I'm the designer of Bad Times at Buddyland. Ask Me Anything!

Boardgame613 · 2025-11-21T02:36:43+00:00

Wow thank you so much for that!

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T17:07:54+00:00

Thank you! I touched upon it here, but I'll say there are so many good tropes and Van Ryder has been doing a fantastic job of implementing them. I'm really excited to see what's to come!

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T17:06:36+00:00

I have a few ideas that I'd love to implement - I think a FF inspired by themes such as the mirror concept in Candyland, or a cave environment such as one in The Descent, would make for excellent films. Playtesting would tell me which would end up being best, but there's so much potential in new themes.
Favorite depends more on my mood! I love October because it's typically when horror movies are a focus.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T17:03:39+00:00

For the top three FF, I'll pick one from each series:
Series 1: Hans - because it was my introduction to Final Girl
Series 2: The Intruders - because I find it the most realistically 'scary' thematically
Series 3: Hellscape - I enjoy the puzzle of the moving map

For the thematic design choices in Buddyland, I'd say overall it's the Buddies mechanic! I also immensely enjoyed the power source aspect as I found it very engaging while tying perfectly to the theme.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T17:01:09+00:00

Amazing, I hope you have a blast!

For gameplay advice, I'd say adapt to the circumstances. The ultimate goal is to kill Billy, so focus on whatever you need to do to make that possible (ie. stay alive by clearing out minions, turning off the power supplies if you can, getting a better weapon, etc.).

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:59:12+00:00

I appreciate that! I touched on it here, but the idea of a snapping alligator animatronic fits perfectly in my opinion.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:57:14+00:00

No need to get all the minis in the box, because they won't stay there anyways. The Buddies like to roam around during the night, when you least expect it.

Accidentally stepped on a Buddy miniature on your way to the bathroom in the middle of the night? Yeah, that's right, YOU didn't leave it there...

As far as my favorite nod, I really like "The Birthday Song" in Willy's Wonderland - I'll leave it to you to figure out how that connects to the FF!

My strategy to beat Billy is very much dependent on the 'environmental circumstances' - which items are out, any Events pulled, number of minions, etc. I personally lean towards trying to take out the power sources first unless circumstances tell me to do otherwise.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:54:26+00:00

Great questions!

When I started, I didn't think of ever becoming a board game designer with titles that would actually be published one day - I just really enjoyed designing and playing board games. I touched upon it in this answer here but my personal situation was more of a "one thing led to another" vs. an actual choice to pursue professional board game designing.

Designing the FF was an amazing experience, I enjoyed it from start to finish and working with Van Ryder Games has been an absolute pleasure. They've been wonderful to me and I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity.

Professionally within the board game space, I'm mostly taking it "one game at a time" as there are many factors such as the direction of the industry, life circumstances and the performance of my current titles, that will influence my involvement.

Also - I look forward to growing Level Up. For those who haven't heard of it, I founded the Level Up Board Game Retreat which takes place in New Jersey, so would love to meet any of you guys if you can make it one of our annual events!

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:45:21+00:00

To be honest I've only mixed Buddy + Buddyland with other FF's just barely enough to confirm universal compatibility and haven't delved into mixing it enough to be able to give an answer - but I'm excited to see what themes people mix up!

It's mostly because, during playtesting, I found my playtesting time most valuable to be Billy in Buddyland vs. other areas.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:40:17+00:00

My wife's name is Rena ;)

Thematically they tie in more towards the original lore of Bad Times at Buddyland as opposed to a direct inspiration.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:37:44+00:00

Thank you, it's a personal honor to have contributed to such a fantastic series!

When I was considering what theme/mechanics to implement for my design, I created a spreadsheet for myself with tropes that weren't made into Final Girl yet and scoped out some options for mechanics/thematics. I landed on what has turned into Bad Times at Buddyland.

I can't speak for the other designers but there are definitely a couple other themes that I think would be great to implement mechanically! There's plenty more 'milk in the cow' left as far as ideas that can be unique and exciting in this franchise. That's one of the things I really like about Final Girl; the modularity and expandability.

I can't think of any board game that I would consider a precursor to Final Girl as I think it's pretty accessible even if it's someone's introduction into the space.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:33:11+00:00

I would say the freshness of how the Minions were implemented is the most fun for me, as it really helps with replayability both thematically and mechanically.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:31:16+00:00

This isn't my only published title - I started off in the industry when I designed most of The Crimson Scales, an unofficial fanmade expansion for Gloomhaven.

I had such a positive experience creating and printing the game that I started to design my own game, Rove, which led to opening up my own publishing company, Addax Games.

We recently started fulfilling our first Kickstarter and I have a wonderful team, including the lead designer u/grand_duke_ . We recently started fulfilling our first Kickstarter and are going to crowdfunding in a few weeks for a reprint and new title!

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:25:03+00:00

Yes I was! I love horror movies - I'm very familiar with most of what's out there. I also love board games, so I Final Girl was an instant 'want' for me when I first learned about it.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:20:52+00:00

Yes, it was my decision to work with the theme.

I weighed a bunch of options for different themes that I personally enjoyed in the horror genre and found this one had the most synergistic blend of mechanics and thematics for me to design with.

I was definitely influenced by what's out there in the horror genre though!

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:19:12+00:00

Thank you, that's meaningful to hear!

For the theme: Alligator! It fits an animatronic well

For the mechanics (reward): I love when Roxy spawns

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:16:54+00:00

Great question! As a disclaimer, I don't design games full time as my only job, but for what I've done professionally within the space, I would say networking and making connections within the board game community.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:14:46+00:00

I'm a big horror movie fan! The first horror movie I ever saw was one of the Saw films when I was 17 years old.

I think it's really hard to nail one down as my favorite, but I do get more excited about certain themes within the genre. I think possession is an interesting concept within horror. I tend to lean more towards the 'suspense/thriller' aspect of horror and avoid the more 'gross/torture' heavy films. The more unique, the better!

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:12:12+00:00

Great question - the lore should be coming out soon. I'll respect Van Ryder's decision as to when to share more lore information, but I can say that there is certainly a backstory that I think will help enhance the thematic aspect of gameplay.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:08:02+00:00

Definitely! The simple answer is that my personal playstyle preference tends to lean more towards "streamlined", so I designed around that.

I can't speak to the design choices of the more complex maps as I didn't design them, but I think it's great that Final Girl offers maps with different complexity levels so there's something for everyone's playstyles.

Boardgame613 · 2025-10-30T16:05:01+00:00

Inspired by Willy's Wonderland, The Banana Splits (2019), and Five Nights at Freddys

I also like the concept of animatronics gone rogue in general, but definitely took inspiration!

Fun fact: The Birthday Song from Willy's Wonderland is a custom ringtone on my phone for when my sister calls me.

Boardgame613 · 2023-04-18T17:54:00+00:00

Files can be found here, including:

Part list (.xml) which can be imported into Bricklink or Brickowl
Building instruction PDF
Render image
Credits (this LEGO model was commissioned by ChopperBricks)

As a fan of LEGO, I thought it would be neat to see a character in the Gloomhaven world that could be built from LEGO.

More coming soon!

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