Tag: kickstarter

The ‘Sword Interval’ Kickstarter.

I’m going to pause in my archive-dive into Sword Interval long enough to point out its Kickstarter:

As you can see, Sword Interval is all about the professional monster hunting. What draws my pleased attention to it is the world-building, which reminds me in some way of Pacific Rim‘s (that’s a compliment, mind you).  I’m struck by the way the artist shows humanity quietly taking into account the way that monsters are part of their world now; it’s very satisfying on a visual level.  Check it out.

Yeah, I’m gonna back the Red Markets Kickstarter.

I’m still not thrilled by the way it got pitched, but I’ve been told by a bunch of people whose opinion I wouldn’t dismiss lightly that Red Markets is a legit tight zombie RPG and that it’s gonna be awesome. So, what the heck. Last hurrah of the monthly Patreon money before it starts getting auto-assigned to the household budget anyway.

So check it, as they say, out. Zombie apocalypse meets the free market RPG, for those who are curious.

The ‘Red Markets’ Kickstarter, its obnoxious promo video to the contrary.

I’ll be honest: if it was just a matter of the aforementioned video, I’d have been tempted to give the computer monitor the finger and keep on moving. But I’ve had enough people whose opinion matters to me say that the Red Markets zombie apocalypse-meets-the-free-market RPG is worth a look anyway to make me… not so much forgive the game, as to not hold that video against it. Helps that the folks who wrote the actual game (Caleb Stokes and Ross Payton) have good, solid reps in the business, too. That helps. A lot.

I would possibly suggest that they do a new pitch video, though. I mean, the Kickstarter has already funded, so maybe they won’t care – but I don’t imagine that I’m the only person in the universe who got their back up at the way this game was presented.  It’s not like I can just fling cash around with nary a care any more.  These days, I need to call my shots when it comes to discretionary spending.

The Skin Horse Volume 6 Kickstarter.

I enjoyed the choice of music for this particular Kickstarter video. For those who don’t know Shaenon Garrity and Jeffrey Wells’ Skin Horse, it’s about… one of the more interesting federal agencies in the American shadow government.  Put it this way: I liked this particular strip so much I bought the original art for my wife’s wall. And this one for my wall. So check it out.

Continue reading The Skin Horse Volume 6 Kickstarter.

Kickstarter and Call of Cthulhu: a Cautionary Tale.

If you’re into crowdfunding and using places like Kickstarter to fund your favorite geekstuff, you’ll want to read this mildly gruesome tale about how Chaosium almost imploded over a successful Kickstart of their Seventh Edition rule set for Call of Cthulhu. Short version: take underestimated international shipping costs and mix it with bad management, flavor to taste with extravagant promises, and then serve it up with a poor choice of corporate HQ (seriously, San Francisco is too expensive to HQ your gaming company). The company only survived because the new management loved Chaosium enough to spend the money needed to save it; great for Chaosium (seriously), but you can’t count on it for your smaller shops.

Via @jefftidball, who sardonically notes that this is why Atlas Games is charging so much for shipping Unknown Armies.  Which is what you have to do, these days. Especially if you’re shipping overseas. There’s a reason why the British gaming companies try to maintain a publishing presence over here, and vice versa.

Irregular Webcomic’s @dmmaus is a man of good character, known to me. Back his Kickstarter.

David Morgan-Mar is a web-cartoonist (Irregular Webcomic, Darths and Droids) who is doing a Kickstarter to fund his first book of Irregular Webcomic; he is a Good Fellow who I remember from the Before Times. Please note that because he is Australian, the Kickstarter is priced in Australian dollars. It’s considerably less in American money.

Via @prayerborne