Monthly Recap - August 2012

I seem to gravitate toward compartmentalization, so I will try giving topic headers for the various aspects of my life, then summarize each:

Games

Mike got an advance copy of Noblemen, and while I've only been able to play it about 4 times myself, I set it up at Strategicon and I know about 4 different groups of people played it there. I'm really excited about this one, because I had a hand in it. A friend from BGDF.com made the game, and sent me a prototype about 4 years ago. I played it a lot and offered many suggestions, most of which made their way into the game in one way or another. Finally the game is being published, and I'm proud to say that TMG is in on that with Pegasus Spiel from Germany!

In addition to that, I've played a couple of other games which TMG has decided to go in on: Rialto by Stefan Feld, and Il Vecchio by Rudigor Dorn. It'll be awesome to get some of those big names in the TMG lineup.

Other than that, I haven't been playing much. Most of the time I play anything lately it's been the Eminent Domain expansion (called Escalation), which should have all the illustration done by this weekend, when everything will go to the graphic designer. Pretty soon that one will be all wrapped up, and I'll have to turn my focus toward the next expansion, or another game altogether.

RinCon

RinCon planning is humming right along. I visited several game stores in Phoenix to hand out posters and Vendor packets, hopefully some of them will come down for the convention. I also hit up every vendor in the dealer room at Strategicon, and one of them has signed up to come to RinCon! We're currently at about 150 people - I wouldn't mind another 100 though. I'm sure there will be some latecomers signing up in this last few weeks. The show is less than 3 weeks away! If you're reading this, tell your friends to spread the word. We have a bunch of special guests now as well.

Kickstarter

Mike had to cancel the Stack It! kickstarter project because of potential copyright issues, so TMG doesn't have anything currently on Kickstarter. Past KS project Ground Floor (and Skyline) are on track for Essen delivery, according to the guys from Panda when we talked to them at GenCon. And Josh is wrapping up Kings of Air and Steam (another past KS project) as well. I look forward to both of those being completed and seeing final copies of them.

I've heard some chatter on podcasts or online about people being "done with Kickstarter" - deciding they've gotten over he novelty of it and aren't interested in supporting any more games on it. That's all well and good, but their reasoning makes me chuckle. People don't seem to differentiate between one type of Kickstarter project and another - they seem to lump it all together in one big pot and assume that any given project on Kickstarter is equivalent to any other given project. To me that sounds pretty silly - akin to "I've played enough published games I didn't like that I'm going to stop shopping at game stores." Each project may or may not have merit, whether it's on a crowdfunding site like Kickstarter or whether it's on the shelf at the store. It continues to amaze me how many people don't recognize that.

Travel

 In August I spent a week in Indiana at GenCon. It was an interesting and fun trip, Mike and I picked up a couple of submissions to consider, and we met some interesting people. It was a relief not having to be leashed to the booth the entire week, but at the same time, leaving the sales of TMG stuff up to someone else meant we couldn't do much when they weren't selling very well. Next year I think TMG is going to have a dedicated booth again.

At the very end of the month I went to L.A. again for Strategicon, where I met famous game designer Antoine Bauza. He was very cool, and even played one of my games!

That's nothing compared to next month's travel update... (that's right, a teaser in a blog post!)

Frisbee

I mentioned before that my hip is old and busted. It had been really getting me down, and I got sick of that, so I have started playing frisbee again. I am playing summer league, and I've started going back out to pickup on Sundays - and better yet, a group of club players have started playing a higher level pickup/practice on Saturdays and Mondays, and I've been going to that as well, at least when I'm in town. So far so good! My hip is holding up, and between that exercise and eating a bit less I think I've lost about 4 or 5 pounds.

Friends

This month a good friend moved to Hawaii with his girlfriend. We had a going away BBQ like old times, and like old times we played some Guitar Hero (which we've not done in several years). This makes 3 friends now that live in Hawaii, I'd better get out there to visit them before they start to leave! In fact, I think Steve might be moving back to the mainland sometime soon.

Speaking of friends from Hawaii - Tyler is in town right now, I am going to go hang out with him. See you next month!