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Concept To Funded Kickstarter in Less Than a Month. [Tabletop]

Swoop

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Awesome job dude. Congrats on getting fully backed on Kickstarter! I'll be submitting my pledge for a set of my own right after I make this post.

This game looks like a lot of fun. A great twist on CAH. Your kickstarter page is also very well done and professional looking.

The game mechanics are solid, but I would have to question the inclusion of the pawns and the game board. They seem unnecessary to me. I think simply having the winner of each round keep the question card for a points tally would be a sufficient way to keep score, as it is done in CAH, Apples to Apples, etc. I think many players will even be lazy and play this way. Adding the board and the pawn pieces to each game set is going to cost you $ on both the pieces themselves and in larger packaging and shipping. As a customer, I would gladly pay the $25 just for the deck of cards and the tokens and would not expect a game board or pieces for that price. Probably too late as far as the Kickstarter goes, but if this really takes off, and I think it could, you could maybe consider just selling the game board as an optional add-on for better margins on the base set. Not trying to bring you down at all, just my 2 cents on how you could maybe maximize profits with this. You've done a great job so far dude. Im happy for you.

-Swoop
 
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DennisD

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Thanks a ton!

Adding the board and the pawn pieces to each game set is going to cost you $ on both the pieces themselves and in larger packaging and shipping.
The board is not included separately, it's on the back of the box and the pawns only added 28 cents to my costs and no additional shipping so it wasn't a big deal.

I playtested without the pawns and it was much less fun.

It was hard to tell who was in the lead, pawns added visual tension so you could FEEL somebody pulling into the lead.
Co-op also mode requires pawns to work accurately.

Additionally, each question card contains 4 questions, so by 'keeping' the card, you're removing 3 other questions from gameplay.
 

Swoop

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Thanks a ton!


The board is not included separately, it's on the back of the box and the pawns only added 28 cents to my costs and no additional shipping so it wasn't a big deal.

I playtested without the pawns and it was much less fun.

It was hard to tell who was in the lead, pawns added visual tension so you could FEEL somebody pulling into the lead.
Co-op also mode requires pawns to work accurately.

Additionally, each question card contains 4 questions, so by 'keeping' the card, you're removing 3 other questions from gameplay.

Cool, that makes sense. I didnt consider that a question card would go back into play after it is used. I guess you are also going for "everyone can score" on each hand rather than "winner take all" in which case it makes sense to have a mechanism to track scores/position. Lazy people (like me) can always just leave the pieces in the box and just count cards haha.

Edit: Oh, and $0.28 times one million copies is $280K...just sayin' ;).
 
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DennisD

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Cool, that makes sense. I didnt consider that a question card would go back into play after it is used. I guess you are also going for "everyone can score" on each hand rather than "winner take all" in which case it makes sense to have a mechanism to track scores/position. Lazy people (like me) can always just leave the pieces in the box and just count cards haha.

Yeah, because the funniness is assigned qualitatively, you can still get points and eventually win by being consistently the 2nd funniest answer the whole game.

I should add a "winner take all" ruleset.

These are my game-modes so far: www.originalspingame.com/gamemodes
 
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TheNextTrump

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@DennisDuty it's awesome to see how everything's playing out, way to go!

I look forward to seeing your results after year one and beyond.

Keep up the hard work, and best success with the game!
 

Mark Anthony Le

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Did you get swarmed with Kickstarter/Indiegogo press releasers promising you media coverage from ABC, Good Morning America, Forbes etc.?

:)
 

merc

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Amazing value here for starting up a kickstarter. You took what looks on the surface to be a complicated game for the general population and explained it very well. Will be following this closely. Thanks so much for the post @DennisDuty .
 

DennisD

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@DennisDutyI look forward to seeing your results after year one and beyond.

I'm excited to see where this takes me.

Did you get swarmed with Kickstarter/Indiegogo press releasers promising you media coverage from ABC, Good Morning America, Forbes etc.?
:)

actually, only two people msged me about it, and one manufacturer.

Great post!! Just in time for me as well, since I put together my first prototype card game on Sunday! Definitely drawing inspiration @DennisDuty

I'd love to hear more about it.

How did you make the KS video?

After effects for the animation. Iphone for the video, and premiere pro to throw it all together.


Sent from my KFTHWI using Tapatalk
 

funkj25

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DD - great to see your documenting the Kickstarter project and that you're also in the Tabletop space. I just launched my first tabletop game at the beginning of the month, skipped kickstartering it and just went straight to putting it out there after some successful beta feedback and tweaking. In beta testing and working on card art for my second game that I'll probably kickstarter so your thread is much appreciated.
 

Unknown

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DD - great to see your documenting the Kickstarter project and that you're also in the Tabletop space. I just launched my first tabletop game at the beginning of the month, skipped kickstartering it and just went straight to putting it out there after some successful beta feedback and tweaking. In beta testing and working on card art for my second game that I'll probably kickstarter so your thread is much appreciated.
How did the first game do without kickstarter?
 
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funkj25

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How did the first game do without kickstarter?

I basically just did a small batch order (100 units) to start. Launched it a couple weeks ago, sold about 80 units in 9 days. The other 20 I had given away as promos to e-mail customers to get honest reviews on it. Ordered another 500 units and just got back in stock the other day. I'm spending most of my margin right now just in advertising to get the ball rolling on it which I'm okay with for now for visibility sake. How it will turn out in the long run I don't know, but my goal is to have at least 1000 units/month in sales with next to no advertising. Time will tell.
 

DennisD

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I officially hit 200% funded... and I realized I made a mistake with my kickstarter campaign.
3 expansion packs from the get-go is ambitious. From a gameplay development standpoint it's fine, but as far as manufacturing and getting MOQs for separate products, it's a huge pain in the butt. I'm getting quotes from different people, figuring out exactly the best way to do this while remaining consistent with the look/feel of the cards across expansions/editions.

skipped kickstartering it and just went straight to putting it out there
Where did you order from that allowed a 100-game order? What's the pricepoint of your game?
 

nausbot

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I'd love to hear more about it.

Right now it's a card game consisting of 112 cards loosely based around golf. Each player has opportunity to score on other players as well as be scored on. Card values determine scores, and is cumulative depending on # rounds played (pre-determined, infinite, etc). I liken it to a combination of uno, hearts, and a**hole

Keep checking your kickstarter, good to see it's growing (despite pains). Keeping an eye on this thread!
 
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merc

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I noticed you're using squarespace for your launch page. Do you plan on using this platform for your ecommerce?
 

DennisD

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6 hours to go! Congrats on hitting your stretch goals!
I'm super stoked! I can afford a production run big enough to turn this into a legit business!
I planned it so it ends at 11:59pm. One minute later, and it's my 27th birthday. Damn fine birthday present to myself :-D
 
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OperationMyWay

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Saw that you broke $8k. That is incredible man! Hope you celebrated the achievement. Now the real work can begin, haha. I'm positive 27 year old you will be up to the task.
 

DennisD

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Saw that you broke $8k. That is incredible man! Hope you celebrated the achievement. Now the real work can begin, haha. I'm positive 27 year old you will be up to the task.
So far 27-year-old me has been a complete slacker obsessed with cake and beer. :-D

From the planning stages this is what I had in my head:
  • We will easily break 1K, which will only cover our costs.
  • $7K is realistic for what we'd make, and what I planned for.
  • $10K is the idealistic goal.
Making $8K is amazing... it's better than the "realistic" number I set for myself and I'm super stoked about it.

So what's next?
I don't have an LLC, so that's the first expense.
Then I need to calculate shipping based on weight and packing materials to each individual backer first.. and take that away from the total $ made.

After that, I'll be using 100% of the money I made for inventory. I'm ordering the boxes, cards, pawns, and chits separately from separate places and consolidating here, and then shipping off individually to backers. It's a process I want to familiarize myself with intimately and am willing to take the hit trading my time for labor, as I want all possible $ to go towards inventory to take advantage of these bulk prices.

Once the backers' orders are fulfilled, I should have a healthy amount of games leftover to sell-off individually. I'll push them via some manual direct-marketing. I'll use the proceeds to buy another batch, plus invest some $ into getting some legit PPC figured out. This is the first thing I've ever done that I truly consider "mass market" and I think can benefit from facebook ads directed to a landing page with some gameplay footage, a nice video, and some upsells to the expansion packs.

I have really shitty credit myself, but I'm hoping to build up the credit of my LLC. I have no experience with this and advice from anybody who does would be killer. If this can be done by registering a cred-card to my business (if this is even possible) I think this would be the best time to do that, considering I literally have all the money sitting in a bank account I'm spending anyways.
 

merc

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Justs a heads up I tried clicking on your site link to pre-order and it says your website has expired.
 
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DennisD

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Thanks.
Once kickstarter releases the $ I'm renewing the hosting.

Sent from my KFTHWI using Tapatalk
 

Journey2Million$

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Not to hi-jack, just to say your timing is unfortunately the same as:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/elanlee/exploding-kittens - as I write this he is over $1.3m in under a day!
Similar niche, he just had a HUGE following. Definitely shows the size of the market for such games!

Wow that Exploding Kittens web page was a marketing tour de force. It told a great story and there was so much creativity and innovation. It reminds me of the old Ebay auctions where people sold some stupid piece of junk but they made such an entertaining, long story out of it that people bid them up to high prices. I don't know if people still do that.

As for the CAH style game, I think you did a nice job and showed good initiative, but I didn't think the text on the cards were all that funny and I didn't care for the color scheme. I don't like pea green and beige. I like brighter, purer colors. If you'd improve those things I think you'd have a lot more sales.
 
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DennisD

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If you'd improve those things I think you'd have a lot more sales.

Love it or hate it, it's has absolutely unique positioning in the marketplace and I wouldn't change a thing.


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Eskil

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Dang it.... I meant to pledge but there was so much going on at the time I spaced it, sorry. I'd still like to help though. I'll hit you up on Skype ;)

Congrats on the funding though!! Awesome to see you going forward with this. I really like the design and everything too :)
 

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