April 4, 2013

Tooling along.

We finally received the "tooling" sample, which is essentially the first printed prototype, with the gold foil leaf on the box and everything. Looks classy and fantastic! We decided to partner with Grand Prix International to manufacture the games, and we couldn't be happier. BTW, pay no attention to the (male chauvinist) pig pawn — we've got a surprise in store for that later on.

October 8, 2012

Mr. Pennybags.

Been play-testing with my son Neuman, and I've always wanted to say this: he's literally beating me at my own game. Even when I change the rules slightly every time to try to offset my total incompetence, he still manages to come out on top...

March 30, 2012

Are you game?

We just got an email from Graham Houghton, an archaeologist and writer (and Uppity fan) from Australia, and we thought we'd share it with you:

"I know how much work goes into this sort of thing. Back in the late 80s and early 90s we developed a game called 'Country Landowner'. It was inspired by all the nouveau riche in the UK, also known variously as yahoos, yuppies and several other appelations, who were spending their sudden fortunes buying up country estates and making out they were the next best thing to some sort of royalty."

"The idea was that you had to run the estate, avoid the taxman, make money, screw everybody else and try to stay out of the bankruptcy court. You bought Title Deeds, shares etc, but the trough (as in 'snouts in') was where you made or lost fortunes. We mocked it up and tested it for months and it seemed to work well.

"But then we tried to sell it. I would never have believed how hard that would be. None of the major manufacturers were interested; out of some 45+ enquiries we only had one response telling us, bluntly, to go away because they only developed in-house ideas. We never did sell."

First Day of Spring, 2012

Et In Arcadia Egos.

Had a great fun time play-testing with JP and a couple of his buddies in the conference room of Arcadia, Inc. this morning. Still some tweaks to be made, but the mechanics of the game seem fairly sound. And we had a big winner after about an hour and a half, Kindarp, which was a miracle given that most of the time was spent trying to pile on, and then cut through the b.s., condescension, trash talk and egos.

Oneupmen: JP, Jeff, Glen and Kindarp.

Leap Day, 2012

All in the family.

You play games the same way you live life, and that's never more true than when you're with family. Unfortunately, I tried to impress everyone (it's my game, isn't it?), but I ended up losing bad ugly...

Tripp, center, with his "trophy" niece Cate, before the start of his slow-but-steady-wins-the-race victory. Connor looked off camera; Dad looked dapper, and even stayed awake until the end.

February 13, 2012

Masters of the (Wall Street) Universe.

JP brought his buddy Ken over this morning and we had a first-go at the game. It was interesting to see how they played it—shrewd, aggressive, and in it to win it! Meanwhile, I felt like a dissolute stoner wannabe buying the Trophy Wife and attempting to build the tallest building before I went bankrupt.

Seriously, lotsa fun, and a qualified initial success. There's a lot of work ahead—some elements worked well and others didn't work at all— but at least we've set ourselves up for an interesting, if quixotic adventure.

January 23, 2012

Oneupmanship — Mine's Bigger.

I finally got the game board somewhat mocked-up and have started play-testing with friends. I never thought it would be so much mental effort to design and prototype a simple board game— I think it's been a casebook study in The Peter Principle, validated in the real world by me. Seriously, let's roll the dice now and see how/if it works!