I’ve been so caught up with my travels for SPIEL Essen 23 that I’m just getting around to posting about the kickoff of the Zenobia Award II, which is a game design competition and mentoring program for game designers from underrepresented groups to submit game designs covering underrepresented historical topics. The Zenobia Award II application period is open until October 14, 2023.

The Zenobia Award II application period, Oct. 1 – Oct. 14, is officially open! If you are an underrepresented history tabletop game designer with a cool idea, don’t overthink! APPLY!!https://t.co/9Akryh51fH

— Zenobiaaward2 (@zenobiaaward2) October 2, 2023

The first Zenobia Award kicked off in November 2020, and the winners were announced in October 2021. Regardless of which game designs won or didn’t, the first Zenobia Award was a great success. It led to the creation of several awesome, unique-themed historical games, with some submissions even getting picked up by publishers including Sherria Ayuandini‘s Kartini – From Darkness to Light (Ion Game Design), and Jo Kelly‘s Molly House (Wehrlegig Games).

Kartini is a historical strategy game for 1-6 players about educating young women in Indonesia, and is available for late pledge on Kickstarter (KS link). Meanwhile, in Molly House, 2-5 players take the roles of the gender-defying mollies and compete to create joy in a queer community in early eighteenth century London. Wehrlegig Games is launching a crowdfunding campaign for Molly House on Backerkit (BK link) on October 17, 2023.

These are just two examples of great game designs that received some much deserved attention as a result of the Zenobia Award. I can’t wait hear more about the designs we’ll discover from the Zenobia Award II!

For a wealth of information on the Zenobia Award (including the snippet quoted below) and details on the application process, be sure to check out the official Zenobia Award website.

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