It's difficult to imagine the weight of working on a legendary game like Catan. As an artist, Quentin Regnes – whose artwork is now displayed across the boxes of Catan's upcoming 6th edition – had a strange time working on a board game that had meant so much to him as a child.
He tells me games like Monopoly and Risk weren't really his bag. "I was a little frustrated by those kinds of games", he says. "And then arrived Catan, which contained all I missed about the other games: The feeling of really being immersed in the moment, exploring the landscape, interacting with it, seeing the evolution of your settlers". That was a great feeling, and one that "made a big impression" on him as a 10-year-old boy playing what's still considered one of the best board games around today.
Years later, Regnes found himself working on the Dawn of Humankind Catan expansion, for which the Catan team had reached out to him. "Even if it wasn’t THE Catan," he notes, it "was related to a part of my childhood, it was really just a good surprise."
However, this wasn't Regnes' first foray into working on games with big legacies.
Longest Road
"When I was still at school, I received an email from a studio asking me to work for them on a new project. I was really happy, thinking about my very first real work related to drawing and it was for a video game. Cool! A little game no one knows about, to learn about the craft." Or so he thought.
The studio then dropped a note that read, as he remembers it, something like “Can’t wait to see what you will come up with, oh and it’s for World of Warcraft's next expansion.” That was WoW: Battle for Azeroth, and I expect the imposter syndrome would be hard to shake having been approached by Blizzard at such a young age.
As Regnes puts, "in my first work experience I took that imposter syndrome full in the face. And it’s still somewhere, appearing from time to time. I think you never really escape it, you have to accept it and make its presence as silent as you can."
Year of Plenty
Today, having just revealed his work on Catan 6th edition, Regnes looks back at his contribution with pride. But there's a real sense of responsibility that comes along with a project like this.
"I put much more pressure on myself in this project as, this time, it was THE Catan game". As such, he thinks he "probably put a little too much effort in." This isn't just because of the game's popularity, he explains. Part of the worry comes from balancing the need to make your own mark with respecting the work of the previous artist.
"Contributing to a game with such a legacy is often very complicated, especially with Catan and its very recognizable covers. That big sun, that village on a hill, it’s like a printed image in your mind. You also think about the artist who contributed to it before you and want to respect his work, even if you will inevitably add your taste to it too.
"So it’s a tricky mind gymnastic; you want to conserve the legacy and respect the work of previous artists, and in the same time add something fresh".
A difficult project to work on for sure, and when asked if he would change anything around his contributions, Regnes really opened his heart to us.
"Every work you do is a moment of your life", he believes. "If I observe the illustration in several years with my better eye and skills (well I hope so!) I may see some mistakes, some things I would like to change, but that would destroy that memory of who I was at that precise time. And I think that’s precious."
Victory points
When asked if he has any tips for aspiring board game artists out there, his advice leans toward practice, variety and "staying true to your inner self and what drives your feelings".
"Exploring different thematics can always help your art to be more unpredictable, even if you’re specialized in boardgames," he says, making it clear that "people trying to do what they like and not just reproduce a trending style have in my opinion better chances to be noticed, or at least, appreciated for who they are."
You can check out Quinten Regnes' contributions to Catan 6th edition on his Artstation while you await the game's release some time in "Spring 2025". Not long to go then.
For more, why not check out the announcement of Exit: The Game - Adventures on Catan, or read about how Catan changed board games forever.
