This is the final installment about how I created the board game Oh No! There Goes Tokyo!
Game Update #25: I received three boxes of boxes from Panda Manufacturing. Inside were 30 boxes, tuck boxes and token sheets. There's nothing like seeing the final box in person!!!
The box and its contents didn't just magically appear. It was the result of correspondence between myself and Panda Manufacturing. I worked with Tyler and once he had the files and knew what I wanted, he sent me images of the components for me to review. I've never shown these publicly, because I wanted them (like the Thank You and the squashed Scott image) to be a surprise!
Game Update #26: Rulebook!
The final rule book will be posted on the BGG site.
Game Update #27: The Home Stretch!
Firstly, a HUGE stack of boxes appeared on my doorstep last week, and inside those boxes were more beautiful boxes... and token coins! Each box was individually wrapped for safety, but as they were missing most of the game components inside, so I had to open each one up in other to assemble them!
The assembly process! First came the components - the custom building cubes and meeples were all sorted and bagged. There should be 80 cubes and 12 meeples in each box That times 30 is... well, math was never my best subject. Let's just say there were a lot of them! (I should know, I double counted each one!)
I also discovered a mistake when I received the cards from Printerstudio.com. A purple insurance card was labeled "blue". I printed up replacement cards and considered just including it with instructions on which card to replace... but you know what? It was too much effort to do. And besides, it was cathartic to tear up the offending error card and replace it with the correct one!
All of those cards, including the brand-new Big Al Big Ten Point card (the card to give you something to spend your cash on late in the game) were packed up into a ziploc baggie.
Now for the star of the game! Each windup Kaiju was hand-tested to make sure they worked (there were a few that didn't make the cut!) and packed away in its special crate. Its foam-packing should keep them extra-safe during transport!
This week, the last component arrived from my friends at Print & Play Admagic - the rule book! It turned out great and fit right inside the box!
Game update #28: Shipping day!
Packing up thirty board game for shipping is a time consuming process. I spent most of the day first boxing them all and then taking them to my local post office.
When I arrived at the post office, I realized that the cost of shipping had gone up. I originally priced it at $17.70 for a pre-paid mailer and when I got to the post office, I saw that it had gone up to $19.50! Ugh. Now I know why everyone always says that shipping is the most troublesome part of doing one of these projects.
Because of the price difference, I reached out to all of the customers who lived in Los Angeles to see if it was OK for me to delivery the game in person. Fortunately, most of them agreed!
Game update #29: First delivery!!
Congrats to Colleen for being my first local pickup and for supporting my crazy game efforts!! Soon I was delivering games all over town. The First To Play LA playtesting event allowed me to deliver several customers at once.
Soon, photos were coming in from other customers online! It's a great feeling seeing so many people so excited about receiving the game!
Thanks again for everyone who backed the game! I couldn't have done it without you!
Post-Mortum: There were several lessons that I learned over the course of this project that will help me make better game productions in the future:
Post-Mortum: There were several lessons that I learned over the course of this project that will help me make better game productions in the future:
1. Start with plenty of options. While "Make a game with a windup monster" give me a direction, it wasn't until I explored all the options for game play. While I ended up going with my first idea, it was good to explore and get those other ones out of my system. Also, testing all of the different components (blocks vs. dice) helped steer me in the right direction on what to use for the game.
2. Don't be so hasty. Having to redo the map was a big hit to the budget, as was having to re-print or print new cards. For the map, I should have explored and understood all of the options the printer had first. As for the cards, I was in a hurry to finish them and as a result, missed the "blue/purple" typo.
3. Don't rely on the internet for information. My research online had indicated that the colors I picked were all color-blind friendly. However, real-world testing proved otherwise and one of the colors (Teal) couldn't be distinguished by a color blind player. From now on, I test these things in the real world first before committing to them.
4. Don't hand-do everything. I originally was going to hand-write the rule book, which would have been an extremely time consuming process. In fact, I was daunted by the prospect that it slowed me down for a week or two. It was when I found a similar font that I was re-energized to finish the rule book.
5. When in doubt, crowdsource. One of the better decisions was to put the rule book in front of my social network. They jumped right to it, pointing out errors and providing invaluable feedback.
6. Be mindful of oversea interactions. A big slow down was dealing with an overseas printer. One day is really two (or three) when it comes to communication. And even though I tried to avoid it, I was hit by the "National Day" week slow down that China experiences in October right when I was in the heat of talking with the printer.
7. I still have to learn how to stay on budget. I was doing pretty good with my budget until I realized I had to redo the maps. Then I got temped to "plus up" the box, tuck box and tokens. And finally, the unexpected change in shipping costs caused this project to end up in the red by about $400 overall. Next time, I will do more comparison shopping between printers to help bring costs down.
Despite some of these mistakes, I'm very proud of Oh No! There Goes Tokyo! I am planning on pitching it to publishers at the upcoming GAMA trade show. Whatever the commercial version ends up being, I will make sure that this bespoke version will be different enough to keep the original run unique.
Be sure to stay in touch for when I announce the next game project around February of 2025!
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