Go For The Krill
Your belly rumbles, but you know that you aren’t the only whale in the water… You had better be quick and clever if you want to sate your hunger for krill!
Go For The Krill is an incredible 20 minute, simultaneous card selection game that has a risk assessment factor. It leaves you on the edge of your seat waiting for the reveals each round with huge excitement! When all the players have revealed their cards, some players at the table will be cheering as they gather up food points and others will be giving each other death stares as they try to get in the head of their opponents so that they can outmaneuver each other next turn! No matter the scenario, the table will be filled with laughter and memories that you won’t forget!
In Go For The Krill, 3 – 6 players control a group of whales made up of a hand of cards numbered 1 – 10, a squid card, and a penguin card. Your goal is to play a card each round to consume a school of Plankton (or the more valuable Krill) cards that correspond to the numbered whale card you played at the right moment before your opponents eat them up first! If two or more players play the same number in a single round, the cards are moot and neither player gets anything!
How Sam and I got connected!
I, Rusty, had the random opportunity to met Sam, the designer, at Origins 2021 when we ended up being next to each other in the ticket line. It only took a short conversation to see that we had a lot in common! Origins was super busy for me, as I was constantly teaching our games to the convention’s attendees, but I kept running into Sam at the end of the evenings! In our first conversation together he had mentioned that he was there to show a game that he had designed to publishers at the publisher pitching event. (kind of like a speed dating event where designers get 5 minutes to pitch their idea to a publisher before they move on and a new publisher walks up for the pitching process to start all over again) I was excited for him and wished him the best of luck!
I was not one of the publishers involved in that event because we were truly not looking to pick up any games from another designer at the time… The last night of the convention, I was able to play a couple of games with Sam and his crew before I left town! Although I wasn’t looking to pick up a game, I am always thrilled to try another designers game and give feedback! Well needless to say, I loved it! I took a prototype back home to try with family, the youth group, and students and they all loved it too! around 8-9months later Sam and I were excited to sign a contract making Go For The Krill the very first Three Nail Games game to be designed by a designer other than myself!
One tricky aspect of publishing games is trying to find the right style of art to put on it. A huge part of the charm of Go For The Krill that pulls a person in, is the beautiful hand drawn art that was done by none other than Sam’s mother, Amy Pak! It is an incredible honor to work along side this incredibly talented duo on this amazing project!
Meet the Designer and Artist/Graphic Designer!
Sam Pak
Designer
Hello all! I’m an avid enthusiast of the board game hobby for both the intellectual benefits it can offer as well as the wholesome element of bringing people together. I’ve had some of the fondest moments I can ever remember with people while playing a board game with them. It’s truly a special medium to grow close with others.
I grew up enjoying classic board games with family and friends, but my exposure to modern games never went beyond Settlers of Catan before 2013 when I was properly converted! A friend of mine introduced me to a brand new game at the time; Russian Railroads. Being my first worker placement game, it opened my eyes to the vast potential that games had to stimulate my brain, and I loved it!
Since then, I started paying close attention to games and their mechanisms. It helped that I have a close friend from childhood who also likes tinkering with game design and often bounces ideas off of me and vice versa.
The idea for Go for the Krill struck me in the summer of 2019. I’d always had the desire to design my own game, and I wanted to make sure it was a game that I could feel comfortable showing to literally anybody. I wanted it to be language independent, simple to learn, fast, and of course, fun!
I met Rusty Lumpkin at Origins in 2021 where I showed him my first design, and I was so humbled when he told me he wanted to publish it. What an answer to prayer!
I’m overjoyed to make this contribution to the hobby. It’s my goal to share my creation with as many people as possible so that they too can grow their friendships with who they play games with. Game on!
Amy Pak
Artist/Graphic Design
Amy Pak grew up in upstate New York, and has pursued the arts for as early as she can remember. She has participated in several local competitions since age five, winning nearly all of them. After attending a higher education in graphics, she worked as an illustrator and graphic designer in print houses and agencies, as well as freelancing for both commercial and fine art. In 2002, her illustrations became the foundation of her family business, “Home School in the Woods Publishing,” creating thousands of line drawings used in history timelines and studies.