What started as a fun idea on my kitchen table turned into a marketing campaign being presented at one of the world’s largest gaming expos, PAX East 2025.

Mushinko is a family-friendly roll-and-move adventure inspired by handcrafted mushroom sculptures. Join the main characters, Hinko and Mushin, as they journey through the enchanted fungi forest, gathering resources and preparing to compete in the exciting Mushroom Pachinko drop game.

The Game

Mushinko is a 3-5 player roll-and-move action game, where players travel the multiple board tracks collecting resources. At the end of the game, players compete against each other in the interactive Mushroom Pachinko drop game using the magnetic game box and resources.

Players use magnetic pins to build the Mushinko drop game directly on the box.

The Mushinko Coloring book provides new designs to change the media and game layout on each play-through.

An iOS prototype companion app was created to support gameplay with rules, guides, and virtual multi player

The Project

Mushinko began development in the summer of 2024. Originally called ‘BG Mushroom Land’, the game explored the fantasy world surrounding my BG Mushroom Sculptures. The final mini-game, Mushroom Pachinko, became Mushinko and gave us our main characters, Mushin the gnome and Hinko the monkey.

Using a combination of my graphic design skills, web development, and generative AI technologies, I took on the challenge of designing a game of mini games which incorporated a magnetic game box into the gameplay.

Mushinko was play tested through the winter of 2024 and launched at PAX East in May of 2025, with a corresponding Kickstarter campaign.

Results

While the Mushinko board game was impacted by international politics and shipping, the overall project was a success. The work allowed me to explore various product, marketing, and user experiences, putting myself at the center of the one of the largest gaming conventions in the world.

Mushinko gave me the opportunity to dive into game design, graphics, web design, digital marketing, parts sourcing, vendor management, and overseeing a trade show presence, all while engaging in real-world research and development.

The Mushinko booth at PAX East 2025 was around the corner from the official Pokemon station and next to the CATAN booth. A long way from my kitchen table in Boulder Colorado.

At PAX East 2025, we sold over 100 BG Mushroom Sculptures and several Mushroom Chess Sets, allowing us to continue to build on the BGM Designs brand.

Challenges

Some challenges were easier to overcome than others. Ultimately, Mushinko had the wrong timing for a crowdfunding board game with international parts sourcing.

Tariffs & De Minimus
Throughout game development and fundraising, international shipping posed significant risks. Due to uncertainty about the feasibility of parts sourcing during the summer of 2025, digital marketing efforts were halted. Eventually, the removal of de minimus policy and unknown tariff impacts made the Mushinko board game impossible to continue.

Game Planning
The Mushinko board game went through several game mechanic redesigns. In addition to the roll-and-move adventure, the game includes several mini games which were independently designed and play tested.

Marketing
Marketing for Mushinko included social media ads, a kickstarter campaign, and in-person marketing at trade shows and fairs. Promoting Mushinko happened in parallel with game development, booth planning, and redesigns. This posed significant challenges and was a weakness in the project.

Design
The board game itself has over 80 board spaces, 85 action cards, and multiple route game mechanics. The game box includes an innovative magnetic receptive sheet allowing players to play Mushroom Pachinko directly on the box. The Mushinko Coloring book lets players use new designs each time they play. Each of these aspects of the game were time consuming and required multiple revisions and different approaches.