Castles of Mad King Ludwig Collectors Edition – Coming January 2021

(Edit – 12/23/20 – If you want to see a cool video that actually mentions both new expansions, see Bezier Games’ Instagram post about it.)

We had a feeling it was coming.

When Bezier Games posted on Boardgame Geek asking for suggestions for what to include in a Collector’s edition of Castles of Mad King Ludwig, we really knew that it was just a matter of time.

Surprisingly, it was only a matter of a couple of months!

Bezier Games has announced that a Collector’s Edition of Castles of Mad King Ludwig will be hitting Kickstarter on January 19.

The game, designed by Ted Alspach with art by Keith Curtis, Agnieszka Dabrowiecka, Ollin Timm (though who knows if they’re going to be involved in this edition) is a tile-laying game where each player is designing their own castle to get as many points as possible by laying down room tiles.

There is also one expansion, Secrets, that added moats and a few other things to the game as well. You could play with the expansion but it was simply “ok” (though I did like the moats).

Now, everything’s going to be deluxe.

Including the box (I think we may be talking Suburbia: Collector’s Edition size here, though maybe not).

The artwork looks simply gorgeous, a kind of cross between the Polish edition of the game and something that’s actually useable (Editor – Meow!!!!).

The room tiles look amazing.

Tiles could be super-sized if you want to pledge that level (similar to the Suburbia Collector’s Edition, which I’m not exactly happy about) so you will be able to have beautiful pictures to post on Instagram (in case you still do that sort of thing).

There will also be GameTrayz organizers included to help fit everything in the box.

The game will also be coming with four expansions, including two new ones (I’m not sure what that means since I’m only aware of one expansion, but maybe they’re dividing that one into two parts?).

The score track also looks pretty cool (see above), though I hope it’s less “busy” when seeing it live rather than the picture. It looks like they are incorporating the score track with the area where the tile stacks go. If that’s the case, it’s pretty cool because I really didn’t like how the regular game took up a lot of room unnecessarily.

There also appear to be 3-D towers (maybe part of one of the two new expansions?) and the trays will have room for them as well.

What else is going to be in this Collector’s Edition?

Components for a 5th player (which is brand new, I think) along with completely new artwork, metal coins (at least at one pledge level, which if it’s a separate level I probably won’t worry about) and two pledge levels that will include COLLOSAL (capitals in the press release) tiles.

Thankfully that’s not going to be automatic like it was in the Suburbia Collector’s Edition Kickstarter. I don’t really need colossal tiles, so I won’t need to pay the extra for them.

I’m really psyched about this one.

No word on the price yet, though I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s similar to the Suburbia Collector’s Edition, so around $99 US. That being said, if the “colossal tiles” are an upgraded pledge, then maybe the basic will be a little less?

Hard to say.

While Castles of Mad King Ludwig isn’t in my Top 25 games list, it is a game that I really enjoy and I haven’t played it in a long while.

This could really revitalize my interest in it.

If you think you might be interested in this, check out the Kickstarter preview page here.

What do you think of this announcement?

Are you in on Day 1 like I am?

Let me know in the comments.