Good News, Not-So-Bad News
about 6 years ago – Sun, Apr 15, 2018 at 07:35:24 PM

Greetings Guys and Ghouls!  

The last update was titled "Breaking Non-News". This update is titled "Good News, Not-So-Bad News".  

First, the good news: After months of inexplicable delay, manufacturing is at long last underway and we have a projected date from the manufacturer.

Now for the not-so-bad news: It will be about ten weeks to manufacture and another two weeks to ship the product to us, so we don't expect to be in receipt of the 7th Guest Board Game until mid July. However, reality being what it is, it would be wise to pad out the time adding two or three more weeks, which would bring us to August. That would actually put us a month or more behind our original projected delivery date, but better a month late than never, I almost never say! ("Business at the speed of light" my arse!)

That's our story and we're sticking to it. At least until our next update.

Someday, I might write about our adventures in board game development and manufacturing. It would read like Kafka.

In other news...

There is a fine interview at eTeknix with Ryan Holtkamp who is leading the charge on The 13th Doll fan game. You'll want to check that out.

You'll also want to support Lawrie Brewster's crowdfunder for his next gothic horror venture, Automata. He did such an outstanding job on his previous movie The Black Gloves, this new tale promises to be even better.

Breaking Non-News!
about 6 years ago – Tue, Mar 13, 2018 at 10:19:39 PM

We have been on the verge of being able to share a progress report on the 7th Guest Board Game for quite a while, but kept coming up short of that ability. For weeks now, it has remained just out of reach. Why? Here is the short story. 

We finished development of the game in late November and have been ready since December to get production underway. But for some reasons that remain inexplicable to us, our prospective manufacturer (who is otherwise probably the best in the business) could not manage to get their end of the process underway. Whatever was going on there, despite our best efforts to get things going, was entirely out of our hands.

So the latest development - which is slightly better than non-news - is that last week we finally managed to break though that first roadblock or bottleneck, or whatever it was, that had been causing the delay. We now have a signed agreement about moving forward. Yet we are still at the very beginning of the manufacturing process and are still unable to project a delivery date, although if things actually go as they should, we should be able to meet our original shipping date of July.

In the meantime, we are working on our next Kickstarter campaign for an 11th Hour expansion pack and two special editions for the original board game.

Here's hoping the next update will be a more substantial progress report.

A Bright Future is In the Cards
over 6 years ago – Fri, Dec 22, 2017 at 05:21:24 PM

I had hoped to be able to write a pre-Christmas update with a solid projection regarding a shipping date for the 7th Guest Board Game and accompanying add-ons, but that update will have to wait just a few days more. Hopefully for a pre-New Year's update. 

The good news is that all development work is finished and materials delivered to Panda, our manufacturer, and we are awaiting word from them regarding their schedule. But all things being equal and barring any major glitches, I am anticipating that we will get everything shipped in the April-May time frame.

We will be using the several weeks between now and then to finish development and manufacture of the add-on items - Stauf action figure, the Stauf Mansion model kit, the Infection board game, and of course, the Stauf and Tad miniatures.

On the creative front, we have made a significant design change to the cards and have increased their size to tarot card dimensions (see illustration above). We've taken a new approach to the Puzzler cards with the questions on the front side and the corresponding hints and answers encrypted on the back side.

We also decided to increase the size of the miniatures from 42mm to an average height of about 48mm. We've had prototypes 3D-printed and they are just the right size and look pretty cool. Kudos to our mad Transylvanian sculptor Silvaticus and to our own in-house modeler and man about town, William Hennes!

Also, a big holiday shout out to our invaluable puzzler editor Kristy McGowan and the entire puzzle making team of Ben, Brad, Brandon, Chris, Todd and Zsuzsa.

That's about it for now, kiddos. Until next time, have a great Christmas holiday.

P.S. Just between you, me and the ghosts, we've also been busy developing and game testing an 11th Hour expansion kit for the board game. Feedback has been very positive. Much more to come on that in the upcoming months.

11th of November Sale
over 6 years ago – Sat, Nov 11, 2017 at 03:46:57 PM

We looked at the calendar and noticed that the date is 11.11.17 (or 11.11.17 in Europe) and thought it to be a good excuse to run a special 11th Hour-themed promotional sale on our pre-order store. So this might be a good time to order that item or items that you've always wanted in life but never got around to getting.

Simply visit our pre-order store, add your item(s) of choice, and on checkout apply the code below to get $11 off your pre-order. Or go to this link to have the discount applied automatically.

Code: 11TH-HOUR

The sale will run for the next 11 days, naturally. 

Or unnaturally, as the case may be.

Ahead of the Game
over 6 years ago – Wed, Nov 01, 2017 at 11:06:02 PM

With the puzzlers finished, it's clear sailing ahead

Back at the beginning of July we began our search for puzzle-makers and by mid-August we had narrowed down the candidates to a team of seven (eight including myself) very clever, erudite and talented people from around the country and around the world... five Americans, one of whom works abroad, one Brit and one Hungarian. Two of them (three including myself) brought with them a history of professional puzzle-making experience. Together, within a span of three months, the team produced twice the number of puzzlers as needed for the 1st edition of the game. In fact, by next summer we hope to offer a 2nd standard edition as well as a special "family friendly" edition that youngsters and casual players can do well with, and a "mad genius" edition for those who relish tougher mental challenges.

There are yet a couple of important things to do before handing materials over for manufacturing  - specifically six character portraits for the Destination Cards and preparation of the miniature models for casting - but those are well within reach. And so we find ourselves ahead of schedule which means we expect to move up the shipping date by a couple of months.

I must say that, coming from the world of software development, I am finding this ahead-of-schedule business to be a heady and even somewhat disorienting situation. But I like it, and we are determined to press forward.

I attempted to load some samples here of the kind of brain teasers you will be confronted with as you make your way through the mansion, but Kickstarter processes the images in such a way as to make the hidden hints and answers look suboptimal, so instead, starting now and over the course of the next months, I'll be sharing them periodically via our newsletter, website and Facebook.

If you are not signed up for our newsletter, you can do so from this page on our website, and you can also like our Trilobyte Games Facebook page.

Onward!