Return

I’m driving home from Bristol today.

The Gower was lovely

Back at work tomorrow.

And back to Xeno Wars.

The pledge manager officially closes today but we still have 95 people who haven’t completed it.

Once that’s done we can place the orders.

We also need to finally choose a new box maker and place an order.

Lots to do…

Holiday

I’m away for the week.

In (old!) south Wales.

We’re taking some family time.

When I’m back I’ll be closing the pledge manager and starting to order everything.

Xeno Wars will begin to take shape.

Until then I’m relaxing.

‘Exciting’

… is one word for it.

Frustrating is another.

Worrying also works.

I’ve placed the order for all the wooden bits we need.

There’s a long lead time, so best to get the order in early.

Paid via Wise. It usually takes 3 hours and has low international fees.

It took eight days. For ‘verification’. Then at the end of all that they refunded me.

I need to fix the problem and try again.

I also contacted the box-maker to check the quote I got a couple of months ago is still valid.

They’ve gone out of business!

I need to find a new box-maker.

‘Exciting’.

Or frustrating.

Or worrying.

Production

I've spent the week working on the Pledge Manager.

It goes live at 2pm UK time today.

Paul is making the rewards that we already have the components for.

We're starting to place the orders for the materials that will take longest to arrive.

It's coming together.

Still lots to do.

But moving in the right direction. 

Shut Up

… and Sit Down covered FlickFleet in last week’s podcast.

Tom repeatedly described it as cute. And silly.

We got a bunch of orders as a result.

Many of which arrived while I was camping last weekend. 

It’s amazing the effect of a big name mentioning your game.

Actual influencers.

Photo by Eric Ward on Unsplash

I’ve tried to email Shut Up & Sit Down a few times over the last few years.

No luck.

Then Tom wandered past our stand at the Expo.

Was intrigued.

Took a copy.

I wonder how many sales we’ll get as a result?

Currently 16.

Plus a noticeable jump in Gamefound page followers.

Comparisons

We’ve just finished our first Gamefound campaign, after four increasingly successful Kickstarters. I’m going to do a bit of a deep dive on the differences (bear in mind my Kickstarter experience is now over a year old - things might have changed in the meantime).

Why did we change? Kickstarter was working well for us, we had raised over £75,000 through four campaigns. Why would we risk changing? Blockchain is the answer to that. If you live in Europe you’ll have probably experienced a record breaking heatwave in the last week. It was over 2 degrees C hotter than the previous record in the UK and over 4 degrees hotter than the previous record in my city. The world is on fire and it’s our fault. We need to make radical changes to prevent tipping points in the climate.

Blockchain is hugely energy intensive. BitCoin is the worse example, but even the Proof of Stake chains require a lot of energy. Kickstarter announced a move to blockchain last year without providing any real reason at all. When pushed by numerous incensed creators and backers they doubled down ‘Blockchain!’.

Contrast that with Gamefound whose equivalent message was all how how they would be helping creators and backers. Rather that pouring fuel on the planetary fire. We’d used them three times already for pledge managers, so it was a natural choice. But was it a good one?

TL;DR: It was our best campaign ever, but I’m pretty sure we’re would have raised even more on Kickstarter with the same campaign. But I don’t regret it at all.

Gamefound has a lot of advantages. You can have a preview page that’s a landing page with real content that you can make available before the project is reviewed. A dedicated account manager with good response times on queries. Add-ons and stretch goals are first class citizens. They handle EU VAT for you. And the pledge manager is in the same place. We were also offered a free banner ad on the site.

But there are also plenty of downsides (though this is very early days and I expect lots of these will get addressed quite quickly). The worse was the lack of notifications on comments - I find myself having to frequently check the page comments and all the updates to see if I’ve missed responding to any comments. The ads between updates and comments confused a lot of people, so we got responses to update questions on the main page comments. Our backers complained the site was hard to use and the ads were too intrusive. Some backers had pledges blocked by their card issuers (if you’re in the US a Polish company looks more dodgy that an US one). There’s no app and a much smaller user base so we got a lot less pledges on the last day than last time. In fact we probably lost a bunch of backers because they’ve never heard of Gamefound (but know Kickstarter). Kickstarter claim to provide 40-45% of the backers on our previous campaigns. I’d always assumed that was some creative accounting and most of it came from the ads we ran, but maybe not so much. We got almost nothing directly attributed to Gamefound.

There was also a few features of the Kickstarter dashboard I missed (the stream of pledge/adjustments/cancellations including backer name, the graph showing various pledge backer totals in a single place).

Campaign performance by day, darker lines are more recent

We had 40% more people on our mailing list, nearly four times as many followers at launch, three times the marketing budget and a bigger draw project - it added multiplayer rules which people have been clamouring for. And we raised 8% more than last time. It’s not quite a fair comparison as Gamefound doesn’t include shipping in the pledges, but even assuming similar shipping to last time that’s still only 24%. I’m pretty sure we’d have done better than that on Kickstarter.

But I don’t regret it. We need rapid systemic change to minimise the effects of climate change. Blockchain is an ecological disaster and companies should be avoiding it like the plague, not starting to embrace it. Our decision costs us money, but it’s one I’ll happily repeat - we’re going to have to collectively make far bigger sacrifices in the coming years.

Culmination

Our first Gamefound campaign finishes in just under five hours.

Less than 5 hours left!

It’s been ahead of our last one since the beginning.

Our best ever campaign.

Again. The last was was too. And the one before that. They all have.

How much better will it end up? At one point it was looking like we might get £45,000!

Then the prediction dropped to £35,000.

It’s been pretty static since then.

We’ll see where we finish.

It’s been a rollercoaster.

It always is.

I need a rest.

Doldrums

We’re mid-campaign.

It’s slowed down as it always does.

We need to keep the momentum up.

We’re running some ads.

Bizarrely they are generating more website sales than Gamefound backers.

A FlickFleet playmat!

We’ve just unlocked the playmat, which people have been keen for.

That should help.

Next up is the big box.

Hopefully that will help too.

We’re at 63% of our previous best campaign with just over half the campaign left to go.

And shipping will be collected in the Pledge Manager.

It should be our best ever campaign.

We’re still in the doldrums though!

And it’s really slowed down the last few days.

Launch

It’s launch day.

Just over five hours to go.

A time of great excitement. And great nerves.

In eight hours I’ll have a pretty good idea of how it’s going.

We’ve got four Kickstarters’ worth of data to compare this against.

For now though: just possibilities. It could go well.

Or badly. Extremely well, or mediocre.

I’ll just have to wait and see.

In hindsight, choosing to launch the campaign when Paul is on holiday and my parents are visiting may have been … sub-optimal.

Lots to do.

Anxiety

A week today our next campaign goes live.

Our first Gamefound campaign.

Can we replicate the success of previous campaigns?

Will the switch to Gamefound help or hinder us?

Have people had enough of FlickFleet?

How will the cost of living crisis affect things?

In a week’s time I will have a rough idea of the answers to those questions.

For now they are worries I have no way of answering.

What little data I have at this point is promising.

But it’s far from concrete.

Just hints.

So I worry.

For another week.

It’s an anxious time…

Story

We have a weird way of making games.

Our factory

Paul does it himself, in his garage.

Why would we do such a thing?

Are we mad?

Possibly.

Judge for yourself!

We’ve done a couple of interviews in the last week.

Explaining ourselves.

Producing Fun with James Naylor.

And The Thoughtful Gamer with Marc Davis.

I hope you find them interesting.

It was a nice distraction from the Gamefound page - which is finally taking shape.

Refocus

I’ve been wholly focused on the UK Games Expo for a month or so.

There was a lot to prepare.

Because it was our first show.

Now the focus has changed.

The Xeno Wars Gamefound is the main focus.

I need to send out the review copies.

Review copies!

Calculate shipping prices.

Add more photos and video.

Mention it on the website.

Work out the stretch goals.

We’re hoping to launch on Independence Day. Y’know, because the aliens are coming.

Clock’s ticking…

Exhausted

We did our first show as Eurydice.

Me and Paul, tired but happy!

My first in 11 years.

It was elating, exciting, exhausting.

Meeting so many people I’ve known for years, but never met.

Meeting fans of the game who wanted to come by and say hi and tell us they love it.

Watching hundreds of games. The cheers, the groans, the cries of disbelief.

Watching new fans discover the game.

I’m elated. Excited. Enthused. 

But mostly exhausted. 

Busy

It’s been a week.

Daughter the Second turned five.

So we decorated the house.

And then did everything for her party on Saturday.

On top of that, it’s the Expo this weekend.

We need to get everything ready for that. 

Including the review copies of Xeno Wars.

I’ve been flat out.

The Xeno Wars artwork is now with the printer.

Just got a couple of things left to do: send the newsletter and create our Zettle shop.

Then it’s off to the Expo.

It's hard work!

Our first time exhibiting.

It’s exhausting.

I remember from my Reiver Games days.

Long days.

On your feet.

Enthusiastic and interacting with people constantly.

Next Monday I have the day off.

With two young kids - both schools are shut.

Might not be the day of recuperation I’ll need!

Competition

We're running a competition at the UK Game Expo.

How many fighters can you destroy in 5 turns?

Each turn you can move and/or fire three times.

Move first or fire first. Your choice.

If your ship leaves the mat, your entry is over.

If a die leaves the mat it deals no damage.

If you collide with an asteroid or fighter that's the end of your turn. And you take damage from asteroids.

It'll be running for the first and last hour of every day.

Highest score at the end of the show wins all four deluxe boxes worth £220.

Ties will be broken by random number generator.

You're only allowed one entry per hour slot. First entries will be prioritised over repeat entrants.

It'll look like this!

Not going to the Expo? If you have the game and expansion 1 you can play along at home. You won't be able to enter the competition, but we'd love to see your scores! 

Expo

The UK Games Expo has been in the news this week for dropping its mask and vaccination requirements.

Three weeks before it starts.

We’re going though.

Our first con!

It’s our first ever convention.

It’s exciting.

And expensive.

We need to buy loads of things, on top of the cost of the stand.

Paul and I are working on those.

The Xeno Wars Gamefound campaign is slipping as a result.

At least a lot of stuff will be re-usable for our next convention.

I’ve not exhibited since 2009 I think.

Will be interesting to see how things have changed.

And how well FlickFleet will do at a convention.

We'll have loads of stock with us of FlickFleet, the Scenery and Scenario Pack, Box of Flicks 1 and Box of Flicks 2.

Plus we'll be running a competition where you can win a deluxe copy of all four of those.

That's £220 RRP!

Retail

We make small print runs.

On a laser-cutter.

In Paul’s garage.

Retail is out of reach.

We don’t have the margins to sell to distributors.

Or the large number of items ready to go.

Or shrink-wrap.

Or large, mostly empty, retail-focused boxes.

But we are carried in a local chain of comics and games shops.

And another store saw an ad and offered us a demo day.

Paul went down on Saturday.

He played a lot of FlickFleet. 

Sold a few copies. And they took some more for stock.

We have another retailer:

Geek Retreat Leicester

Review

We’re nearing review copy readiness.

It’s an exciting time.

We get ‘real-ish’ copies of the game for photography and then send them to reviewers.

Will they like it?

Hate it?

Don’t end up like this!

The playtesters have had ‘a lot of fun’ with it.

Now we need the reviewers to enjoy it too.

But that’s their call. Not ours.

We don’t do paid previews - just send a copy for an honest review.

We’re on tenterhooks.

Pressure

Now I’m back from holiday I need to finalise Xeno Wars so I can finish the rulebook, print some review copies and post them. 

Our playtesters have had some fantastic ideas that take Xeno Wars and build on the new species. 

I need to playtest those and make a final decision on which ones we want to add in. 

Playtesting time is tricky. 

I got loads in on holiday but none since. 

In an ideal world Paul and I would test it together. 

But we live 100 miles apart. 

And I work full-time. 

And now Paul has COVID again. 

The final rulebook is the blocker for almost everything that comes next. 

To be honest, we can tweak it in the next couple of months, but we want the review copies to be as good as possible. 

I’d like to run the Gamefound in early June - just after the Expo. 

That doesn’t leave long for making review copies, posting them and reviewing. 

I feel the clock ticking.

 

Photo by Sonja Langford on Unsplash

Density

I’ve spent the last week in Shropshire with the entirety of my family.

Was great to see them all - we’ve not seen much of them for a couple of years.

The kids were delighted to spend time with all their cousins.

It was great to meet my youngest nephew.

I took a bag of games of course.

We played a couple of games of Outfoxed with the younger kids.

Century Golem Edition with the older ones.

And a lot of FlickFleet: Xeno Wars. A lot.

This kitchen island saw a lot of FlickFleet action!

It was great to really thrash Xeno Wars - trying out a few of the playtesters ideas and getting in a bunch of multiplayer games.

Then when I got back my next door neighbour came round for a Star Wars Rebellion rematch.

It’s been a gaming-dense week :)