Tabletop Games Crowdfunding Roundup - April 20th, 2022
Does your inbox fill up every Tuesday with Kickstarter emails? Well, mine does - so I decided to start writing my thoughts on new tabletop gaming Kickstarters every Wednesday. Keep in mind, most of these are based on initial impressions and looking at the Kickstarter video.
Yeah, I'm a day late - sorry about that. There's some pretty looking games this week to dive into, so hopefully that will make up for the delay. Murder Mysteries, Dragon minis, and eldritch Appalachian gods - where do I begin??? I will warn you I get a bit grouchy at the end…
Murder and Co - Fallen Star
Ok, the preview image definitely pulled me in. As I've mentioned before, I'm a sucker for good graphic design/artwork. The video, though, seems a little misplaced to my original expectations. A bit cheesy and low production, which sure does fit the theme. However, the sound is BAD. When I can't really understand what someone is saying because of the room echo, maybe it's time to get a new mic….or a new location at least. I was really confused, because the video mentions a "subscription box" for a murder mystery game, but I see nothing on the Kickstarter about a subscription. Luckily, I was intrigued enough to find out more.
Murder & Co is a company that makes murder mystery board games. If you go on their website, you can see that you can buy boxes for ~$50 each that give you new pieces of the story. This Kickstarter is for their second story: "Fallen Star". It also allows you to buy the complete story all at once for a cheaper price that it will be later on their Kickstarter. None of this was explained super well on the campaign page, which is the biggest downside I see. Otherwise, you look on the rewards and see a $240 price tag and your eyes pop out of your head. This game is for hard-core true crime solvers. Lots of real objects to explore and puzzles to solve, along with a sprinkling of clues on their social media as well.
Even if it’s a good deal and worth the money, its *still* a lot of money for a game you probably haven't played. Well, I like that they must have thought of this, because for $25 you can get a PDF of the first episode to try out. That is a brilliant way to attract people to try the game out. Heck, I'm even tempted for that price. Or as I mentioned, you can get Box 1 of their previous story in physical form for $55.
The Deck of Many Quests - Gothic Horrors
This campaign definitely got my attention with the function over its form. I love the idea of a deck that helps you create new RPG adventures but that box is soooooo unappealing. Which is weird because the cards themselves look fantastic! Did they spend all their advance funds on the cards and couldn't hire anymore to make a better box cover? Looking at the first box, it looks very similar but it works for some reason. I think it’s the "Gothic Horrors" font that throws me off.
Video is short and to the point, letting you know quickly how the deck works. You draw 3 cards, each card defining a different aspect of the adventure. This deck in particular is surrounding making horror-style adventures. Since the cards focus more on ideas and concepts, the deck can be used no matter which RPG you enjoy playing. $5 for the digital version seems pretty sweet too. I'm kinda tempted to go get the original version as I don't play as many horror games over others.
Old Gods of Appalachia Roleplaying Game
As this column continues into the future, you'll find there are certain companies that will end up on here no matter what the product is. Monte Cook Games is one of those companies. I mentioned previously how I used to be a big fan of their Cypher System but don't find myself playing it as much. Regardless, their books are beautiful and well-crafted pieces that look great on a bookshelf.
For this latest campaign, apparently they have teamed up with a gothic horror podcast called "Old Gods of Appalachia" to make a RPG set in their world. I had no idea this podcast existed, but considering I have friends that posted this Kickstarter who I think have never played a Cypher System game before, clearly it has a big fan base. Unfortunately, the video is very long winded for my tastes. It's 4 minutes long, with the "what is this product" taking up only about 30 seconds at the very end. The rest of the video is an example of play that also works as an introduction to the setting and the theme of the game.
The idea of the video is strong, but I feel like it only works for someone like me who knows about the Cypher System. If you've never heard of it, when the player and GM talk about "effort" or "levels" I can imagine it can be quite confusing. Only for them to follow up with "the game is easy to learn!". As someone who has had to teach the Cypher System, I can attest that the game is easy to play…once everyone understands how to play. It can be quite difficult for people to understand since it's very different from other types of RPGs.
(Wow, 4 paragraphs on one campaign?) In summary, the best thing about this campaign is also the worst: the fanbase. It's great because the game has a built in community who want it to succeed - the game is already one of (if not the highest) Kickstarters that Monte Cook Games has ever run. However, you run into the same problem with this game as I mentioned when I talked about Vampire: The Masquerade. Settings like this only work if everyone buys into it equally. Otherwise you have people who get every reference and there's one person who feels like they aren't getting anything. Or, you have a GM who puts out all these inside bits but no one in the party is picking up on it. If you are a fan, you'll probably back this campaign, but my suggestion would be to take the book and use it for insights for your own custom game. Then if someone says "Oh is that like Old Gods of Appalachia?", you can just smile back.
Broken and Beautiful: A Game About Kintsugi
This game definitely has the beautiful part down, but once I pulled it up I did not immediately watch the video like I would normally. When I see "A Game about Kintsugi", my first thought was "what's Kintsugi?" Luckily, the campaign starts out by explaining that it's the Japanese art of repairing pots with gold. This immediately sends up red flags to me. If a game is about an art from a specific culture, I would really hope that culture is involved in the creation of the game. Yet, when I scroll down to the "Team"….it's 90% white dudes. Also, most of the video previews about this game are from, you guessed it, white dudes.
Even if we exclude the fact there's no indication whether or not there's anyone with some Japanese knowledge on the team, my first thought is has anyone who does have experience with the culture looked at the game? What did they think? Was the subject matter handled well? 5 years ago I probably wouldn't have asked these questions. But after it became clear that Rising Sun used wikipedia as a source for Japanese monsters, I've been trying to be more critical of these things. So unfortunately, I'm not even going to watch the video and ask that the company do better. One video on the page with someone with some Japanese heritage talking about how well the subject matter was dealt with would add so much more credibility to this game.
Anastyr
Just some insight into how I do these posts: I pick which campaigns would be interested for people to hear my thoughts about, *then* I actually go into the campaigns and find out what they are all about. So by the time I got to this campaign I'm in a hyper critical mood (Sorry in advance). After watching the video, here's what I know about this game:
Lots of minis.
Lots of very gorgeous looking minis.
You can have your character mount a dragon?
The board looks like a huge scroll across multiple boards.
Theres dice…only because the picture at the end shows dice
Someone spent a lot of money on CGI animation.
That's all. The campaign mentions that it’s a co-op game, so that's nice. But from the video, this looks like your standard several hundred dollar miniatures game box. So for most of their target market, what I listed above was probably enough to entice them to back. I am surprised that the $160 price point seems to get you everything - I was convinced that as I scrolled down there would be box upon box of various addons.
They do eventually go into how the game plays, but I personally would have like to see that earlier. I asked on Reddit if people other than me watch the campaign videos, and the consensus was that most people don’t. So *why* would you spend SOOOO much money on a big CGI masterpiece when you could have just done like 20 seconds of it and then focused on what makes this game different?
Ok I'm spent. While I go play something that makes me less grumpy, let me know in the comments below what *you* do to decide whether or not to back a game?
Note: I generally assume I know nothing. So if I've missed something, let me know in the comments. Or let me know on Twitter or Facebook. If you like these types of posts, consider subscribing to our patreon.