The past month we've been polishing the game text with final updates to the layout and text. Proof copies were ordered at the start of the month and once we've verified colors/margins look good, we'll be sending off the order to print.
In the meantime, we've been working to get finished on our two outstanding stretch goals: the player aids and city one pagers.
For the city one pagers, we're partnering who have lived experience in all of the selected cities.
New York City, New York - Alex Tripez (he/they) is a New York native and a writer working with Hunter's Entertainment and Darington Press New Orleans, Louisiana - Loki Williams (he/him) is an 8th Gen New Orleans native, career rpg writer, and Ennie winner Madrid, Spain - Vicka Ruscica (she/they) is an Argentinian rpg writer and project lead whose previously lived in Madrid for years Istanbul, Turkey - Luke Frostick (he/him) is an English scholar of Turkish literature whose been living Istanbul for the past 5 years while working as a contributing writer for Metis Media London, England - Katy Eddy (she/her) is a English senior technical writer who also writes and self publishes rpgs. Katy almost joined to help us with layout with her love of English Folklore so we're happy to haver back.
The writing for the one pagers are in flight and on progress to being finished in parallels with delivery. The printable player aid has been finished for a while but going through some minor revisions and layout.
Our timeline partially slowed by the print proof production but we're on pace still to print and begin fulfillment in October. We'll probably be locking cards in the next week or so.
We're getting closer to the end and can't wait to share the final project with you all!
City One Pager Tie Breaker Vote + New Full Text Version!
Hello!
We've concluded the final round of voting for the City One Pagers! The top 4 are:
New Orleans, LO New York City, NY Istanbul, Turkey Madrid, Spain
The final spot is currently tied between:
Marrakesh, Morocco Skowkegan, ME
Apologies misread the poll! We have a last city in London, England (Although I would have also been excited to see one of the tie breaker's make it through)
There's a final poll up for the tie breaker while we get moving on writing the other 4 one pagers.
Additionally! There's a new version of the Full Rules which will probably be the final "content edits" before the final proof reading pass.
Layout Revisions are taking longer than anticipated so final edits will probably leak into September. We're overall still on schedule but may have to wait a little more before printing
The poll has closed for round 1 of voting for the City One pager stretch goal with the following 9 cities moving forward!
New York City, NY
Youngstown, OH
London, England
Venice, Italy
New Orleans, LO
Istanbul, Turkey
Marrakesh, Morocco
Madrid, Spain
Skowkegan, ME
No other city received votes so I've decided to not arbitrarily promote one into the top 10. Voting for the 5 to be selected will continue till Sunday, August 23rd!
The first round of layout is finished and released through digital downloads! Rook did an absolute banger job putting together the game's collage focused spreads. Take a peak the spread for the Fables Community below!
We're currently iterating on the layout, making final text edits, and getting ready to handle the final text to Kodi for a final proof reading pass.
In the mean time, we're shifting focus to fulfilling our stretch goal rewards of printable player aids and 5 One Page Quick Starts for Cities chosen by the backers. The first round of voting is attached to this update! The top 25 cities will be culled down to 10 and then our final 5. We'd tried to get a good spread of both US and International locations. If any international locations are chosen that are outside the teams cultural background, we'll be pulling in guest writers to help do those locations justice. For larger cities, we'll be narrowing in on specific neighborhoods and boroughs that have a great mix of historic and modern locations. Go vote for the poll on the backer page!
Thats all for now! If you haven't, hop over to the backerkit and lock your order!
Layout Finishing + Final Editing and One Pager Voting to Come!
Quigley here to give another belated update on the state of the project!
The past month the game has fully been in the skillful hand of the project's layout artist Rook. From the campaign we passed our stretch goal allowing him to go all-out in build an urban-scrapbooky-fantasy style for the game's layout. You can see how that's beginning to take shape in the image below! Chris and Lex have wrapped up on the game's illustrations including those sponsored by the campaign's generous Arts Patrons.
Meanwhile I've been discovering the mysteries of the Backerkit and getting approval for opening up the pledge manager. Apologies for the delay in digital download access as I initially thought that those rewards would be available pre-Pledge Manager, which I was mistake about.
In the next week, I will be sending out the smoke test quickly followed fully opening the Pledge Manager. From there, you'll be able to pay for shipping as well as access your digital downloads: the game as currently available in plain text and a code allowing you to have ownership through Itch.io. All rewards will be delivered through both Backerkit and Itch but I would highly recommend using your Itch key for post-campaign updates.
Once the Pledge Manager is underway, I'll transition focus to taking care of our outstanding stretch goal of 5 quickstart one pagers which will be voted on from a selection of 20 in a future update.
Overall, we're still on track for a delivery by November with final layout and proof-reading throughout August!
Excited to share more in the next week!
PS if you're a follower who missed the campaign, you can access the Pre-Order now through the campaign page.
Large break between updates but production has been going forward as planned. In fact, you can access the game right now through the digital downloads (I think)! The three months the text has gone through major revisions moving the mechanics away from points and towards narrative flexibility. Kodi their editing pass of the text and we've been working to restructure some of the awkward information flow so make play seamless.
A large reason for delay is I have been resting with the Pledge Manager getting things setup for you guys to get accurate shipping costs and access to codes to redeem on itch.io as a backup for rewards here. I'll continue slamming my head into that but didn't want imperfection to keep preventing me sending an update.
Art and layout have been cooking with the finishing of final interior illustrations, the cover, and concept explorations for the game's layout. Below you can find two illustrations by the fantastic Lex and Chris as well as a chosen concept (not final) for the game's layout direction by Rook.
Once we've finished up the core rules, layout will start and we'll begin working on the extra handouts (city one page rules and reference cards) as promised in the campaign's stretch goals. We're pretty happy with how the rules are but if you happen to run the game we'd love to hear your feedback!
Overall production continues smoothly and we’re still on pace for delivery in October.
Interested in Playtesting and Seeing WIP? Join the Discord!
How can you help?
If you have either friends, distributors, or local game stores, spread the word by sharing the link: bit.ly/backyard-rpg
Play the current rules and share your experiences with @quigjam on bluesky or discord.
Join the discord and give feedback to in progress development! See a snapshot of me live ranting about the game below!
The past month we've been polishing the game text with final updates to the layout and text. Proof copies were ordered at the start of the month and once we've verified colors/margins look good, we'll be sending off the order to print.
In the meantime, we've been working to get finished on our two outstanding stretch goals: the player aids and city one pagers.
For the city one pagers, we're partnering who have lived experience in all of the selected cities.
New York City, New York - Alex Tripez (he/they) is a New York native and a writer working with Hunter's Entertainment and Darington Press New Orleans, Louisiana - Loki Williams (he/him) is an 8th Gen New Orleans native, career rpg writer, and Ennie winner Madrid, Spain - Vicka Ruscica (she/they) is an Argentinian rpg writer and project lead whose previously lived in Madrid for years Istanbul, Turkey - Luke Frostick (he/him) is an English scholar of Turkish literature whose been living Istanbul for the past 5 years while working as a contributing writer for Metis Media London, England - Katy Eddy (she/her) is a English senior technical writer who also writes and self publishes rpgs. Katy almost joined to help us with layout with her love of English Folklore so we're happy to haver back.
The writing for the one pagers are in flight and on progress to being finished in parallels with delivery. The printable player aid has been finished for a while but going through some minor revisions and layout.
Our timeline partially slowed by the print proof production but we're on pace still to print and begin fulfillment in October. We'll probably be locking cards in the next week or so.
We're getting closer to the end and can't wait to share the final project with you all!
Tie Breaking Vote! Poll will last 1 week! This is round 2 of voting for the locations for the City One Pager stretch goal. We tried to get a wide variety of locations across the US and International. For locations outside the team's cultural background, a guest writer will be pulled in to help do the place justice. Larger cities will be broken down to a specific neighborhood/borough with a focus on places with a good mix of historical and modern locations.
We've concluded the final round of voting for the City One Pagers! The top 4 are:
New Orleans, LO New York City, NY Istanbul, Turkey Madrid, Spain
The final spot is currently tied between:
Marrakesh, Morocco Skowkegan, ME
Apologies misread the poll! We have a last city in London, England (Although I would have also been excited to see one of the tie breaker's make it through)
There's a final poll up for the tie breaker while we get moving on writing the other 4 one pagers.
Additionally! There's a new version of the Full Rules which will probably be the final "content edits" before the final proof reading pass.
Layout Revisions are taking longer than anticipated so final edits will probably leak into September. We're overall still on schedule but may have to wait a little more before printing
Top 5 will advance! Poll will last 1 week! This is round 2 of voting for the locations for the City One Pager stretch goal. We tried to get a wide variety of locations across the US and International. For locations outside the team's cultural background, a guest writer will be pulled in to help do the place justice. Larger cities will be broken down to a specific neighborhood/borough with a focus on places with a good mix of historical and modern locations.
The poll has closed for round 1 of voting for the City One pager stretch goal with the following 9 cities moving forward!
New York City, NY
Youngstown, OH
London, England
Venice, Italy
New Orleans, LO
Istanbul, Turkey
Marrakesh, Morocco
Madrid, Spain
Skowkegan, ME
No other city received votes so I've decided to not arbitrarily promote one into the top 10. Voting for the 5 to be selected will continue till Sunday, August 23rd!
