Final days of Scoville kickstarter

We're down to the final 48 hours of the Scoville kickstarter, and we're up to $65,500 in funding. The final stretch goal is at $80k, so if you've been on the fence then now's the time to jump in - we're going to make it!

TMG big box games on Kickstarter have come to an odd place. They're very likely to hit their funding goal, but since we don't like exclusive content, and we like to provide a full game in the first place, there isn't much to get excited about as far as stretch goals...

It's one thing to come up with a mini-expansion for a 10 minute microgame from scratch, there's much less going on in those games, and there's time to test it and make sure it's good... however the same is not true for a larger-scale game. Big games are a lot of work, and unless the designer has been sitting on the game for some time and has already designed an expansion, there's not a lot of game content that can be "tossed in" as a stretch goal. Bigger, longer games by definition take more time to test new content, and so big box games don't have the luxury of coming up with mini expansions or new content on the spot (without risking that content being out of balance or, in general, bad for the game).

What we've got on deck for this last stretch goal for Scoville is something that many people have expressed an interest in... pepper shaped bits rather than cubes. Due to board legibility concerns, we've combined the pepper bits with a fancy board with depressions into which the "cubes" will fit, which will serve to ensure uniform placement on the board. This is more important than many people realize, because it will significantly reduce the load of simply reading the board, allowing you to concentrate on your game decisions.

This upgrade is not exclusive to Kickstarter backers, it will be an upgrade for the entire print run. We tried a similar format for Kings of Air and Steam, and frankly I'm a little surprised at the overall reaction to that format.

To me, it's an extension of the original funding goal - and it should work the same way. When a game meets the original funding goal, it becomes available for everyone - not just Kickstarter backers. So when an upgraded version of the game becomes available at some higher funding level, why is it people hesitate to back, citing that the upgrade will also be available to everyone, not just the backers? By that logic, why were those people backing in the first place?

Best I can figure is that if the original funding goal isn't met, then there's no game at all. If it IS met, then the game will be available - even if not in an upgraded version. The risk of the game not being upgraded isn't as big a deal as the risk of not being able to play the game at all, and maybe that's why people make that choice to wait for retail - even if they say they really want the upgraded version.

My advice to anyone considering backing is this: If you want the game, and you're planning on getting it anyway, then you might as well pledge now rather than waiting for retail - to help ensure the threshold is met for the upgraded components (assuming you in fact do want the upgraded components). Of course, if you do not want the game, or cannot afford the game, then don't pledge - that goes without saying.

At this point I'm confident we will make the $80k funding goal, but that's only true if the people who want the pepper bits go ahead and pledge!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/michaelmindes/scoville-the-hottest-farming-euro-game-ever

Scoville on kickstarter!

We had planned to launch the kickstarter project for Scoville last November, coincident with BGG.con, however we ran into some delays (that seems to be the standard, no matter how hard we try to avoid it).

Today, only 2 months later than planned, the Scoville project went live! I'm really happy with the reception so far - 400 backer and $16,600 as of this writing, and it's only day 1 of the project!

If you haven't been following this game, it's about pepper farming. Colored cubes represent various peppers, and players will plant them, cross-breed them, harvest them, and turn them in to fulfill orders or make Chili recipes.

Each round of Scoville has 4 phases:

1. Auction: Bid for turn order
2. Planting: Place peppers onto the game board
3. Harvest: Navigate the game board to obtain new peppers
4. Fulfillment: turn in sets of peppers for points and other benefits

So far, everyone I've played Scoville with has really enjoyed it! The game can play with up to 6 players, but in order to get enough components into the box to support that we're going to have to hit some stretch goals. But with the start that we've had, the quality of the game, the reputation of TMG for putting out great games of this type, and the stellar art of Josh Cappel, I think we'll be able to get there.

So please, check out the project, and feel free to sport this avatar to support it on social media:

Thanks!

Dungeon Roll Winter Promo, TMG goes "micro", and "pay what you want"

Michael has been fascinated by the idea of so-called "microgames" for a while now. Ever since Love Letter met with great success and people started saying that games with minimal components are the wave of the future he has wanted to figure out how to produce and market them in a way he was happy with.

As those who follow TMG probably already know, we have a Kickstarter project going on right now for a Dungeon Roll Winter Promo - 4 new Heroes and a punchboard of Treasure tokens - and it's doing very well. There are just 2 days left, and we're over 5,000 backers! This performance has given Michael confidence in the format, and in researching this promo pack he's decided that he's comfortable shipping out microgames as well.

A year or so ago Michael, with microgames in mind, started working on a partial information, deduction game of his own. It's called Templar Intrigue, and it's in the genre of Werewolf and Resistance/Avalon. It plays much faster than other similar games, and uses just 10 cards. At one time the plan was to make Templar Intrigue available as a print and play game, and if it proved popular, Michael could use Kickstarter to print a higher quality version and sell it at a low price. Well, plans changed a bit... Templar Intrigue is on Kickstarter right now, and has over 2400 backers.

Both of these Kickstarter projects have a few common elements. For one thing, they are very short duration Quickstarters, a format that I like a lot for KS in general. Another common thing is the price structure. Michael is asking people to "pay what they want," with a minimum of $2 ($3 internationally) just to cover postage. This has proven to be a fairly popular price structure, and while some people are most certainly taking the opportunity to get the games at the minimum price, enough people are chipping in extra that the average per unit pledge is about $4.50 or so. This is only a tad under the "suggested" price of $5 (what the games would sell for normally).

I know Michael's got a few more microgame projects planned for the near future. The idea of microgames is interesting - in today's age of busy-busy-busy, interesting games that don't take a lot of time or space are a welcome thing. Often there's just no time for a bigger game experience. However, in most cases I find that I prefer a deeper experience than a microgame can offer, so I hope that the gaming world doesn't migrate entirely to these small, quick games... I'm sure it won't. In fact, TMG has another full size game project coming to kickstarter soon. It's for the hottest euro-style game you've ever played: Scoville!

Michael Keller Double Feature funded - Captains of Industry and City Hall going to print! So what's next?

Last month I mentioned that we were running a Kickastarter for two games by designer Michael Keller: City Hall and Captains of Industry. That has wrapped up, and we finished with just under $50,000 in funding to print those two games. I put quite a bit of development work into Captains of Industry, and I'm looking forward to its debut! Art for both games is being finalized and sent to the printers for pre-press.

Thanks to everyone who backed the project, I hope you all enjoy the games as much as I do, and for the cost of the Kickstarter pledge you can't really go wrong - I'm sure there will be people who missed out on the project and will want the games when they arrive.

While we wait for those games to go through the long manufacturing process, we will be starting another Kickstarter in November for a game called Scoville, by Ed Marriott.

Scoville is a game about planting, cross breeding, and harvesting peppers to fulfill orders or mix into chile recipes. It's a fun game, and it's been universally well received by every group I've played it with. Ed puts a lot of work into game design, and it really shows in his work. There was almost nothing I felt I needed to tweak in this design, which makes my job a lot easier! I'm looking forward to this one as well, and we'll have demo (prototype) copies with us at BGG.con in November, while the Kickstarter is live, so if you're going to Dallas you can give it a try before pledging.

So watch for Scoville on Kickstarter mid November, and I'll see you all at BGG.con!