North Star Games is a board game publishing company based in

Bethesda, Maryland Bethesda () is an unincorporated, census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. Located just northwest of Washington, D.C., it is a major business and government center of the Washington metropolitan region ...

and founded by Dominic Crapuchettes. The company has been publishing games since 2003 including Wits & Wagers, Say Anything, and Dirty Pig.

History

Dominic Crapuchettes grew up designing and inventing board games since he was nine years old. He fulfilled a lifelong goal of starting a board game company in 2003 while attending Robert H. Smith School of Business at the

University of Maryland, College Park The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1856, UMD i ...

. MBA classmate Satish Pillalamarri joined the company full-time after graduation in 2004. Crapuchettes and Pillalamarri raised money from friends, family and even faculty to fund the first run of ''Cluzzle'' board games. In time more games followed and North Star board games began to appear on the shelves of specialty gaming stores and later

Target Corporation Target Corporation is an American retail corporation that operates a chain of discount department stores and hypermarkets, headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the seventh-largest retailer in the United States, and a component of th ...

. When it came time to name the venture, founder Dominic Crapuchettes chose the name 'North Star' in reference to a stormy night off the coast of Alaska when the salmon fishing boat he was piloting lost electrical power and Crapuchettes was forced to use the

North Star Polaris is a star in the northern circumpolar constellation of Ursa Minor. It is designated α Ursae Minoris ( Latinized to ''Alpha Ursae Minoris'') and is commonly called the North Star or Pole Star. With an apparent magnitude t ...

to guide the boat safely home. On that night, Dominic vowed to quit fishing and start the board game company that he had dreamed about since childhood. ''Wits & Wagers'' was included on many 'Best Games of Year' lists in 2007. The game was also awarded the 'Best New Party Game' by ''Games Magazine''.

Time Magazine ''Time'' (stylized in all caps as ''TIME'') is an American news magazine based in New York City. It was published weekly for nearly a century. Starting in March 2020, it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York Cit ...

highlighted ''Wits & Wagers'' as a "Lively trivia game" in a profile of games they determined as board game entertainment "beyond Monopoly". North Star Games' title, ''Say Anything'', has been called, "A party game that appeals even to those who claim to hate party games."

Games

*Cluzzle (2003): Family clay game where the object is to sculpt poorly. * Wits & Wagers (2006): Party trivia game where you can bet on the answers of other players. *

Say Anything Say Anything may refer to: Film and television * '' Say Anything...'', a 1989 American film by Cameron Crowe * "Say Anything" (''BoJack Horseman''), a television episode Music * Say Anything (band), an American rock band ** ''Say Anything'' (al ...

(2008): Opinion game designed to get people talking and laughing. *

Evolution Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...

(2014): A card-based strategy game where players try to evolve their species to out-compete other players in the quest for food. *Happy Salmon (2016): A speedy card game where players get rid of their cards through physical activity with other players. *Dirty Pig (2019): An easy-to-learn card game where the goal is to be the first player to dirty all your pigs. *

Oceans The ocean is the body of salt water that covers approximately 70.8% of Earth. The ocean is conventionally divided into large bodies of water, which are also referred to as ''oceans'' (the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Antarctic/Southern, and ...

(2020): Players create marine species and earn points by keeping those species healthy. * Paint the Roses (2022): A cooperative puzzle where players must work together to finish the Royal Gardens for the Queen of Hearts. Thurot, Dan
"There’s always another layer to peel back, always another riddle"
'' Space Biff'', 5 October 2021. Retrieved on 8 December 2022.

Notes and references

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External links

North Star Game Official WebsiteBoardGameGeek page for North Star Games
American companies established in 2003 Companies based in Bethesda, Maryland Board game publishing companies 2003 establishments in Maryland