Kickstarter Roundup 11-21-13

Where-in I pick through Kickstarter for the projects that most catch my fancy.

Bubblegum Crisis Ultimate Edition Blu-Ray Set

WHAT IT IS: A definitive Blu-Ray release of the classic cyberpunk anime.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: Come on, it's Bubblegum Crisis. On Blu-Ray. Do you really need a reason? Okay, okay...Bubblegum Crisis was one of the first unedited, subtitled anime releases in North America, making for a watershed moment and a title a lot of tried and true anime fans are nostalgic for. It's also being released by the original licensee, and your backing dollar supports a smaller company putting out high-quality releases.

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $50 Basic. The physical Blu-Ray disc, postcards, commemorative coin, and involvement in the design process of the Blu-Ray itself.

RELEVANT LINKS: @animeigo | www.animeigo.com | Facebook Page

 

Hana Doki Kira

WHAT IT IS: A shoujo-inspired comic/illustration anthology lovingly designed and printed.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: There's a lot to like here, great artwork, the promise of great shoujo tales...but I'll be honest. What sold me is the brilliant use of the seafoam spot color. (Even the project page is adorned in nothing but head-to-toe.) Two-tone printing seems to be a lost art form as full-color has become ubiquitous, but you can do some really special things with it and use shades that simply aren't reproducible in CMYK. 

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $25 Doki Doki Deluxe Pre-Order. The book, the PDF, and a set of postcards. Higher pledges feature sketches, commissions, tote bags, and other premiums that might strike your fancy.

RELEVANT LINKS: Tumblr | Facebook

 

Sega Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works

WHAT IT IS: An incredible retrospective of an incredible console. SEEEE-GAAA!

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: First off. The cover. Just look at it. That's a glorious cover, is it not? But this project is more than a pretty face. Exclusive interviews with a veritable who's-who of Sega's 16-bit history, myriad production images of both the console and classic games, 300 pages of cover-to-cover nostalgia awesome, and did I mention how amazing that cover looks?

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: £30 (roughly $48) The Book. A physical copy of the book and your name immortalized in its pages. No blue hedgehog included unless you go for the $400 hyper-limited edition.

RELEVANT LINKS:  @romalerts | www.readonlymemory.vg

 

Board Games That Tell Stories

WHAT IT IS: A collection of 35 fan-favorite articles from the game blog of the same name.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: It's not often you can get material written about game design (or tabletop games in general) packaged in a nice hardcover. When it's written by the designer of many great board games, like Neuroshima Hex, it's even better. Admittedly, the text suffers a bit from English being Trzewiczek's second language, but there's still loads of insight and fun humor here. And the cover looks nice.

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $26 Hardcover. Nets you a signed hardcover version of the book. But if you poke around the add-ons you can get one of Trzewiczek's great games.

RELEVANT LINKS: http://www.BoardGamesThatTellStories.com/

Kickstarter Roundup 10-11-13

Where-in I pick through Kickstarter for the projects that most catch my fancy.

Hyper Light Drifter

WHAT IT IS: Gorgeous 2D Action RPG with lovingly pixelated sprite graphics and captivating artwork with a real style of its own.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: People's fondness for pixelated gaming is not a secret, and it seems any indie effort is as likely to sport blocky graphics as it is "HD." Those jagged edges invoke feelings of nostalgia for the games of yesteryear, and in many cases go a long way in demonstrating what kind of game you are about to play. But sometimes a game is more than that, a real statement of beauty like Sword & Sworcery was. Hyper Light Drifter is one of those games.

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $40. Digital versions of the game, manual, soundtrack, and artbook. You also get some other digital bonuses (like a new "sprite.") and a second key for the game, so you can actually take advantage of all those additional platforms from the stretch goals.

RELEVANT LINKS: @HeartMachineZ | www.heart-machine.com | Facebook Page

Akiba Anime Art Magazine

WHAT IT IS: A new magazine straight from Japan, featuring many talented Japanese artists and articles about Otaku culture.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: Japan is putting its foot into the Kickstarter ring with successful projects like Little Witch Academia and the enormously popular Mighty No. 9. By continuing to support Japanese efforts, that means we'll get to see even more of it! Besides, Akiba is a book full of lovely Japanese art, printed with a special wide gamut process that results in much brighter images than with traditional CMYK.

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $18 Otaku. A copy of the magazine and all of the various stretch goals that have accrued over the campaign.

RELEVANT LINKS: jhlab.jp

Game Cave Vol. 1

WHAT IT IS: A loveletter to the gaming magazines of decades gone by, rife with exciting layouts, new artwork, and a sense of humor.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: One of the big things I really miss about magazines is the design of them. When you view an article online, you get all the text, all the photos, and even video clips you never could have back then, but never the lovingly defined spreads, crammed to the gills with artwork, screenshots exploding from detailed backgrounds, and maybe a line of crooked text or two. It's nice to see that again.

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $30 Physical Book Tier. A physical copy of the magazine—I mean come on, that's the whole point, right?—plus an art print and all the digital goods.

RELEVANT LINKS:  @sketchcraft | www.sketchcraft.com | Facebook

Dawning Star: Fate of Eos

WHAT IT IS: A reboot of the fan-favorite sci-fi RPG, rebuilt from the ground up using the excellent FATE Core system.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: FATE is a great system, as can be attested by its modestly successful Kickstarter. So if you want to take the game to task in a far-flung future of aliens and spaceships, then Dawning Star is a good place to find it. With a flexible setting that can be tailored from pulp to space opera to interstellar intrigue with ease, and a healthy fanbase from previous editions, it's hard to go wrong.

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $35 EOS Defense Force. A physical copy of the game and all the digital goodies.

RELEVANT LINKS:  @DawningStarRPG | www.dawningstar.com | Facebook

Destiny Fails Us

WHAT IT IS: An “Otome” Visual Novel, a Choose Your Own Adventure-esque game featuring a female protagonist and lots of potential male suitors.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: While the game's use of 3D anime-style models isn't as nice as traditionally rendered art, the look serves its needs, and what you have is a fun-looking take on the date-sim. I'm especially fond of your character's cellphone that you actually check for messages throughout the game.

WHAT YOU SHOULD GET: $10 Digital Download Pack. A download copy of the game and the usual digital extras.

RELEVANT LINKS: www.destinyfailsus.com | Facebook

Far-Off Promise

A new year lay ahead, and the promise of a new set of days inspires the best intentions. The world echoes with countless commitments to work harder, be healthier, to care for each other, and to change in ways we hadn’t the year before. The sentiments are as often enough as vague as they are well-intentioned, the sort of positive thinking that we can stretch and contract to the size we can make room for.

But I want to do more than that this year. I want a game plan, as much for myself as for the accountability saying it outright provides. That’s not to say 2011 was empty of accomplishments. After all, I helped Minion Games ready no less than six games for sale in a single year -- no mean feat! And I took part in a graphical overhaul for DriveThruRPG and its sister sites that will be rolling out soon. Yet, for 2012, I want to get my things done.

So, here it is, my plan for the year. (Split up for your convenience and mine.)

My Blog 
I’ve been moving to a new computer, an iMac, for the past month or two — the lengthy travails of which I'll have to detail one or these days — but I fully intend to get this blog back on track. Besides my usual excursions of fancy, I'm launching several bi-weekly columns.

You’ve seen a taste of the first one with the Digital Gameboard. I’ll be making a point of covering all the gaming apps I come across, especially those involving euro-style board games and their kin. I stand by that the iPad is a great platform for classic board gaming fun and can use all the coverage it can get.

I’ll also be penning my foolhardy quest to play every console rpg ever. It's something that’s become ever more difficult as my list of unplayed and unfinished games grows longer. But maybe by adding you all to my party, this quest may become less of a foolhardy one.

And for those of you wondering, yes Minion Monday will eventually finish out its run. I’m waiting on my own physical copies of the games so I can better show off the components. It’s just taking a little longer than expected.

My Games
While there’s a certain anime-inspired elephant in the room, I have up my sleeves a plethora of games I've tinkered on in perpetuity, and I’d really like to finally get some of them out the metaphorical door and into the light. While finishing, much less releasing, all of them in this revolution of the sun is a unlikely accomplishment, I do want progress, and I want to share that progress with you. Here's a highlight reel of what to expect.

OVA — Yes, the oft-promised return of Wise Turtle's flagship product is still very much in the works, and I’ve made a commitment to its release in the early half of 2012. Long-time fans may have dim memories of several supplements that I hope to talk more about and bring closer to release. You can see a sample of artwork for a sci-fi-themed supplement on the left of the header, done by feguimel.

Legendary! — While I love all my work for Minion Games, and all its games are special to me, they’re still not mine in any true sense of the word. Legendary! is a fantasy dungeon-crawl of a board game inspired by fond childhood memories of Dungeon, but with enough twists to the formula that I believe in its ability to give something new to a crowded and often trite set of games. It’s infused with lore from a lifetime of love for console rpgs, and the very talented Honoel Ibardolaza certainly brings it to life. That trio of numbskulls in the header is his handiwork.

Last Legend — Before OVA, I was a devoted follower (and sometimes contributor) to the Returner Final Fantasy RPG, an attempt to capture the spirit of the eponymous video games in pen and paper form. Eventually I left that community over a difference of opinion...whereas most were concerned with copying the actual game mechanics and number crunching of the video games, I felt the rules would be better served trying to approximate the feel of rpg battles and leave the math for the CPUs that spawned it. Last Legend is my on again, off again take on the subject. You can see some art from it in the header, this time the inks in the background that are once again provided by Honoel.

iOS — Tied in with all these is a general interest in the iOS platform. Now that I have an iMac (more about that in a future post), exploring the world of iPads and iPhones is a real possibility. While the likelihood of me gaining enough prowess with programming to create a game of any decent measure is not good, having access to the tools does open other interesting opportunities. OVA-dedicated apps to aid with dice-rolling, character creation, and even easy rules reference would be a great resource to provide players, and iOS versions of the various Minion Games would be cool indeed.

My work for others
While I said I wanted to make 2012 a year for my projects, there is at least one outside job I'm really excited about. If you follow Ewen Cluney's blog, you may already know what I mean. If not...well, be sure to check by Tuesday for my own official announcement!

DiTurtleizzi

TURTLE TUESDAY

I used to love AD&D. But more than that, I really loved Monster Manuals. Almost every RPG has its collection of things to toss at players, but Dungeons & Dragons’ just seemed so expansive, a kitchen-sink of every neat (and occasionally not so neat) idea, a treasure trove of mythic creatures cobbled from countless mythos, including that of Dungeons & Dragons itself. The Zaratan pictured above claims to hail from Al-Qadim, one of many campaign settings of TSR’s heyday, but it has obvious inspiration from the mythic World Turtle. You may have come across a version of that story from the famous Steven Hawking anecdote “Turtles All the Way Down.”

But as fascinating as each volume of the monstrous menagerie was, the part that really captured my imagination was the art of Tony DiTerlizzi. Whereas much of the art of the 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual was functional, and at times barely serviceable, DiTerlizzi's art breathed on the page, the soft colors and wispy inks conveying each creature as more than a stat block. When I got my hands on the Monstrous Compendium Annual Vol. 1, I was ecstatic to find every denizen within the paperback tome was penned by his hand. It was more than great art. DiTerlizzi was a revelation and a lesson. RPGs could be beautiful.

DiTerlizzi continued work for the Monstrous Compendiums, and even defined the look of entire worlds as the face of Planescape, another AD&D campaign setting. But he’s long since moved on, his dabbling in RPG illustration likely a scarcely remembered stepping stone on the way to his true passion in children’s books. [1] But no matter how many of his new stories become a part of modern childhoods, I’ll always love him for the books that were a part of mine.

[1] Serendipity abounds. Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi actually met while she was interviewing him for, of all things, an RPG magazine.