North Star Games
Encyclopedia
History
Dominic Crapuchettes grew up designing and inventing board games since he was 9 years old. He fulfilled his lifelong goal of starting a board game company in 2003 while attending Robert H. Smith School of BusinessRobert H. Smith School of Business
The Robert H. Smith School of Business is a school of business management within the University of Maryland, College Park. The school was named after alumnus Robert H. Smith...
at the University of Maryland, College Park
University of Maryland, College Park
The University of Maryland, College Park is a top-ranked public research university located in the city of College Park in Prince George's County, Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C...
. 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 even Target Corporation
Target Corporation
Target Corporation, doing business as Target, is an American retailing company headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the second-largest discount retailer in the United States, behind Walmart. The company is ranked at number 33 on the Fortune 500 and is a component of the Standard & Poor's...
.
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 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 highlighted Wits & Wagers as a “Lively trivia game” in a profile of games they determined as board game entertainment “beyond Monopoly”.
North Star Games’ newest game, Say Anything, has been called, “A party game that appeals even to those who claim to hate party games.”
Current 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 AnythingSay anything (party game)Say Anything is a board game designed by Dominic Crapuchettes and Satish Pillalamarri. It was released by North Star Games in 2008 as a follow up to the award-winning Wits & Wagers. Say Anything is very similar to Wits & Wagers except players answer open-ended subjective questions instead of...
(2008): Opinion game designed to get people talking and laughing.