Table Talk with Taylor Reiner

by Jay Bernardo August 12, 2024

Table Talk with Taylor Reiner

~ Designer Interview~

Jay: Taylor! It’s so good to finally see you face-to-face! If you are indeed Taylor, and not Trick or Table…

Taylor: A monumental occasion! THANK YOU FOR HAVING ME!!!

Jay: They shall erect a monument of this meeting, and today shall forever be known as Jaylor Day!

Taylor: I love it!

August 4th is henceforth Jaylor Day!

First question. What came into your life first: trick-taking or the table?

I want to say table. Then, I would explain why, hopefully in a fun way.

In my dreams, you’ll eventually sell trick-taking tables. Do you see that in your future?

Anything is possible on Jaylor Day.

According to the Seers Catalog rulebook and the BGG forums, you’re the founder of CoComelon! How did you transition into creating content about trick-taking games?

Oh yes, I was the founder of the local Youtube channel CoComelon. Not to be confused with the international one, that was founded by Jay Jeon…. Wait… What was your last name again….? :O

Mr. Crabby Crab says, “Mwa ha ha! Mwa ha ha!”
All through the town!

"CoComelon fans of the world unite!" - Taylor Reiner

I started making videos in high school and loved it. My friends and I would film the most worthless footage and try to make it something in editing. It was such a highlight of school for me, that was missing once I left.

Flashforward some years ago and I’m looking desperately for a video rules teach for some trick-takers I got from the 2019 Tokyo Game Market. (I learn best through video. Props to Rodney “The Goat” Smith.) But there was nothing to be found.

So, in a mixed desire to make videos again and to help anyone in my spot, I decided to make videos about trick-takers, which at the time were a pretty poo-pooed genre in the space. And the rest is currently now-story, where I’m ironically reading more rules than ever ha! But I love it all so much.

It’s fascinating how little moments in your past can have such a profound effect on your future. The world’s a better place with Taylor’s Trick-Taking Table in it. Your show definitely has its own unique style to it. Was that editing style deliberate? What were some of your thoughts in that creative process to go in that direction?

Cheers, yeah it started as a mix of actually being bad at making videos and then leaning into it for gag. There’s a bit of a craft to making things look slightly off or bad. I knew I’d never be as good as the gods at Shut Up Sit Down or as clean as the Dice Tower, so I kinda leaned into the off/goofy nature of it all.

I remember being in awe at how Zee could do an entire review without any cuts, because I flubbed so often. And I'm better at talking now, but at the time I was just taking it in as the vibe, the aesthetic. It helps that my house is wild and my humor style is equally wild. I also was using super cheap editing software and phone cameras at the start, so it helped that the entire vibe was bad ha!

Taylor talks about Seers Catalog on his own channel, Taylor's Trick-Taking Table

But your vibe resonated with thousands of gamers! In the last few years, you’ve become an internet celebrity in the board gaming community, going to several conventions and invitationals across the US. Tell us about one of your more memorable “Star Lord” moments where someone recognized you and said hi.

I am eternally awkward about the idea of any celebrity, and really can’t believe it because creating videos is so solitary, but it is extremely, extreeeeemly kind when people come up and say hi.

How did that recognition feel?

There are moments that really caught me, like when someone first asked for a signature, especially since it was for them and their son. It really blew me away! I remember not being sure how to sign, like what’s my signature? In the moment, I kept thinking of how I’d been on certain Wikipedias that have a signature and always laughed at how it’d be funny to keep changing it, so people wouldn’t know if it was legit or not.

That first signing and the booth at Tokyo Game Market (TGM) stand out. That was like hours straight of selling games and meeting amazing people. It really was an out of body experience and the most time-dilation I’ve ever felt in my life.

Those moments certainly take some time getting used to & it’s even more bizarre experiencing them in another country.

So bizarre!

Taylor is known for his wacky & wild edits and vibe.

Flashing forward to now-story, you’ve been to board gaming events in the US, but you’ve also traveled to Japan to attend Tokyo Game Market. What were some of the highlights from your first trip to TGM?

Oh yeah, my first trip was in 2019 and I remember researching which games to get and I had learned through that process that trick-taking was what genre the game Hearts was from my youth.

That led to me getting loads of trick-takers from the booths there, a highlight being Taiki’s booth selling Zimbabwee Trick and Time Palatrix. I remember meeting him and it being so exciting someone made TWO trick-taking games! Oh how naive I was! I also have a fond memory of getting Third Strongest Mole and the designer giving me the sheet of uncut cards. That sent me. And the designer of 72 Demons of Geotia not wanting to sell me a copy of the game until I said I had a Japanese friend who would translate it ha!

WILD! There’s certainly a deep passion Japanese designers have for their games regardless if it’s their first or thirty-first. You must have played well over a 100 trick-taking games by now both from Japan and from designers in North America.

What would you say are the major differences in both design and the creative process between the two groups: Japan and North America?

Ooo great question!

I’ve noticed tons of Japanese designs really swing for the fences. I don’t know if it’s because I play mostly TGM designs and those tend to be more fresh/daring ideas, but they’re often wacky and innovative, if at the detriment of balance and smoothness at times.

I’ve often played TGM releases and thought “woahhhhh awesome idea!” but the game itself is broken in terms of player balance or certain strategies. Whereas the American designs are often clean, if a bit redundant/safe.

I’ll get shown a game by a North American designer and it sometimes feels a bit behind the curve and lacking innovation, if clean and fluid. I’ve obviously been shown amazing and innovative American games and smooth and balanced Japanese games, but I'd say those are some generalized differences over the last few years.

Curious. With those differences in mind, how do you see both those trick-taking design groups changing in the next 5 years?

I think the American groups will start to publish more indie designs and push toward making games with more daring/experimental ideas. I see the Japanese space continuing to innovate and do things we couldn’t expect. I do think climbing/shedding is another frontier to be explored more, and I’m excited for that to be more popular.

Seers Catalog was released at Gen Con 2024 and is available at retail.

To be fair, you’re a fairly innovative designer yourself. Seers Catalog is a very novel approach to card shedding and ladder climbing games. How did you come up with the initial idea of NOT being the first player to go out?

Cheers, that’s so kind!!

I got the idea from chatting with a friend about trick-taking vs climbing/shedding. They said they didn’t like climbing/shedding games because they always wanted to play their high cards to try and go out and then they’d fail and be stuck with only a few low cards and have to sit out the rest of the hand.

And I thought:

What if that was a good thing in a game? And that was the impetus!

Truly, we all need more friends like this! During your development process a lot of things changed over the several iterations. What was something that never left & what was something you wanted to stay but had to let go?

A huge part of design and development for me is making sure there’s something that will never leave the game. There has to be a core that cannot go. For this game, it was the simple melds and the almost-shedding. I didn’t want to add much else either.

The amazing Jon from JonGetsGames has a rad design diary for his stellar game Spring Cleaning about how it started as an idea for the Seer’s Catalog’s base game of Of What’s Left, where the players would show a card when they passed. Such a rad idea, but I wanted my game to be deadly simple and that was another moment of trimming away anything that added to it, though Jon’s idea works perfectly in Spring Cleaning.

"On Jaylor Day, we shall dine on card game charcuterie!" -Taylor Reiner

YouTuber. Game designer. Game developer.
What’s next for Taylor Reiner in the years to come?

I’m excited for some bigger designs and develops (is that a word?) to come out!

There’s some really fun pipeline stuff in the works that I want to shout about from the mountaintops. So it’s mostly just preparing my lungs for that. But also looking to wind down the channel.

I had a goal of 5.55 years of making weekly videos for the channel and I’m at about 3-4 years. It’ll be fun to wind down the channel and cover some huge titles like Bridge, and finally do a top 555 list. There’ll be various videos after, but just not weekly. Should be nice!

Other than that.. Might move to New York for a bit. Um, maybe run a 5k. Try a stand-up set finally. I’ve wanted to play Zelda Breath of the Wild for a while now, could do that!

Drowning in Tom Cardy "Level Clear" vibes here.
Boss Dead. Level Clear. Where do I go from here?
Walk home. Try to eat. I’m not hungry. Go to sleep.
I can’t sleep. Lie in bed. Think about what bad guy said.
Even if you did defeat me, what would you do then?
Anything can happen on Jaylor Day!

Rock on! You have been interviewed a number of times now. What’s a question you’ve never been asked that you feel should be asked more often?

I’d probably say “If you were Jumanji’d into any trick-taking game you’ve played, which one would it be and why?”

If you were Jumanji’d into any trick-taking game you’ve played, which one would it be and why?

Oh!! Spoke too soon!! Great question, and I’d probably say Ohio.
Could you imagine living there? That’d be SO FUN.

"Ohio is the Ohio of Ohios." - Taylor Reiner

What the Sigma? OHIO! Lastly, what is up with the handles TropicanaCatfish and Tropicana55? What’s the story behind those names?

Hahaaaaa!!!

I feel like online usernames are this strange “chosen name” we have that sticks around with us forever, but it’s always picked at the silliest time. So it all started back in high school.

I got diagnosed with chronic bronchitis (woo!) and I was laid up on the couch, hacking and coughing for weeks and weeks. Sick as a dog with chronic bronchitis. And I'm pounding orange juice, just jug after jug. And I am home from school with not much to do, so I spent my saved-up work money on a PS3, the chunky kind. And later, as I’m asked by Sony what I want my username to be, I’m deep in my 10th Tropicana Orange Juice TM jug. So I went with ‘Tropicana’ and, of course, I did 55, the best number ever (other story).

Funnily enough, my sick brain decided to save that Tropicana Juice cap as a memory for when I created that name. I still have it, not sure why.

And flash to me getting a twitter and I try Tropicana55 for a while, but it gets stolen! So I got TropicanaCatfsh because it was an alt that wasn’t really me, but I guess I use it now for the channel so it’s a bit awkward now. Anywhoo, hope that explains it!

Catfishing, Tropicana, Ohio, Tom Cardy, CoComelon, Trick-taking, and a table. Anything else you’d like to end on?

This has been perfect. Happy Jaylor Day & cheeeers for the amazing questions!!!!!!

Happy Jaylor Day!