Infamous update: less than a month to go

The Infamous Kickstarter is scheduled (currently) for August 10th, so that means I have less than a month before life gets insanely stressful.  As if it wasn't stressful already...

The big project for me since Origins has been working with our exceptional graphic designer, Kody Chamberlain, on the Infamous rulebook.  Rulebooks are always a bear, and this one is no exception.  I do wish I had the graphic design skills (like Vital Lacerda, or Ryan Laukat) to do the rulebook myself.  Then I wouldn't have to worry about minimizing the number of revision requests I make, and I could obsess over small details and changes on a never-ending basis.  Actually, that sounds terrible, so maybe this is all for the best.

All will be revealed...

Otherwise, I've asked Kody to make a few minor adjustments to the components, per some feedback I received at Origins.  And while EGG and I have a fairly good idea of what the Kickstarter for Infamous is going to look like, there are a number of details to still work out:

• Kickstarter video needs to be recorded
• Kickstarter page graphics needs to be designed (wish I could do this myself)
• Specific order in which we reveal stretch-goals needs to be determined
• Promotional work

It's that last bullet-point - "promotional work" - that really sticks in my craw.  Some companies (and designers) are better at this than others.  It seems so hard to stick out in a crowd of so many games, to generate enthusiasm for yet another Kickstarter, to reach potential backers & buyers who just don't know you exist.  Over the years, I'd read so much on this topic:  from Jamey Stegmaier's amazing blog series on Kickstarters, to dozens of post-mortems.  I do wish that EGG did more than they do now; they are not the most nimble or creative company when it comes to promotion.  Having said that, they have a solid presence and reputation in the industry, they reach international customers better than many companies, and they do have a very solid "following" of customers who often support EGG games.

I did recently post a nice summary of Infamous on BoardGameGeek, and you can read it here if you want:

What is Infamous?  Let me tell you!

Infamous: status update

Perhaps not surprisingly, Infamous is absorbing an enormous amount of cognitive and emotional energy right now.  The rules are set, the components are set, and we have a solid plan for the next couple months.  The final stages of graphic design came together very nicely, and I'm desperate to show people how everything turned out.  Here's what the final gameboard will look like (or pretty close to it):



Given the many staff changes that have happened at EGG this past year, I ended up being de facto art director for Infamous, and working directly with both Rob on the final set of illustrations and Kody Chamberlain, our freelance graphic designer.  There are pros and cons to being this closely associated with the artwork of your own game.  On the one hand, I can in some ways ensure that the art and design-work mesh with my original artistic "vision"; on the other hand, I'd prefer to have a bit more distance from this process.

Having said that, I really enjoy working with artists, and both Rob and Kody have given us some amazing work.  I hope that the art and LOOK of Infamous will be a big draw.  After all, looks sell on Kickstarter (maybe even more than gameplay!), so I think it obviously benefits us to have such exceptional, unique artwork in the game which we can splash through the KS campaign.

Our final push to get all components print-ready by mid-May means that we should have new prototypes ready to show off and demo at Origins this month.  Should being the operative word here.  I will definitely be there, as I go to Origins every year with my brother and my friend, Flip.  This year will be special, as I'll get to demo Infamous at the EGG booth at least once or twice every day while I'm there.  I just hope all the pieces come in on time, including the custom dice.

The next big project for Kody and I is to generate the rulebook.  I have high hopes for how good it's going to look, and how well it will exude the theme of the game.  But rulebooks are always a bear, and I regularly wake up in the middle of the night thinking of small edits and revisions I should be making.  For the Clockwork Wars rulebook, I got to work with my close friend (and pro graphic designer) Benj.  Because we were close, I was able to request several revisions and work with Benj until the rulebook felt just right.  In the end, I think that rulebook came out great.  With Kody, there won't be as many opportunities for big revisions (unless we're willing to pay), so I have to be careful from the beginning.

Otherwise, I'm having lots of tough conversations with EGG folks about whether we want to push forward with an Infamous expansion right away, what the content of that expansion should be, and how much it will cost.  From my end, I have a decent amount of expansion material that I think is ready to go; but I understand that investing in an expansion before you even have a sense of how many basegame copies you're going to sell is kind of crazy.  And yet - a lot of KS's have expansions built into the campaign, and it's a nice way to give backers access to additional content if they want it.

I don't know if I've written about this before on my blog, but I often have conversations with my wife about this:  game design and publication is equal parts exultation and stress.  There are many times when I truly don't think it's worth the hassle.  So many (unpaid) hours brainstorming ideas, writing copious notes, trashing those ideas because they're derivative, meticulously crafting prototypes, organizing playtest sessions, selling to potential publishers, showing off your work to strangers, reading about game design, feeling like you spend way too much time thinking about game design.  And then you sign a contract!  And it's amazing!  And then there's a HUGE wait, and after that wait passes, there's an insane truckload of new stressors ready to wreck your sleep schedule.  And for what?  A board game?  A vacuous cultural product that will eventually sink into the trash-heap of humanity's decadence?  One game, amidst the multitudes published every year (over 3000 by some counts)?

The joy comes when you see your game in "the wild" and watch strangers play it and enjoy themselves.  And that joy doesn't really fade.  If your boardgame is good, people can continue to discover it and play years after it is released.  So there's pride and satisfaction and some sense of giving back to this hobby that's given you so much joy, but it really is tempered by this nagging feeling that the cost is just too damn high.

Post-KS: the work continues

I'm not quite ready to write a complete "postmortem" on the Clockwork Wars KS campaign, so don't expect that here.  It was a thrilling, anxiety-provoking, and perplexing experience that I have yet to fully wrap my head around.  Given that it was my first campaign as well means that I don't have a clear understanding of what was "normal" or "odd".  I will say that watching the initial pledge total roll up like it did in the first 24 hours was an amazing feeling.  We weren't able to keep all our initial backers, but we kept a fair number of them.

There hasn't been much time for a celebratory break - a lot of art and component work still needs to be done, and I'm setting a hard deadline for myself (and all the artists) for November 1st.  If we can get all our files to our Eagle contact in China by then, we have an excellent chance of meeting our shipping deadline, or even getting the game out a little early.  

The artwork is coming steadily.  Some artists can finish a piece in 3-4 days - most take a lot longer. But with 9 artists working simultaneously, our pace is solid.

We've also pretty much finalized the look of our first player token and score tokens.  The first player token is going to be wood, shaped like a gear, around 4 cm diameter.  I think it will look great and have some nice heft to it.  The score tokens, as we revealed during the campaign, are also going to be wooden, matched to the player colors of course, and shaped like miniature steampunk airships.  I've been working with one of our artists, Alejandro Lee, who did the magnificent "Dirigible" artwork for us.  

I asked him to draw us some simple schematics for a score token, based off of this beautiful and unique airship.  Here's what we came up with, after a couple iterations:

These aren't the exact player colors we're going to use, but close.  They'll likely be ~20 mm long.  I think they look very cool, and not like your everyday blimp.  These are war machines - troop transports - not the Hindenburg.  

Finally, we've also been brainstorming how we can re-design our Discovery Cards to really show off and maximize the fantastic artwork .  I think our new design will be an improvement over what we revealed in the campaign.

Last 36 Hours!

Link to Kickstarter

Developing a 2 vs. 2 Variant

Even though we're in the mid-campaign lull for Clockwork Wars, I've been putting in hours of work every night on further development of the game.  I've got plans to video-record a complete 3-player game within the next week, but scheduling folks at my age (meaning, people with babies and toddlers) is always tricky.  We've also been running some polls on the KS page for one of the territory icons:  the icon that will represent both Manufactories and Science Influence in the game.  That's been a fun process, involving backers in some key design decisions.

Smokestack vs. Flask

I've been brainstorming a number of ideas for the two Kickstarter exclusive territories that would become available if we hit 70K.  I've generated ideas for Volcanoes, Prison Camps, Power Plants, Jungle, Academies, Desert, and even Dungeons.  Some ideas have been better than others!  But I've honed the list down to a solid four, each with unique rules that will throw a twist into any session.  Pretty soon, I'm going to poll the KS backers to see which two they'd like to see actually developed.

Finally, I've been working on a 2 vs. 2 team variant for Clockwork Wars.  This came about from a suggestion from several backers.  During initial development of CW, I never even considered the idea - even though "informal" alliances are very possible and even quite common, depending on the play-style of the group.  But developing formal rules for what I'm calling the Alliances variant has been a pleasurable (if slightly daunting) challenge.  In the Alliances variant, each alliance will consist of 2 players who sum their VP total at the end of the game to determine the winner.  That much was easy to come up with.  But I had to comb through the rules, and each specific phase of the turn, to see what rules needed to be tweaked to accommodate and facilitate team play.

For example, I had to decide early on whether I was going to allow allies to have units in the same territory.  I went with "yes," mostly for thematic reasons.  But this brought up questions about control.  If both allies had 2 Soldiers in a Village, for example, which player would gain the recruitment advantage?  Both?  Just one?  I decided that control of a territory could never be shared.  The ally with the greatest Army Strength in a territory would be in control and gain the benefits of ownership (worker recruitment, IPs, VPs, etc.).  But what if the allies had an equal Army Strength, as in the above example?  This forced the creation of a new game concept:  the commander.  During each turn, one player in each alliance serves as the commander.  That player is the one who comes earlier in turn order.  The commander controls a territory where there is a tie in Army Strength between allies.

Another issue I wrestled with had to do with the hidden deployment system and "table talk".  It's very important to me that the uncertainty and tension of the Deployment Phase be maintained, even in a team game.  As such, it didn't make sense to allow allies to share complete knowledge of their deployment orders.  This also didn't sit right with me from a "realism" or simulation perspective.  Especially in a time and place of limited technology, allied generals would not have perfect knowledge of each other's troop movements.  So, allies cannot openly discuss their deployment plans and must make their decisions in secret, as per the normal rules.

However, the commander of each team can make a call-to-arms request of her ally.  To do so, you simply write down the ID tag of the territory you want your ally to deploy units to, and pass that (secret) information to them during the Deployment Phase.  All you can specify is the location - not the number of units you are requesting, nor how many you plan to commit.  This allows for some coordination of offensive thrusts or defensive actions, but it's imperfect and should lend itself to some fun and surprising moments.  The ally is also not bound to fulfill the call-to-arms, if he does not wish to.

These are some of the major issues that have come up so far, but like I said, it's been a joy - as game design always is.  I plan to release a version (work in progress!) of the complete Alliance variant rules sometime next week.

Kickstarter Success!

I finally have a moment to breathe, about 3 days into our campaign.  I'm shocked and thrilled to say that we were able to meet our $25,000 goal within 12 hours, and our current pledge total is teetering just beneath $50,000.  I was telling Aili, my wife, the night before we started about those amazing KS campaigns where people press the button, fret, go to sleep, and then wake up to find that they've already met their target.  But I never imagined I'd be fortunate enough to be in that camp.

How did it happen?  Well, it's far too early to make any firm conclusions, and I'm not an expert in KS advertising and mechanics - but I have some ideas.  Obviously, having Eagle Games in my corner with their broad advertising outreach and stellar reputation (especially when it comes to strategy games and KS campaigns) helped enormously.  That's #1.  The professional artwork and videography we had done, I'm sure, also did wonders for us.  It's basically a necessity.  A large percentage of our supporters, it appears, wandered over to our KS page from the "Popular" projects area.  People clearly like to browse KS projects and are willing to check out what's currently trending well and looks interesting and shiny.  But how did we get on the Popular page?

First, I think our Eagle Games strategy bundle early-bird special was extremely attractive - and those 25 pledges got gobbled up very fast.  That's nearly $7000 right there.  Second, our international outreach and ability to have EU friendly shipping, especially to France and Germany, have brought in a LOT of international backers.  The design of the game, as I had hoped, also seems to cross boundaries and appeal to Americans and non-Americans alike (to be honest, I'm not even sure I believe in the Ameritrash vs. Eurogame distinction anymore, insofar as they suggest geographic differences in what appeals to gamers).  Clockwork Wars has theme, beautiful art, and lovely components.  But it's a hard-core strategy game at heart, with rules of steel and play that rewards intelligence and wit.  

What next?  Well, obviously I hope we can keep the momentum up and achieve as many stretch goals as possible.  I'm especially passionate about our $60,000 goal - where we would get to include plastic miniatures of all the unique units in the game.  This would greatly increase the value of everyone's game and play experience, and I desperately hope we get there.  If you're reading this and have backed the project, spread the word!  60K is where we want to go!

This has been an immensely gratifying and humbling experience.  I'm a pessimist at heart, so to see so many people legitimately interested in the design and asking great questions and showing enthusiasm for the campaign is mind-blowing.  The internet is an amazing place, and periodically, magical things happen here.

In celebration, here's a close-up of possibly my favorite piece of art in the game:  the Colossus.  What a great piece and what a great time to be into board games!

Last minute preparations

With less than 24 hours to go before our Kickstarter campaign begins, we're busy with last minute preparations.  I've been tidying up our official website, adding a few more component pictures.  I've also been working with some French and German translators who have prepared versions of our instruction manual for potential European supporters.  I really hope we get a good push in our campaign from France and Germany - I think a hybrid strategy game like this has great appeal across the ocean.  And of course we're finalizing our Kickstarter page.  We've got a ton of info for potential supporters on there - multiple videos, lots of images, rules, etc.  And I think there are some fun stretch goals planned that we'll hopefully get to include.

We're aiming for $25,000.  I don't know if that's a little or a lot, but it's an intimidating number regardless. And to get a copy of the base game, a supporter needs to pledge $85 ($79 if you're an "early bird").  That certainly sounds like a lot, but I guess I can say a couple things about it.  First, I didn't have much say in that number.  That's just Eagle Games crunching the numbers.  Second, like most modern board games, Clockwork Wars is a quality product.  The production value here is very high, and we're obtaining individual art-work for over 70 different cards and game components.  Each one of those pieces costs money.  There will be wooden components, tons of big hexagonal tiles to build maps with, and at least 3 unique miniatures. Since I designed this game to play very differently every time, I think you're getting a lot of bang for your admittedly high buck.  

Fingers crossed!  Anxiety levels high!  Enthusiasm peaking!  Hope to see you on our Kickstarter page tomorrow.

Kickstarter videos

With the launch of our KS campaign only two weeks away, I've been busy working on various videos for our KS page.  Eagle is putting together a professional looking and sounding video (around 2 minutes) that will serve as a nice introductory "pitch" of the game.  I'm excited to see how it all comes together.  We just finished picking our voice actor.  I never thought I'd get a chance to be involved in all these nitty-gritty decisions.

I also finished putting together a 3 min video introducing myself, in which I also talk a little bit about where the idea for Clockwork Wars came from.  It's weird - I'm a professor, and I spend a lot of time in front a classroom blah blah blahing about lots of different things.  I never (or rarely) get self-conscious or nervous about that anymore.  But doing this video was a little horrifying.  First, you have to deal with watching yourself in a video.  It's worse that hearing your own voice and realizing you don't really sound like the "internal voice" in your mind.  Second, you worry about saying the wrong thing, coming off like an idiot, or arrogant, or confused.  Gakk.  I took a bunch of takes, and I think it came out fine, but I can't say I'm looking forward to seeing it on the KS page.

Finally, I'm putting together a sample play-through video, where I take people through 3 or 4 turns of the game.  This one was more fun and easier to do, but the raw footage has ended up quite long. I need to do some editing or try to do it again more succinctly.  I'm learning how to use iMovie, which is a nice bonus.

I understand that these videos are immensely important to the success of our project.  People will often run away from a KS page if the intro video is crap, and boardgamers expect to see a decent play-through video nowadays so that they can get a solid sense of the gameplay.  I think we're doing everything right and real professional-like, but the tension is building!

Oh, and check out this awesome art for one of our territory tiles.  This is what our "tower" tile is going to look like (or pretty close).  I love the lava rivers and arcane runes on the ground!

Official Kickstarter Launch Date

Well, we're finally ready to get this party started.  The KS launch date for Clockwork Wars is July 30.  You can follow any last-minute announcements at either our official website, or our Facebook page.

Right now we're solidifying our various stretch goals and add-ons.  It's at a time like this that I'm eternally thankful I'm working with Eagle Games, who have extensive experience launching and guiding successful KS campaigns.

Whew!  I'm excited/anxious to see whether all this hard work and patience pays off.