I’ll have a more detailed review at some point, but this post is going to be more about game “bling” than game play.
As mentioned previously, I picked up a MakerBot 3D printer a while back. It sat idle on my desk until recently. (Or in the case of Forbidden Island it sat “idol” 😆 ) Today I want to show you a really cool accessory that I was able to print for this game.
In a standard game configuration you shuffle the tiles and lay them out on the table. There are also tons of variations on the tile layout available on Board Game Geek (some of them official, some of them fan-made). With the standard diamond-pattern layout it’s quite easy to remember where tiles were…and where they weren’t. This becomes more important as tiles sink, especially for the Diver role. More on that in a bit.
I was browsing Thingiverse and found that someone had created a tile holder for the island tiles. The design was really well thought out. It created a way to ensure that the tiles didn’t move during game play. If a tile sank, you still had the tile holder to help you remember something was originally there. Last, and the most cool, is this:
As you can see, there are supports in the middle of the tile holder that allow you to press one side of the tile and pop the other side up. That makes it quite easy to flip over or remove altogether, based on the game situation. Very cool!
I printed 24 of these tile holders. Here’s what the game looks like in a standard configuration.
3D Print Costs
You might be wondering how much something like this costs. Outside of the cost of the printer itself, the cost is very manageable. When I started printing these tiles I used this design:
You can see the two ribs and the interlocking design. Each of these takes about 12.5g (grams) of filament, which costs about $0.02 per gram for the cheaper version, meaning each tile costs about $0.25. An entire set of 24 would be right at $6.00. (Prices are in US$ if you’re wondering.) But despite the fact that this isn’t going to break the bank, I got to thinking about the design and decided I would try to see what I could do.
I have no 3D design software, and wasn’t even sure what to look for. It turns out there is a web site called TinkerCAD that allows you to do basic 3D design…for free! How much fun is that! I uploaded the full version shown above, cut out some parts of the plastic that I didn’t think I would need, and saved it back down to my computer. The new version with voids (shown below) now takes about 9.9g. That saved me an entire nickle. 😉
That might not sound like much, but if I’m printing a bunch of these the cost starts to add up. I have several friends with copies of the game, and I expect once they see what I’ve done they’re going to be looking for a set of their own. The biggest investment, frankly, is time. One tile (the void version) takes roughly 50 minutes to complete on my printer. Fortunately I can print them three at a time so I can set it up and walk away for a while.
In the pictures on this post you’ll see both versions. I didn’t see any reason to continue printing the full version once I had completed the void version. I also didn’t see a point to throw away something that was already working. That left me with a mix of pieces and I’m okay with that.
Alternate Island Layouts
For the standard layout the tiles are convenient. For alternate layouts, they become even more important. You see, if a tile is flooded you turn it over. If it floods a second time (I should say “when” rather than “if”) the tile is removed from the game. Without the tile grid on the table, it’s more difficult to remember what spaces were originally parts of the island and which parts were not.
Forbidden Island Standard Layout
So there you have it: 3D Printed tile holders for Forbidden Island. They help with setting up the game, playing the game, were easy to make and I learned something along the way.
Unfortunately they don’t keep tiles from sinking. You’re on your own for that. 😎