Crab Fragment Games
Welcome to the Games Page. This is your stepping-off point into many worlds of adventure. At Crab Fragment Labs you will find new games in development, lost games from the distant past, and wild guesses about what’s coming next.
Our newest projects include Prudh and Linos, two simple abstract games; Cold Comfort, a board game about hospitality in the Yukon, and Bread Basket, a cute little sandwich-making card game. You should also check out Bitin’ Off Hedz, a colorful update to the classic dinosaur race, and Pairs, a collection of more than 50 original games with many beautiful art decks.
The Games Pages:
The Board Room: Thematic board games like Cold Comfort, Tomb of the Ancients and Shipwrights of Marino
The Card Room: Stand-alone card games including Letter Boxing, Bread Basket and The Harvest
The Pub: A mix of various abstract games, such as Whispers, Linos, and Tablero di Berona.
The Game Preserve: A vast catalog of out-of-print Cheapass Games.
The Ready Room: Games that require only the rules, and components you already have.
The Shop: Print-and-Play PDFs of games that you may buy if you like, or download for free.
If you’re looking for a specific game, you can try the unreliable search box on our front page, or scroll through the alphabetical lists in the Map Room and Cheapassic Park.
Many of our games are available print-on-demand from DriveThruCards. For your convenience we have built a page with links to all of our DriveThru products. Check it out!
Making Your Own
Nearly all of the games at Crab Fragment Labs include at least one version that you can print and play. Here are some hints for printing your own copies, and links to helpful resources for some of the components you might need.
Making Paper Components: If you’re new to making things, here are some videos about making your own cards, boards, and more:
Making Wooden Components: Most of the wooden components in the photos and videos at Crab Fragment come from James Ernest’s Workshop. We are considering offering these components for sale someday, along with posting some videos about how they are made. But in the meantime, for crafting hints, we recommend the many talented woodworkers already on YouTube.
Where to Buy Components: If you’re new to buying things, here are some helpful links and suggestions.
Thrift Stores: Check out your local thrift store for used games. This is absolutely the cheapest and most environmentally friendly way to pick up extra dice, tokens, play money, and game boxes.
Your House: If you need boxes, flat cardboard for game boards or tile cards, or objects to serve as pawns, you can probably find them in your house. And you should learn to compulsively save “good boxes.”
Your Local Game Shop: Most game stores carry a decent supply of generic components like dice and tokens. If you have a local game shop, please throw them some business when you can.
Discount Poker Shop: Discount Poker Shop have the best micro poker chips, which you will see in many of our playtest photos. They also have normal-sized poker chips at reasonable prices, and a few other gaming bits.
Koplow Games: Koplow make just about every game component imaginable: dice, pawns, tokens, sand timers, spinners, you name it. They don’t have a retail website, but you can search for their products at your local game shop, or via your favorite river-themed online retail conglomerate.
Chessex: Chessex specializes in high-end dice and dice accessories (yeah, that’s a thing), they do have a retail website, and their monthly newsletter is called “The Scoop.”
The Game Crafter: We don’t host any products at The Game Crafter (yet), but they are the foremost print-on-demand board game maker, and they carry a huge variety of components.
Do you have a suggestion or a query about building your own games? Help us grow this list, and make our free offerings even better.
Of course, “free” isn’t really free. Game designers have to eat. And travel to Hawaii now and then. So if you like Crab Fragment Labs and you want to contribute, please consider buying our free PDFs from the Shop, ordering our games from DriveThruCards, or becoming a backer on Patreon. But to be clear, the most valuable support anyone can give us is to tell your friends!
More to Come
We have several ideas in active development, and a few more that are waiting in line. Some will be surprises when they magically appear from nowhere, and others may persist as unfulfilled promises for an years to come. Here are some of the wildest guesses from the guessing hole:
On the Back Burner:
London Vacation: A family board game about getting the most out of a day in London.
Rogue’s Court: A multi-deck game of politics and intrigue, still a long way from done.
Stop the Truck: A two-player simulation of a dozen little cars trying to waylay a speeding oil tanker.
Plus updates, improvements, surprises, and new versions of games we already have!
Please Support Us on Patreon
We have a Patreon page, as you might expect, and you can help us immeasurably by joining our cadre of Hermit Crabs. If you love what we do, and you want to support our huge catalog of free content, please become a Hermit Crab today!