This board game about making board games is more than just a cute gimmick

We’ve officially hit the meta era of board games thanks to Tabletop Inc., a board game that’s quite literally about the act of designing board games. It’s a charming bit of board-game-ception, though perhaps not the most accurate recreation given how rapidly the industry is changing right now. Still, tariffs and crowdfunding politics aside, it’s a unique and appealing theme. Tabletop Inc. also, thankfully, has quality gameplay to back it up – even if it’s not going to revolutionize the worker placement genre.

Tabletop Inc. raised over $300,000 on Gamefound back in 2024. You might recognize its former name – Meeple Inc. – as it caught publisher Cotswold Games in a bit of hot water. Carcassonne publisher Hans Im Glück sent the company a cease and desist in response to its crowdfunding campaign, stating that the word ‘meeple’ in the board game’s title was infringing on Hans Im Glück’s copyright.

Rather than axe the game entirely, Tabletop Inc. was rebranded, but its mechanics remained basically unchanged. In this strategy board game, everyone competes to become the most successful board game publisher. Your employees are a mix of humans and ‘mumans’ (meeples by definition, but not by name), and you’ll place these workers at various spots on the board to gather resources and craft your award-winning board games.

Every board game needs a box, mechanics, and rules of a specific quality to qualify for an award, of which there are three tiers. You can only produce top-quality games if you have the staff and employees with the relevant experience (though it’s possible to spend time training them). Plus, you’ll need to manage a pool of thematic resources – time, money, playtesting, and research – to achieve your goals.

Any published board game is worth points, but they’re worth more if they take home a prestigious award. Players can also boost their score by recruiting freelancers, completing additional objectives, or simply placing their workers in an optimal spot.

While all this thinking is going on, the clock is ticking. Players must repeatedly collect their workers and return them to their pool, which reduces the game timer bit by bit. Each time they do, they also have a chance to make predictions about what their opponents’ next move will be – gaining extra points if these happen to come true.

At first glance, Tabletop Inc. might look a little overwhelming to the beginner board gamer. There are 16 possible actions to take with your meeple-that’s-not-a-meeple and five resources to manage (not including your actual workers). However, the game is deceptively approachable. It’s a breeze to learn and teach, and its iconography is clear and easy to understand.

The sum of its parts is mid-complexity rather than super crunchy. That might be a turn-off for hardcore worker placement fans, but it’s a big plus to anyone who’s new to the genre or looking for a more relaxed play experience.

The gameplay loop can feel a little slow at first, but it sets up an interesting puzzle. Namely, the puzzle of ‘how can I squeeze more turns and points out of my limited options?’ Perhaps you’ll want to hoard a particular resource to guarantee you can perform a crucial action, even if a competitor has already stolen the free-to-use space. Maybe you’ll choose to collect your workers earlier than you need to in order to benefit from a specific bonus.

The endgame can creep up on you at surprising speed, so it’s important to plan ahead and maximize your final turns. As with all worker placement games, however, you’re competing with others for prime action spaces, so your plans will regularly change on the fly.

For players who want to upgrade the basic worker placement experience, Tabletop Inc. offers a handful of additional cards and mechanics to encourage replayability. The prediction mechanics also add another iron to the fire. I largely ignored these in my early learning games, but they became more enticing when I wanted to add complexity to the experience.

While it’s not the only reason to try Tabletop Inc., the delightful theme is a major plus. Every component is bright and whimsical. Each player represents a company that comically parodies the manufacturers of the very best board games.

When you publish a tabletop title, you get to select a box lid from one of many spoofs of a famous title. Beak Size, as produced by Asmodeus Games? That’s bound to get a guffaw out of somebody.

The components that help sell this theme are, sadly, a bit of a mixed bag. Cotswold Games provided me with a deluxe edition of Tabletop Inc., which added chunky wooden display pieces, plastic employee standees, and 3D resource components. These are wonderful, but their counterparts in the regular edition are incredibly flimsy. I’m reluctant to praise the Deluxe Edition’s additions when those who buy a standard copy will have a drastically different experience.

Additionally, my copy of the game came with a misprinted card in the solo mode deck, which I only discovered after an extensive dive through board gaming forums. The rulebook occasionally lacks clarity, too. More than once, I ran back to these forums to verify a basic rule that wasn’t explained outright in the rules – the sort of thing you could perhaps assume was true, but should have been explained nevertheless.

My only other critique is that Tabletop Inc. is not as enjoyable as a two-player or single-player board game. The bot system that makes one-player games possible is great for learning the ropes, but it’s a bit too easy to predict, and it doesn’t reflect the authentic experience of playing with a group. Two players also won’t feel the pressure of a crowded board, and the advantages of going first become far more apparent with fewer people in play.

Looking for more gaming recommendations? Here are the couples’ board games that we love. Or, if you’d like to share your own opinions on Tabletop Inc., join us in the Wargamer Discord for a chat.

Source: Wargamer