Why is my Kickstarter not ready Part 1 of 3

WARNING! This blog post has not been edited .. I'm Dyslexic (see Below) I make mistakes. DEAL WITH IT ... I will have someone edit it later. 

So the whole point in this kickstarter is to give me the funding to create an amazing game. If I am very lucky I may be able to cut back my hours at work ... And if I am really really lucky maybe even quit!

So like many creative people I do tend to jump into things with both feet and think that I will try to learn how to swim on the way down. Sometimes that works and sometimes that does not .. With Kickstarter that is a bit different for me. I just saw a good friend of mine who had an amazing project miss his funding goal by less then $3,000. This was very eye opening for me because I really like his work and much of his previous books have been AMAZING and successful. He posted some very insightful reasons why he thinks his project did not succeed. With this I started to take another look at my own project.

My Kickstarter preparation check list  

Now a few of these items are checked off my list .. and I have created a nice spreadsheet that calculates how many items I have to complete .. This spreadsheet does not put into account items that are more important then others. However these are just a few things that you need to think about before starting your kickstarter campaign. at first I was thinking about making comments on all these Items ... then I started to realise I'm not writing a blog about how to do a kickstarter ... I'm writing about MY Kickstarter... This is something that I might revisit . but for now I'm going to just work on my own project. 

Invoke Card Game Design Checklist 

Rules proofread

Rules posted on website

Print and play version posted

Email sign up list created

Play testing 1-20

Play testing 20-40

All cards proofread

Cards uploaded to games crafter

Prototype ordered (Three Deck version)

Spell list sheet created

Domain name

Blind play testing

Creative Commons  licence (print and play)

Artwork for all cards

Box design

Instructions booklet

Create symbols for the three decks

Create suit for events

Re-create Cards for easy viewing

Kickstarter Tasks 

Submit approval

Create kickstarter page

Shoot video

Calculate costs of shipping US

Calculate shipping Au

Calculate production of all reward levels

Reward levels

Submit press release

Proofread kickstarter page

Back 5 projects (others)

Interview successful projects

Listen to all "Funding the Dream podcast"

Make comments on on other projects

Help promote others project

Amazon payments

Have someone else view my project page

Create and calualte streach goals

Marketing tasks 

Get involved with the board game community

Board game geek forum

Fiverr ad

Facebook ad

Email all friends

Host board game parties where someone brings a friend

Game con

Send out print n play versions

Contact local papers

Flyers at game stores

Be on at least 3 blogs

Get ads on 3 podcasts

At least 20 Blog posts.

Photo tagging promo on facebook

Factors not on my list 

These items I am going to talk about a little bit because they are more important to just put on a to do list. 

My Dyslexia

By the time your eyes have come down this far you may have noticed a few mistakes. .. yes yes I know you have seen me write about this before .. but its a huge factor. Think every single step requires me to wait for someone to help me to insure that there are no grammatical or spelling errors ... these is not something that "Spellcheck" can fix. So a major part of my time is waiting. The problem with having Dyslexia .. I cant just post something and have a mistake overlooked because my brain works differently. This is the internet ... Where the Grammar Jackals are just waiting to rip apart a creative idea due to a misspelling or misuse of tense. So I wait . 

Nobody knows me 

All my social media has been focused on being an artist. This is fine and all but I'm not one of those game creators who have other games out there. Lets face it the Fine art community is not excited because I'm hand painting a card game. So I have started mostly on Twitter looking to actually connect with people who like games .. and I'm not talking about following them just to follow ... or buying followers I'm talking about actually connecting to as many people I can and have real conversations with them. I'm not focusing so much on facebook because I feel that its not all that great for businesses. 

Playtesting 

So I can come up with some crazy ideas now and then .. And I'm sure that Invoke is one of those. The problem with having really out there game ideas is that some of the things that I consider fun may not be so for other people. My wife has told me that as much as she likes the game there is a huge list of other games she would rather be playing. So I want to find out if others are going to like the game. I also want to make sure the game is easy to understand (or at least as easy as possible and still keep the theme of the game) 

Print and Play 

At the time of writing this the print and play version of the game is NOT ready yet .. At one point I had a version of the game out that was so bad that I am embarrassed that I even told anyone about it. My Plans are to make the print and play free for anyone who would like to play. Currently the plans are to keep it that way (Funding my change my mind but as of today ... its free). My hopes is that you are going to like the game and play it with a few friends. If I am really lucky then one of those friends are going to want to own the retail version :) 

I only have one computer

That is not true ... I also have a phone and a cheep Android tablet ... but neither one of those will allow me to edit the cards. So when my wife is not using her computer is the only time I can work on the game. Sure there are parts where I don't need a computer like painting the creatures and such but that will not help me get the print and play version done in time. So I wait . 

I get funded with Kickstarter ... now what? 

Now here is a problem .. I have to start thinking longer term then getting the money to make the game.. I have to look into how its going to get to the stores ( if that ) .. and how much effort I need to put into it. So far its my dream to quit the day job ... stay at home and just do creative projects with my wife all day! with this comes planning. 

So there we go ... this is why my Kickstarter is not ready!
When ... I'm thinking Sept 15th 2014 

The Evolution of a Golem Card!

Some of you may know that I have been working on this game for some time. It started with an idea on the mechanics and has evolved into something completely different.

The cards have changed as well. Here is the Earth Golem card as an example. 

Here is the first attempt that the Earth Golem card .. it's design was as simple as possible .. the card itself was easy to put together with a basic word processing software. The photograph was creative commons photograph that I was using as a place holder .. the size of the card itself was a bit odd.. but It seemed to work for an early prototype. 

The problems with this card was that though the creative commons images were free to use .. the attribution of every single image was going to be a major pain in the tail .. (My wife is a copyright lawyer and we are all about giving credit to those who create images) I also just happen to be an artist so Its important for me to actually be part of the creative process beyond that of the designer of the game mechanics. 

The other problem with the card was that the odd size of the card made it so that mass production of the card was not going to be easy. There would be extra costs in the production. 

The image above is the scan of the canvas I used for the hand painted version of the Golem card (the colors look a lot nicer on canvas as well as the final version ).. The process starts with drawing the creature on the canvas with pencil .. from here I get a feel of the design. then by adding layers of acrylic I start to ad shape and texture to the figure. This scan does not do the original justice.  I do tend to hide secrets into my original artwork that cannot be scanned. This way the original does retain some extra value over a print other then being the "Original art". By the way the canvas Original will be part of the Kickstarter rewards as the top tier backer category. 

Here is the latest version of the card. The canvas has been scanned and all the background has been "Cut away" though useing an alpha tool. The colors have been slightly altered to match the actual canvas. The backdrop is digital in nature. I am trying to create a hand painted version of the backdrop but have has little success. 

I have added lighting effects to the backdrop to accentuate the golem. In the earlier version the golem almost blended into the background though that was a very interesting effect and would not interfear with the gameplay it almost made the card look boring.

The text areas are no longer a boring block. I have chosen to limit the amout of right angels in the design to a minimum. 

Up in the top left corner is the suit icon. This I have found removes confusion of the golem is a creature or an object for the purpose of game mechanics. I am considering adding a "Deck icon" to show what deck this card belongs to make the print and play version of the game easier to play.. I would love some feedback on that. 

For those who are sticklers at grammar may have noticed that I have a very hard time with this. The cards and instuctions are being edited for ease of gameplay and to ease the frustration of those who actually understand proper grammar. 

Being that I have to go through this process another 40 times