The Blasphemous devs are making a family-friendly VR board game platform

Gruesome side-scrolling Metroidvania Blasphemous is a pixel art game where a burly man in a very pointy hat smacks the daylights out of unholy monstrosities, from Spanish devs The Game Kitchen. Now they’re back – the devs, not the monstrosities – with something a bit more than a game. It’s a VR platform for co-op board games called All On Board!, and its Kickstarter launches today. Have a 2D-looksie in the trailer below, but maybe mute it or you’ll have the song stuck in your head all day.

All On Board! promises officially licensed board games along with the ability to make your own, and share them for free. They’ve already partnered with some real-life tabletop names such as Ludus Magnus’ Black Rose Wars, Themeborne’s Escape The Dark Castle and Pegasus Spiele’s Istanbul. You’ll be able to modify games, mucking about with the pieces and boards, and players only need one copy for them all to play. The weird floating head avatars look surprisingly okay, even if the Metaverse chills me to the code. There’ll be the option to dress them up and change them however you like.

I’m all for devs completely changing tack and trying something different. All On Board! looks like one of those cases, but there are already other collaborative digital board game platforms out there. Some of them – I’m looking at you, Tabletop Simulator – are very well established. It could prove tricksy for the newer game to stand out. Don’t worry if you were really hoping for another Blasphemous instead of playing hands of virtual cribbage though, because The Game Kitchen have one planned for next year.

All On Board! is aiming to release sometime in 2023 for Meta Quest 2 and SteamVR. Kickstarter backs can nab a copy for $20/£17/€20, and exclusive access to the beta coming later this year.