Entries and modifications to games were allowed up through March 31st. After that, games were locked and voting began. In total there were 38 entries in the contest, all of which looked really interesting.

One of the requirements of the contest was to give meaningful feedback to at least two other entries in the contest. I ended up giving feedback to eight other games - seven of which I was able to play. To be honest, there wasn't a bad game in the mix. All of the ones that I was able to play had really good mechanics and themes and were fairly well developed. I had a great time with each game that I was able to play and I appreciate Larissa's (my wife) willingness to play all these unpublished games. You never know what you are going to get with an unpublished game and I am sure she would have rather been reading a book or working on a project on some of those nights but she played me whenever I asked. Three of the other games that I played I was able to play via online platforms (Tabletopia and Tabletop Simulator) and that was a really fun experience to be able to interact with other game designers who were very passionate about their own projects.

Voting started on April 1st and closed on April 30th and the winners were announced on May 1st. When the winners were announced I was pleasantly greeted by the results. Queen Bee had won the "Best Game", which was the coveted prize. It also did well in almost every other category. (See below).

• 1st Place in "Best Game"
• 2nd Place in "Best Use of Theme"
• 2nd Place in "Best Art/Graphic Design"
• 2nd Place in "Best Rulebook"
• 2nd Place in "Best Game to Play With Your Child"
• 4th Place in "Best Mechanics"
• 4th Place in "Best Gateway Game"
• 5th Place in "Best Gamer's Game"
• 7th Place in "Best Date Night Game"

Overall, I am thrilled to pieces with the placings I got. I also got some meaningful feedback and updated a lot of things in the rulebook to make the game more clear. Like any game, a lot of the "fun" depends on the interpretation of the rulebook, so I have been focusing on ways to make the rules as clear as I can. Additionally, I've noted that I should play this game more with Ryker and Makayla (two of my kids) rather than Larissa, because apparently this is a better game to play with your child than it is with your significant other. :)

Where do I go from here? Well, I am looking at a couple of other contests to enter this game into. I am curious to see how this game would do in a contest where the "forced alliance" mechanic can be seen and how people in the industry feel about it. So far, playtesters have really enjoyed the "forced alliance" and I am hopeful that others will like it, too. Hopefully I am able to enter a couple more contests before the re-launch of Queen Bee. I don't expect to win every contest I enter but then again, I didn't expect to win this one either.

Have you had a chance to play my game yet? If so, what did you like best about Queen Bee?

NOTE - one of the things I've done as a result of this contest was that I added another page to my website called Other Designers. This section features some of the fun games I was able to play during the contest that I thought were noteworthy. If you are interested in checking out some fun games, I would encourage you to check those out.