walk through the halls and take photos, and these below are the photos I took.
In Malaysia I am used to seeing English versions of boardgames. Seeing familiar titles but in Chinese is a novelty. At first I thought the Chinese version of Sagrada has a different cover. Then I checked and found that this is the 2026 edition cover for all languages. The cover I remember is from the 2017 edition.
This game is called Ice. It is from Taiwan Boardgame Design (TBD).
This is Garden, also from TBD.
Isle of Bears
The Asmodee booth had a section set up like a comfy sitting room, which is nice.
Miniatures from the game Lionwake which I first saw in Bangkok. They are based on lions in the traditional Chinese lion dance.
A cooperative card game. A rough translation of the game title is “Chaotic Summoner War”.
Horse Racing Jam: Memory and Luck Showdown! This is a game from Hong Kong. The Chinese name is a word play which only works if you read it in Cantonese. If you read it in Mandarin the pun doesn’t work.
Bugcat Capoo from Asmodee. This is a reaction and rhythm party game. I have no idea how it works. Asmodee heavily promoted this. They made cardboard headbands of the main character to give out to visitors. I saw many people wearing them walking about. I should have asked for one to keep as a souvenir.
Chinese editions of Ticket to Ride and Ticket To Ride Europe. I can’t quite get used to these new edition covers. They are pretty though.
One of my games is Snow White and the Eleven Dwarfs. This is Snow White Apple Roulette, a game originally from Japan. This was first published in 2019.
This is the Hakuroku booth. There’s something about the art of this game that attracts me. The game is Kamisama no iu toori. It means “listen to the gods”, or I guess “at the gods’ whim”, as shown on the poster.
Siew Ping from Miri helped out as an assistant at this booth, so she learned and taught this game. At the small dinner gathering on Saturday, I asked her to explain to me how it worked. This is a trick taking game. The winner of a trick distributes cards of the trick between themselves, the loser of the trick (last player), and a display at the centre of the table. The display determines which suit is trump and the values of the cards players collect. When you collect cards, they are worth points only if you have an odd number of cards. If you have an even number, they become a penalty.
The Taiwan Board Game Hall of Fame awards were held for the first time this year. This is Taiwan’s boardgame awards. This is for games published in Taiwan, including games which are not Taiwan designed. So big international titles are eligible too, as long as there is a Taiwanese edition. The Game of the Year is Dune Imperium. I am curious to try the best Taiwan original game Double Agents, but unfortunately did not manage to.
This is Lucky Dumpling, a simple push-your-luck game. This packaging is simply irresistible.
Accusation
Maze of the Mountain
Chinese edition of Dune Imperium
The art for Bloom Kingdom is interesting. Not a Taiwan design though. I was curious and sat down to read the rulebook. At the time the exhibition had not started and the booth was unattended.
During the game you will play cards to the centre of the table to manipulate the values of the card types. You will eventually keep two cards, which will score for you at the end of the round.
Games from Vietnam
Pretty merchandise
My Cat Cafe – I bet it’s a game about managing your own cat cafe!
Looks like it’s also a polyomino game
Jiangnan: Life of Gentry has a very pretty cover.
It’s a worker placement game
Characters in the game
5-Minute One Piece is 5-Minute Dungeon with the Netflix One Piece characters attached. It’s a real-time cooperative game. I write this blog post and share quick descriptions about these games I saw at TOBE. Most of this information is from what I look up on http://www.boardgamegeek.com or Google, and not what I learned from the exhibitors during the fair. Most of these photos were taken before opening time when I could roam the halls before returning to my booth to get ready for the start of the event.
It is not surprising that there are other games based on the Three Kingdoms setting. My Three Kingdoms will need to compete with many of these games when it comes out. This one above is Three Kingdoms with cats.
Adventurer’s Guild Girls is a deck-building game and a little risque
The game is based on characters from an art series by a doujin circle – an indie art creator group – called PaintCan. This is a well-known group, and the art series is popular in Taiwan and Japan.
Small box card games, Tanuki and Flow.
Ankh: Rune of Life is a Taiwanese design with an Egyptian theme.
Devil Slayer was launched at TOBE
I’m not sure if this is from Japan or Taiwan
The White Castle Duel won the best 2-player game award. The original White Castle was just okay for me. Not bad but didn’t really hook me. Maybe I should try the 2-player version.
Box cover of The White Castle Duel
This is another Egyptian themed game. This one is called Gods of Egypt. It’s a 2026 release from a Taiwanese designer.
Flow caught my attention because the cards have two ends with different numbers, just like SCOUT, dnup, and Panda Spin. Also Change, designed by fellow Malaysian Buddhima and published by Swan Panasia of Taiwan. Change was launched at TOBE, and I am excited about it because I playtested it when it was still in development. I really like the game and I find it offers something different from the other games also using cards with two different values. When I saw Flow I immediately asked Buddhima to check it out. I took a quick skim of the rules, and it is rather different from Change.
Breadrush
Tanuki
Magic Eleven is a football (soccer) game. I like the box cover.
Sweet Lands looks cute but it is a heavy Eurogame.
Look at all the components!
9Upper is a highly successful game from Hong Kong, and there has been many expansions. This is nominally a trivia game. Every card is an obscure term or name. Only one player can see the description and knows what it actually means. The rest must make things up to convince the judge that they know the real meaning of the word. If you play it a lot, you will gradually learn all the words. So expansions are needed to keep the game fresh.
Pot of Gold. I can’t find this on BGG yet.
Looks like a dexterity game
This booth is Dokkoi, from Japan. They sell boardgame accessories.
There is a special Taiwan edition for the card holder illustrated by Sai Beppu.
Tango from Taiwan visited me!
Plum and Toan from Ngu Han Games, Vietnam were my first customers at TOBE, buying Pilgrim Poker even before the doors opened.
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For more posts visit hiewandboardgames.blogspot.com, http://www.facebook.com/hiewboardgameblog or (in Chinese) boardgametable.blogspot.com.
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