Hiatus + 2 ongoing kickstarters

So I know, it has been more than a month since the last post. In truth, work caught up with me, grabbed me by the ankles and sloshed me around in a big sea of literature, data and deadlines. I was nearly p.u.l.p.e.d. BUT I HAVE SURVIVED. I am a graduate student and the supervision of honours students was just over – I just have one last deadline this week, which is a conference abstract deadline. Thank you for enduring me; if anything I hope my regular posts before the sudden hiatus will redeem me.

As a short post though, I’d like to highlight two kickstarters I recently backed that are really quite awesome. My god-son was just born and my backing the KS Storyteller Cards has to do with me imagining him romping around with glee holding these cards and letting his imagination go wild with fantasy (medieval) stories. The art is fantastic and it’s meant to be a pack of cards you can use for any purpose you design, if you so choose not to run any of the many pdf games that Storyteller cards is including for free.

As you can see from the picture, each card contains several elements: a poker number and symbol (top left), coin (top right), d20 number (bottom left), combat resolution (bottom right), and an image of someone (elf, human, gnome, dwarf) holding an item (spear, shield, sheep) in an environment (swamp, castle, farm) doing something, etc. It goes on for quite a bit, and its quite unlimited!!

They’ve run a successful kickstarter before this, which launched their first storyteller card deck, of no particular theme. This second KS, is to launch their medieval theme. So take a look now!

The other KS I backed was one I backed immediately when I saw it. I’m a sucker for art but even more for awesome themes, and this one places players in a game where they’re trying to sleep well, avoid the nightmares and most of all, avoid waking up. Pleasant Dreams has again, beautiful art that draws the viewer into both nightmarish and peaceful environments, and simple (but not simplistic) play.

 

Aerjen Tammiga, the creator of Pleasant Dreams, has an impressive story of how he became a game designer (which gives me hope of becoming an accomplished one, one day), which you can read at the end of his kickstarter here. It’s quite inspiring and also a reminder of how small encounters with people can lead to future productions and creations. Awesome stuff, really. 

These days, the KS managers are really awesome. Both the managers of Storyteller cards and Pleasant Dreams are responsive and active on Twitter, as well as on their kickstarter. I’d love for you to take a look at their work and support them if you like. Both campaigns are still running now, but only for a short while more! Quick grab your chance!

New filler / short / micro games to check out

I know my past few posts have been about kickstarters, but it’s primarily because so many good projects have opened up in the past few weeks! Lots of new mechanics, cool themes (farming chilli peppers) card games and microgames!!

In a time where the busy get busier, sometimes I can’t afford an all-day gaming session like I used to. Sometimes I want to exercise my brain with my love of euro games and strategy, but meeting times for a group of 4-6 people are messy and difficult to set. In those sometimes, I feel like a microgames would fill the ache to play. And increasingly, microgames with their quirks and few components, are also easy to introduce and ready to be carried around and played anywhere.

Cue funded microgame kickstarters such as Burgoo, This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the 2-4 of Us (by Tasty Minstrel Games), Village in a Box, and the recent epic kickstarter Tiny Epic Kingdoms! The success of these small game projects highlight the people’s need to try and taste new and short filler games for reasonable costs.

Especially when international shipping prices has hit the roof. I have been pushed to reconsider game after game because a $40 game can easily become $100 because of shipping. And publishers / managers have responded by including print and play versions, which makes me especially happy (I may not have quality components, but at least I can play it!).

Kickstarter project managers are also getting especially good at engaging their backers. Japanese, The Game’s by Bernhard Hamaker (see previous post) reached out to all his 2000+ backers individually, personally thanking them and asking for feedback and suggestions. TimeWatch RPG’s Kevin Kulp is super active on KS and Twitter, going fans a voice in voting which faction to be the archenemy of TimeWatch agents, becoming funded and blasting through stretch goals almost every day. I backed it since day 1 and saw how backer’s suggestions became reality (and it’s still ongoing with over $50,000!!). And of course, the engagement of epic proportions comes from Gamelyn Games’ Tiny Epic Kingdoms by Scott Almes, making them a leader and example in successful kickstarter campaigns, with nearly 9000 backers!

Follow @JapaneseTheGame, @TimeWatchRPG, @KevinKulp, @TastyMinstrel, @ScottAlmes and @Gamelyn_Games to join in the fun!

It’s amazing stuff to be part of, and definitely makes me want to support them. Another such project is an awesome traveling card game meant for 2 players – oddball Aeronauts: Pirates vs The Pendragon.

You can play this game ANYWHERE, whether you are standing in line for something or on a plane or bus, because you don’t need a surface to play! The mechanics are straightforward yet pretty ingenious, and I am really looking forward to getting a game that I can literally carry around in my pocket and play anywhere! Not to mention the BEAUTIFUL steampunk animalia style of art and a tonne of fluff, follow @NigelPyne from MaverickMuse or #oddballAeronauts and their kickstarter to learn more now! This one is gonna be real big in time to come (with more factions etc). I am uber excited to get my hands on it!!

And while lots of microgame kickstarter projects are now over, there are still more for you to support! Let me introduce three more short games that are still open.

1) Michael Mindes of Tasty Minstrel Games has yet again released a Pay What You Want microgame called This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the 2-4 of Us. A quick tile laying game with an innovative scoring system, this is sure to be a hit filler game that will be played round after round while say, we are waiting for dinner to be cooked, someone to get dressed to go out, or if we just want to get a bit into the Wild West theme of things.

TMG has produced a fair number of games on kickstarter, including the currently ongoing full boardgame Scoville (about farming hot peppers in a town that craves spicy goodness!), Belfort (he ran the expansion project on kickstarter), and other micro games such as Burgoo (very cute game about making stew) and Coin Age (area control).

Follow @TastyMinstrel to keep updated about their projects! The last I heard however, TMG is taking a break after this run of kickstarters.

2) ZeppelinAttack! is another card game that I backed – you play as captains controlling Zeppelins with an Armada of airships at your control against one other opponent. Again, great fluff and superb art add value to this game, and my gaming group will get to try it out very soon as we already have to Print and Play! This game is by Evil Hat Productions of Fate And The Dresden Files RPG fame. Follow @EvilHatOfficial to find out more!

3) Lastly, if you feel microgames are your thing, check out the Village in a Box kickstarter for up to 8 portable and differently themed microgames! There really isn’t much I can say about these microgames because I’d have to describe all 8 of them, so go on to their kickstarter page to see their gameplay videos and descriptions!

So, to sum up:

If you’re going to do a project on Kickstarter, from a backer’s point of view:

1) Let us promote the thing we love. Include hashtags, Twitter and Facebook profiles we can follow and tweet, and let social media take your project on a tidal wave! Like oddball Aeronauts, promote the blogs and reviews that have been done on your page – it’s a win-win for all! Give us avatars to use!

2) Let us have a voice. Tiny Epic Kingdoms and TimeWatch have impressed me the most, in actually listening to backer’s comments and input, regarding math, design, stretch goals, and additional components. Use them as an example!

3) Be genuine, transparent, and upfront. Releasing all your stretch goal ideas at the beginning inspires us to hit targets. Japanese, The Game and some other projects are now using not just money but number of backers to release stretch goals. Old backers upping pledges can only do so much, new backers are important too! This brings us back to point #1: to use BGG and blogs from all over the world to your advantage!

Kickstarter: Japanese: The Game (LAST FEW DAYS)

So I surf Kickstarter quite regularly, and had been seeing this game for some time – grow slowly into the crazy nut campaign it has become!! From a funding goal of $5,300 it has actually raised $83,000 for now, which is insane!! It has a simple premise, which is to make learning Japanese fun and also more intuitive and unconscious since players will read the cards and learn the words more easily the more you play.

I pledged for it because I know a number of friends who are just taking up Japanese, and my brilliant brain put two and two together and thought this would make an awesome gift!

Shipping as usual is a killer, so I got the print and play level. Increasingly I am devoting my resources to print and play material. I miss out on beautiful colour especially for rpg books, but if it means I can get my hands on more games and support more projects, this is what I will do.

Furthermore, especially for this game, the PnP level includes all future expansions he will make! Isn’t that sweet!!

In any case, go check Japanese, the game kickstarter out now before it ends 7 Feb 2014!