One week in, and things are looking nifty! Chapter 2 of Weaver's Vintage is mostly written and will start going through an initial edit this weekend, the playtest of Jazz is going brilliantly and the players have started looking into their second Incident, and a test run of all the bookmarks and postcards arrived in the post. They look amazing :)
We have dived into a bit (a lot) of research, on such esoteric subjects as belly dancing costumes in the 1920s (quite risque), Edwardian clothing styles (poor Lucy is so out of touch with fashion, after almost a century of 'hibernating' as a cursed nightgown), and the flowering times of various poisonous plants, and are now experts in more weird topics. Go on, test us: ask a question.
Printopia as a whole is going really well - 39 of the 60 projects have funded already, and more are just on the cusp. If you've been thinking about backing a few more to get that sweet 3-projects-within-a-banner zine, now is a great time to place a pledge.
In case you missed it, we're also cross-collaborating with dark science-fiction thriller, Dead God Rising, set in the 32nd century.
Back All That Jazz at any physical tier, and Dead God Rising before both campaigns end to receive a special, exclusive, free Drowned World postcard, and an exclusive Incident for use with the Jazz game that lets you play in the world of Dead God Rising!
Hey there, hep-cats! Another update from our writing corner -
First of all, thank you to everyone who's jumped in and backed us! You are all amazing, wonderful people and we like your faces. (We haven't seen your faces, but we know that we like them anyway.)
We have been hard at work, writing, playtesting, and also - for something a little bit different - teaching: this weekend just past, we held a LitRPG writing workshop in the historic town centre of Midland in Perth, Western Australia. We had LitRPG newcomers and aficionados, gamers, poets, and a range of people in between to come learn more about the LitRPG genre, its history (and a little pre-history), and how to surface a system into your writing. Many thanks to the City of Swan for hosting us.
We'll be running more of these in the future, and the next will be in Midland again on October 17. If you're in the area, register to save your spot for Writing's Got Game: A LitRPG Writing Workshop.
(If you won't be in the area, and you think a streamed or recorded workshop would be fun or interesting, leave a comment and let us know! We don't have plans for one at the moment, but we could make it happen if enough of you wanted us to.)
Midland Town Hall
Workshopping
We'd also like to give a shout out to Storytellers Forge for backing us and giving us a callout on their launch day update. If you're into urban fantasy, Magical Anarchy is the goods.
And just a reminder that if you back three or more campaigns from the Fantasy banner, you'll receive an exclusive zine featuring bonus content from every fantasy author or creator!
Hope you've all had a swell weekend! Danielle & Michele
Live, locked, loaded... and funded! (In under 7 hours!)
Wow! We woke up this morning hoping for a great start, but we officially crossed our 100% funding goal in less than 7 hours!
First of all, thank you to every one of you who has backed us already! You're the bee's knees, the cat's meow, and many other things which mean awesome, amazing folk.
But there's more to come! We have just the one stretch goal, and it's ducky. It's the graphic novel of the first two chapters of Weaver's Vintage. Citadel, the wonderful artist responsible for our cover art, has agreed to help us make this happen, but the graphic novel can only go ahead if we reach the funding stretch goal to pay for the work. So, onward to $8000!
For those who haven't backed yet, your opportunity to grab those earlybird freebies is quickly evaporating!
We are live! Or we will be, as soon as timezones align (at around 1:00 am Friday, Western Australian time) - watch this space.
To keep you entertained between now and then, as promised, here's (a draft of) chapter 1 of Weaver's Vintage for you all to read!
Let us know what you think, and stick around to read further chapters (we will be releasing edited draft scenes & chapters to backers over the course of the campaign - don't expect us to finish the novel by Oct 1st, but you'll definitely see chapter 2, and possibly chapter 3 before the end of the campaign!)
Time has come and gone with the speed and efficacy of a fast-moving eel over slippery rocks, and we are so close to go-time we can taste it! (It tastes like anxiety, excitement, and a hint of petrichor.)
Meantime, we've been doing a boatload of reading ourselves, in preparation for the LitRPG writing workshop we're running this weekend (if you're in Western Australia, do come along - we'd love to see you!), and we have some recommendations for you.
These are some of the stories we've enjoyed - they're not ours, we aren't affiliated with the authors in any way, we just liked them and thought we'd share in case you did too. So, in no particular order:
We'll have more periodic recs to share over the next few weeks, but we'd love to hear from you, too! Leave a comment telling us (or linking us to) your favourite examples of LitRPG fiction.
Five days until All That Jazz launches officially!
While this is very exciting - and it is! - it has been brought to my attention that in my last update I said "Launching September 1st". That, clearly, was not in fact true. Launch day is Septermber 10, and any other date is the result of brainfade and a very busy month planned this September. Which is to say - oops. My bad.
Chapter one of Weaver's Vintage is written, edited, and ready to post on launch day. Chapter 2 is in progress, and our outline and play-through has reached chapter 8. Jean and Lucy are both starting to investigate a suspicious, three-year-old cold case murder which is - not that they know this yet - linked to the cult and the curse. Dorian (the vampire) is flirting and being silly, which is basically what he does, and the various cult members are conniving and scheming.
The Jazz playtest continues apace, and is going very well. The players are testing out the Incident which I'll be running at PAX AU in October, looking for a missing child and discovering some of the secretive cult activity in Astenovica along the way. There may (or may not) be werewolves.
For anyone in the Perth region (Western Australia), Michele and I are also running a LitRPG writing workshop on September 12, and again on October 17, at the Old Midland Courthouse. Book in here!
In preparation for that, we've been reading a lot of LitRPG fiction, and we will have some reccommendatiosn for you in the next update. So many interestiong ways to include the System in the narrative! We still like our System, though - the Mists have so much potential to be creepy and helpful at the same time.
All the best, and looking forward to Septermber 10! Danielle
One week in, and things are looking nifty! Chapter 2 of Weaver's Vintage is mostly written and will start going through an initial edit this weekend, the playtest of Jazz is going brilliantly and the players have started looking into their second Incident, and a test run of all the bookmarks and postcards arrived in the post. They look amazing :)
We have dived into a bit (a lot) of research, on such esoteric subjects as belly dancing costumes in the 1920s (quite risque), Edwardian clothing styles (poor Lucy is so out of touch with fashion, after almost a century of 'hibernating' as a cursed nightgown), and the flowering times of various poisonous plants, and are now experts in more weird topics. Go on, test us: ask a question.
Printopia as a whole is going really well - 39 of the 60 projects have funded already, and more are just on the cusp. If you've been thinking about backing a few more to get that sweet 3-projects-within-a-banner zine, now is a great time to place a pledge.
In case you missed it, we're also cross-collaborating with dark science-fiction thriller, Dead God Rising, set in the 32nd century.
Back All That Jazz at any physical tier, and Dead God Rising before both campaigns end to receive a special, exclusive, free Drowned World postcard, and an exclusive Incident for use with the Jazz game that lets you play in the world of Dead God Rising!
Hey there, hep-cats! Another update from our writing corner -
First of all, thank you to everyone who's jumped in and backed us! You are all amazing, wonderful people and we like your faces. (We haven't seen your faces, but we know that we like them anyway.)
We have been hard at work, writing, playtesting, and also - for something a little bit different - teaching: this weekend just past, we held a LitRPG writing workshop in the historic town centre of Midland in Perth, Western Australia. We had LitRPG newcomers and aficionados, gamers, poets, and a range of people in between to come learn more about the LitRPG genre, its history (and a little pre-history), and how to surface a system into your writing. Many thanks to the City of Swan for hosting us.
We'll be running more of these in the future, and the next will be in Midland again on October 17. If you're in the area, register to save your spot for Writing's Got Game: A LitRPG Writing Workshop.
(If you won't be in the area, and you think a streamed or recorded workshop would be fun or interesting, leave a comment and let us know! We don't have plans for one at the moment, but we could make it happen if enough of you wanted us to.)
Midland Town Hall
Workshopping
We'd also like to give a shout out to Storytellers Forge for backing us and giving us a callout on their launch day update. If you're into urban fantasy, Magical Anarchy is the goods.
And just a reminder that if you back three or more campaigns from the Fantasy banner, you'll receive an exclusive zine featuring bonus content from every fantasy author or creator!
Hope you've all had a swell weekend! Danielle & Michele
Wow! We woke up this morning hoping for a great start, but we officially crossed our 100% funding goal in less than 7 hours!
First of all, thank you to every one of you who has backed us already! You're the bee's knees, the cat's meow, and many other things which mean awesome, amazing folk.
But there's more to come! We have just the one stretch goal, and it's ducky. It's the graphic novel of the first two chapters of Weaver's Vintage. Citadel, the wonderful artist responsible for our cover art, has agreed to help us make this happen, but the graphic novel can only go ahead if we reach the funding stretch goal to pay for the work. So, onward to $8000!
For those who haven't backed yet, your opportunity to grab those earlybird freebies is quickly evaporating!
We are live! Or we will be, as soon as timezones align (at around 1:00 am Friday, Western Australian time) - watch this space.
To keep you entertained between now and then, as promised, here's (a draft of) chapter 1 of Weaver's Vintage for you all to read!
Let us know what you think, and stick around to read further chapters (we will be releasing edited draft scenes & chapters to backers over the course of the campaign - don't expect us to finish the novel by Oct 1st, but you'll definitely see chapter 2, and possibly chapter 3 before the end of the campaign!)
Time has come and gone with the speed and efficacy of a fast-moving eel over slippery rocks, and we are so close to go-time we can taste it! (It tastes like anxiety, excitement, and a hint of petrichor.)
Meantime, we've been doing a boatload of reading ourselves, in preparation for the LitRPG writing workshop we're running this weekend (if you're in Western Australia, do come along - we'd love to see you!), and we have some recommendations for you.
These are some of the stories we've enjoyed - they're not ours, we aren't affiliated with the authors in any way, we just liked them and thought we'd share in case you did too. So, in no particular order:
We'll have more periodic recs to share over the next few weeks, but we'd love to hear from you, too! Leave a comment telling us (or linking us to) your favourite examples of LitRPG fiction.
