Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
A fan podcast celebrating (mostly Swedish) RPGs including, but not limited to: Coriolis; Forbidden Lands; Symbaroum; Tales from the Loop; and, Alien.
Hello, and welcome to episode 292 of Effekt. We're shocked. Shocked, I tell you. I'm Dave.
Matthew:And I'm Matthew. And that was a well done, Dave. Well done.
Dave:Well, I always I always had a bit of the am dram in me, you know.
Matthew:Yeah. So
Matthew:we have got a relatively light program for you in this episode. See what I did there? But we've got a great interview with, I was gonna say, with an old friend, but we've got an old friend and his brother. And in fact, his brother is the new friend in this interview and the old friends. Anyway, we're we're talking to Paul and Chris Wermeran on their current crowdfunding project, Grid Shock Zero Edition.
Matthew:We've got a bit of news in the world of gaming as well. Not so much news, which is why I say we're quite a light program in that one, because
Dave:there's Right.
Matthew:It's a meaty interview. A bit of meaty old interview.
Dave:There's yeah. There's lots in the interview. Oh, yeah. I was I was thinking there. You know, you're saying it's a light episode, but it's not really because we've got a good chunk of interesting stuff to chat about with Paul and Chris.
Dave:And it
Matthew:was great. Do you wanna say it's a packed program, Dave?
Dave:Do you do you No.
Matthew:If you wanna go there?
Dave:I I do, but I'm not going to because we agreed some time ago that we weren't gonna say. We've got a packed program for you because, basically, we're just adding the same thirty seconds of content to every single episode, which people might get a bit bored of after a while. You'd have thought.
Matthew:Before that, it's also worth saying though, we we are not gonna thank any new patrons, but thank you to all our patrons who every month I go, if it wasn't for you, we couldn't do this. But it's true because yeah.
Dave:And it's and it's worth repeating. So, yeah. Thank you. Thank you very much everyone, as always, you know. Deeply, deeply appreciate the support that you all give us.
Matthew:And also the wonderful community that we have on the Discord.
Dave:Yes. Yes. So Yeah.
Matthew:I'm loving that. I'm running a game tomorrow, a bit of Gold Country tomorrow evening. You could you could you could possibly join that as a player, Dave. I'm I might Just saying.
Dave:I might be able to, actually. Yeah. So Well, I'll
Matthew:what you think about that.
Dave:I'll confirm that offline. But, yeah, I haven't haven't I haven't run my character yet. I'm far the different. No. So I have to root out its character sheet.
Dave:But, yes, potentially, that might be a thing.
Matthew:Cool. And also yeah. We might talk offline about an idea I have, if you are gonna join us. But Okay. Right.
Matthew:So patrons, we're done. World of gaming. It's time for the world of gaming, Dave.
Dave:It is. What do we have today? We don't have so many stories today.
Matthew:No. I think the most interesting one for me is after some grumbling now for a couple of years around the UK Games Expo, they've made an announcement to say they are banning AI projects from their or AI content, I should say, from their halls. Which I is big
Dave:haven't it is. I haven't seen that story. I'm just having quick look. So on what's so this is a full ban, is it?
Matthew:Well, so when I read about this, somebody did released a press statement and it says they're Bannergero product. But actually, there are terms and conditions where one might expect them to say, you know, no AI products for for exhibitors. It it it doesn't mention it in there yet. But that may just be, you know, a matter of timing and stuff like that.
Dave:I'm just yeah.
Matthew:I just don't know the exact terms.
Dave:So I'm yeah. I'm just looking at there that statement. So it says, we require that all our exhibitors ensure that all products exhibited, displayed or sold have been created by humans using their own skills. Items and products that have been created or generated completely or in significant part by the use of AI tools and programs are prohibited. This includes, but it's not limited to, art and text used in all forms of tabletop games, associated products, etc.
Dave:Organizers will require exhibitors who do exhibit display or sell suggestions to remove them and in the case that this request is refused may close down the exhibitor's stand and ban them from future participation. So I guess I I okay. So I think, yes, it's a good principle. I think the, the devil is in the detail as always with these things, as in how how is it going to be enforced. Mhmm.
Dave:And if somebody if somebody goes, oh, that looks a bit AI, does that then mean that that producer you know, where's where's the balance of proof here? How how does UK can you how does UK Games Expo prove that exhibitor a is using AI when they are saying that they aren't? Now I guess in some cases it's a bit obvious, perhaps. But if someone goes and complains, then is that exhibitor either, you know, forced to prove their innocence or out the door? So I I completely endorse it.
Dave:I'm behind it, but as I said, devil's always in the detail. And I would hate for there to be a rash of sort of accusations where exhibitors suddenly find themselves guilty until they prove themselves innocent.
Matthew:I think I I think I I'm I'm not sure that they're going to do it on the word of somebody else who says, oh, that looks AI to me.
Dave:I mean, they're not gonna they're not gonna check all the content, though, are they, themselves?
Matthew:No. No. No. They're not. But I think so last year, there was a bit of a hoo about one of their company.
Matthew:I can't remember the name of the company or even the name of the game. I think it was vaguely manga inspired game of some description where the, you know, the the the publisher was proudly stating it's AI and had paid for promotion. And so, you know, UK Games Effekt, though, were promoting it while having made a kind of mealy mouth statement about we were here to foster human creativity. And, of course, that that slight disparity in in intent and actual money caused a bit of a fuss Yeah. Among the community.
Matthew:And so I think that's that's the thing that it will you know, now they've actually said it in hard words, they could confidently say to Blokey Boy Company who says, will you promote our AI product? They can say, no. That's not in our policy.
Dave:No. No. No. That's that's fair enough. Yeah.
Matthew:I I think that's what it really means. I, you know, I wouldn't bid it past some creators to try and smuggle a bit of AI under a thing that says all human made. But, we'll wait and see how that pans out.
Dave:Yeah, I mean, I absolutely don't want to cast aspersions, but I think it's kind of inevitable in some cases that that might might happen. Well, you know,
Matthew:as we talked the last time AI came up in conversation, you know, there is there is a thing now where once upon a time, AI art with all its six fingers or whatever was easily spotted, and it's getting less easy to spot now.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, knowing how expensive artwork can be as a a little producer, I can
Matthew:This is me telling you about our budget a couple of weeks ago, isn't it?
Dave:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, it was expensive in our first time around, it is you know? But again
Matthew:It's more expensive now.
Dave:I mean, I I complain that it's expensive, but I'm not complaining at the people who are producing the artwork who are charging us that amount of money. Yeah. Because they because they need to be, you know They
Matthew:need to be too.
Dave:Suitably compensated for all their skill and talent and effort. Absolutely. It's just when you look at it on a balance sheet, it's a bit eye watering sometimes when you're when you're looking at it for an entire book. Yeah. But I can see that, you know, there there is a temptation which some people might take, to yeah.
Dave:I'll slip in a couple of AI art people never notice kind of thing. Yeah. Don't know. Yeah. It's a tough one.
Dave:So, I mean, it's good. I'm I'm glad I'm glad they've done that. I I think there is there is inevitably going to be a crunch point where it has to be addressed more than just saying we're not gonna have it. Because I think the day will come when it's gonna be so cheap and so good that you could never tell. And there might just have to be an acceptance one day that, you know, it can't be beaten.
Dave:I guess it's you know, mean, is that a very a very, very depressing and pessimistic outlook?
Matthew:It is depressing and pessimistic. Talking of depressing and pessimistic, there's a new game out from Soul Muppet, which I expect Good segue. Will be depressing and pessimistic.
Dave:Good segue. Could could feel that segue bubbling in the background. I could just I could just almost sense your little, you know, that your little brain cells going, oh, there's a segue here. I'm gonna take it. Anyway, carry on.
Dave:Yes.
Matthew:Let's talk
Dave:about the Depressing depressing and pessimistic. Let's talk about that.
Matthew:They've already produced the the game of sad space cowboys, and I'm sure they're going to what's they've already not only produced a game of sad space cowboys, they've got doomed Arthurian cowboys as well. They're moving away from the cowboy theme, which is good, because the only decent cowboy game is ours, obviously.
Dave:That that is true. Absolutely.
Matthew:And they're going they're going Bronze Age, which is good, because, you know, Odyssey and all that shit. With a new game called Atropos. I will put a link in the show notes. They're crowdfunding it shortly. I can't remember who they're crowdfunding it with.
Matthew:This is how useless I am. Let me just see if I can call it up on the Internet as though nobody's ever noticed. I can oh, dear. Atopos, I can tell you, is the Greek goddess of fate and destiny. But that's not the game I'm looking for.
Dave:This is not the game you're looking for. Looks like it's on Kickstarter.
Matthew:It's on Kickstarter. You see so many games on so many different platforms now. I forget which is on Good. Which is on the one we know.
Dave:Good foreshadowing, mate. Good foreshadowing.
Matthew:I love See what I did there?
Dave:We might come back to this topic later, folks. So
Matthew:So, yeah, Atopos is a mythic fantasy role playing game of Odyssey where a group of ill fated survivors of a terrible war venture home struggling both against their own guilt and the wrath of the gods everlasting. They can't do a happy game. I'd love to see Soul Buffet do a game where everybody's happy and it all ends brilliantly.
Dave:So before before we we we started recording today, we had a little conversation about the book and the the cover of the book. And I haven't seen the cover, and I'm just looking at their Kick Starter page now. It's their launch page. It's not it's not gone live yet. But the cover of their book is fucking awesome.
Dave:I absolutely love it. And the the image on it as well of, I'm guessing it's probably Zeus or someone holding an ocean in his hands with a boat on it. That is super, I have to say. Yeah. Absolutely super.
Matthew:So the the cover the cover is the the main reason I wanted to do this, because as you may know, listeners, Dave Dave has got an idea in his head for a, let's call it Rome Year Zero game. It wouldn't actually be Year Zero. Dave could explain to you exactly, yeah, it's all about the republican shit. Bores me rigid, I have to say. But anyway
Dave:Alright. Except except for your character name in the playtest.
Matthew:Well, yeah. Yeah. That's that's hilarious.
Dave:Being very immature and puerile. That did. It's bad enough. We have bigger stickers jokes and all the rest of it for a Roman game, but you just took it one level further.
Matthew:So, anyway, as arch director of our little company, I was just sitting back saying, well, if this game ever ever comes to life, what are we gonna do for a cover? Because, particularly, what are gonna do for a deluxe cover? Because we had a cloth bound sort of vaguely nineteenth century feel of the Western game. What what what's the deluxe cover for whatever we call Rome Year Zero when it when it hits the stands. And in my head, I had the idea of doing one in mosaic.
Matthew:And not just in mosaic, but having it debossed into the cover so that you could feel the mosaic tiles. And and that's exactly what these bastards at Soul Muppet have done. So fuck that. We're not doing that anymore. Well, and it
Dave:does and it does look I hate to say it, but it does look fucking awesome.
Matthew:It looks good. And it will you know me and feel and how book has to feel good. It would feel good as well, because I've read the whole blog post on this. So that that image there is actually made by an actual mosaic artist in bloody terracotta tiles. And then they've digitized it, and the plan in publication is to put it on a book like you see.
Matthew:And and this will be for all the books, not just deluxe. This is standard book. Deboss the grouted areas as it were, put a gloss, shine over the top of all the tiles, the raised bits, and then a little bit of matte varnish down in the grouting as well in the debossed areas. So it will feel like a fucking mosaic every time you pick the book up. Makes me bloody sick.
Dave:Yes. It is it it yeah. It does look super.
Matthew:Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, it's a lovely we will put a link in the show notes. As David said, it's not actually yet getting off the ground. I
Dave:I think
Matthew:it may be this Tuesday. I'm I'm vague the reason I put it in the show notes is not just so I could rant on about the Mosaic cover, but also because I thought they were launching quite soon, but I can't remember what day it was.
Dave:There's there's nothing on the page to say the launch date, but it does obviously Yeah. It's got the launching soon.
Matthew:They've got 702 followers already. So
Dave:It's gonna do well.
Matthew:Fucking bastards. And and thing is they've been so much more ambitious for me. I was thinking that maybe it was gonna be the logo that I was gonna do in Mosaic or not even do in Mosaic. I was gonna do it cheaply or
Dave:Embossing style. Yeah. Yeah.
Matthew:Yeah. Anyway, so we're we're just gonna have to have solid marble covers on our deluxe edition. And I, with the with the name chiseled out by hand.
Dave:Now, that would be cool. I mean, the the the postage costs might go up a smidge. Every book is now 10 kilos. Yeah.
Matthew:Anyway, this this is very much if you wanna play The Odyssey as, the recent film, and you want it better than IMAX, you want it in the screen of your imagination, then this is the game to do it. But be assured it will be depressing.
Dave:Well, a game
Matthew:Because that is just Soul Muppet style.
Dave:Yeah. And and a game with the word word doomed in the title kind of, you know, should set your expectations somewhere.
Matthew:A doomed mythic fantasy. Yeah. Yeah. This is the problem I always had with Call of Cthulhu.
Dave:Everyone's doomed.
Matthew:I'm not really into role playing games where everybody's doomed. Yeah. I like a bit hopeful. Hopeful. Anyway, there we go.
Dave:About hopeful games then. Moving on.
Matthew:Yeah. Oh, yes.
Dave:Well, next one on this.
Matthew:No. This is not a good segue at all.
Dave:No. It's it's an it's an ironic segue, mate.
Matthew:Oh, it's an ironic segue. So tell us more then. Well
Dave:yeah. Right. Thanks, pal. Necromunda role playing game is has been announced.
Matthew:And the thing is, the reason I put this on the on on the, list, we've been talking about this a bit in the Discord. So, patrons, you will have heard this argument before. But for for years ago, Games Workshop produced their own role playing games. Like, for example, Warhammer Fantasy Role Playing. Mhmm.
Matthew:And then they thought, no, actually, we, you know, make all our money out of bits of plastic. Let's let's let's concentrate on making as much money as we can out of bits of plastic. And they licensed all their games out. So there've been a number of owners of or actual publishers of the Warhammer role playing game. It's gone through a number of editions.
Matthew:I think you might be up to fifth edition now or something from, Cubicle seven. Or even 5.5, I feel. I'm angry.
Dave:I've never really followed it, really.
Matthew:And, you know, and Cubicle seven, have a bunch of themed Warhammer and Warhammer 40 k themed games. So my first thought on this one is Decremundur will be of that same stable. But, no, it's actually being published by Games Workshop.
Dave:Mhmm. Indeed. So in this game
Matthew:Which is curious.
Dave:Well, maybe they've they've kind of thought, well, everyone else is making a load of money out of our IP. Why don't we just do it? Because it's
Matthew:Well, there is that, I guess.
Dave:But in this one, you play as a group of bounty hunting Venators taking on jobs. Yeah. I've I mean, I haven't role played in the 40 k universe at all. Obviously, back in the day, did quite a lot of the skirmish game. Yeah.
Dave:And I think I'm again I mean, there's a thing that they're doing here, which is similar to what Monolith did with
Matthew:Mythic Battles.
Dave:With Mythic Battles. In that, they had a series of of games already published with lots of minis, which are the Mythic Battles board games. And then they've taken the idea, turned it into a role playing game where all of your previous purchases are relevant. So here, obviously, all your Necromunda purchases of all your hundreds of miniatures, you can now use them as part of the role playing game. So it's not like you've got a, you know, you've already got a leg up.
Dave:You've got a head start in in in preparing yourself to run this role playing game. So I think that's a perfectly reasonable approach to take. And, yeah, I don't know. Is this coming up on Kickstarter or something, or is this just gonna be launched pre order or anything? Do we do we know?
Matthew:I can't remember. I read some sort of press release about it some while ago and put it on here. And it came from oh, actually, we've got a link probably somewhere in our World of Gaming slot on our discord because it came from one of our
Dave:Right. I can't see anything here that's advertising it as imminently coming on such and such a crowdfunding platform.
Matthew:Yeah. Oh, yes. So it came from Grumple Stiltskin. Shout out to patron Grumple Stiltskin. He posted a thing from the big autumn preview, which is an event that Games Workshop did.
Matthew:So I think they probably haven't actually necessarily shared how it's gonna be produced. They've just said, this is coming Here
Dave:it comes.
Matthew:As part of the big autumn preview. So we don't know if it's gonna be a preorder. I'm quickly skimming through the article
Dave:that Yeah. The the thing that I'm looking at was was dated to ten days ago. So twenty eight eighteenth of September. But it's interesting. There's I'm just having a quick read through some of it.
Dave:There's something that, well, immediately tells of the heritage of where this game is coming from, but also immediately sets my my hackles
Matthew:alive Aloysia.
Dave:In that it says, it's a fully fledged miniatures driven role playing game. Miniatures driven. I'm not sure I like that phrase in a role playing game context. Miniatures shouldn't be driving your role playing game. They should be a an an asset or a tool that help those people who want to use them imagine and and and bring the the place to life.
Dave:I don't know what they mean by miniatures driven, whether that's just
Matthew:So you're saying this isn't your game. This isn't a game for you.
Dave:I wouldn't be buying it anyway. No. But I wonder whether they've just, like, made a mistake drafting, where what they actually mean is you can use your minis. We're setting it up with battle maps, and all your other Necromundi minis that minis that you spent thousands of pounds on, they're not wasted. Great.
Dave:You can use them. Or whether they're doing something in the actual rules that does it make it more of a skirmish game with a role play veneer laid across it or or what?
Matthew:I expect that's that's where we're coming from. Yeah. So, I'm just cutting to the end of this article, and I think it's not crowdfunding. It says both the Warhammer Necromunda role play core set and the first journal will be available soon. We'll delve deeper into the game and how it works before release.
Matthew:In the meantime, head back to the Autumn Preview Hub. So so it doesn't look like it's crowdfunding. It think it looks like it's a thing they're just gonna release. I think it's gonna potentially come in a box with a with a hardback Corebook in it, but also, I expect maps and shit.
Dave:Yeah. They're they're they're talking about battle maps here,
Chris:which Yeah.
Matthew:So I think it probably is miniatures driven. And I do just want to remind you, Dave, that when the very first version of Warhammer came out, not Warhammer Fantasy role play, straight Warhammer. That was called a miniatures role playing game, I think.
Dave:Probably was. I mean, this was in the eighties. I mean Yes. You know, and and we loved playing it. I really enjoyed playing that.
Matthew:We did. Yeah.
Dave:Randy Randy ran a campaign of that, didn't he?
Matthew:Yeah. He did.
Dave:But, you know, I think the the role player Dave the role player of 1985 is very different to the role Dave the role player of 2025, 2026.
Matthew:Dave the role playing gamer of 1985 is very different from Dave the role playing games publisher and author and award winning.
Dave:And and and snob in
Matthew:And snob. And snob. Yeah. Yeah. That's where we're getting to.
Dave:That's where I was heading. Well, I thought I'd just, you know, save you the faff and just get go straight there. Yeah. No. I'm sure that I'm sure this will be, you know what's the phrase I'm looking for?
Dave:You know, this will be this will be, you know, like, very, very welcomed by lots and lots of lots of players and lots of Warhammer fans. Absolutely. And great. If you if you're if you if you enjoy the skirmish style combat in a role playing game, then brilliant. I mean, good for you.
Dave:It's it's it's not where I
Matthew:want And lots of people do.
Dave:They do. I've put you to Dungeons
Matthew:and Dragons, for example.
Dave:Well, yeah. And I'm not I'm not knocking it. I say it's just not it's just not my bag, really. I haven't really played a skirmish game in any any form for for years, years and years and years. I don't know.
Dave:Just doesn't doesn't quite do it for me anymore as it as it used to.
Matthew:No. No. I I think both you and I much prefer the role playing aspect than the fighting bit.
Dave:Yeah. And the storytelling that comes out of
Matthew:that. Yeah.
Dave:Yeah. Very much so.
Matthew:Cool. So let's move on quickly to that, to Dragonmeat, which we will be going to in December, representing both Free League and also we will have hopefully a neighbouring stand for our little publishing house effect. Indeed. And we'll swap probably between the two. So you get to see us changing t shirts in public as we swap.
Dave:I would I would like to say that over the last few weeks, I have been trying to put myself on a bit of an exercise regime, but I'm not gonna look like Arnold Schwarzenegger in 1985 come December. Sorry.
Matthew:Come
Dave:on. I'm working on it.
Matthew:On the other hand, I am. Because I do.
Dave:Yes. Yes. Anyway, yeah, we're gonna we're we're gonna be there. Very much looking forward to forward to that.
Matthew:So, Dave, you're shrinking in time for Dragonmeat, but news only wanted to talk about was like where this You're segue is
Dave:on fire today, mate. You really are.
Matthew:Dragon meat is growing. Think probably not this year, but there was an interview with, John Dodd, and he was and I think we'll link to it. I think it was in, with end world, with the end world guys. But maybe that I saw it reported there and it was with somebody else. Anyway, I'll put a link to it.
Matthew:Which he said that he's looking by '20 I can't remember which date. But within a few years, it will be a three day event.
Dave:A three day event?
Matthew:A three day event.
Dave:Oh, okay. Because it's only a it's still only a one day event, isn't it?
Matthew:Yeah. It's So I think he's gonna grow towards that.
Dave:Right. Right.
Matthew:Right. Yeah. So
Dave:Okay. That's ambitious.
Matthew:And we we need to check with him to get the real gossip on this. But Yeah. From what I recall in the write up of the interview, which I said, I think on end world, I'll post that to you. Possibly starting off with a preview day for press and thought maybe a preview event, which I'm guessing would be on the Friday before a Saturday opening. Then maybe opening to a full Friday, Saturday thing, and then maybe eventually being Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
Matthew:And as I was reading this, I was going, oh, yeah. There's one big thing that Freely, I'm gonna be very happy, and frankly, neither we, about, and that is the hotel costs. And then he says, of course, the big blockers of this is the hotel costs.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:So, yeah, we will wait and see how that develops. But I thought that was an interesting thing. You know, it's grown out of the Hammersmith venue. Yep. It's grown into, but not yet quite filling, the enormous venue that we have now at Excel.
Matthew:But now it's looking at getting longer. And part of me wonders whether actually could we could we not have it longer at
Dave:Longer where?
Matthew:Longer at Hammersmith.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:Particularly
Matthew:since my boy has now moved house to or I'm moving I'm moving my boy into a flat that is not all that far from Hammersmith. It would be easy for him to come. And then we wouldn't even need or Freely wouldn't even need to pay for a hotel for him. They never do for him anyway. But Yeah.
Dave:Yeah. Anyway It's it's an interesting one because, mean, the obviously, the thing that that that, you know, the the the the immediate thing that that John got by going to to the Excel was was floor space. And whether that has encouraged more producers, backers, publishers to come, and whether actually he could fit that floor space with those with all the people who were coming now, or the exhibitors, whether he could fit that in the Novotel anyway. But actually, on the Novotel Dragon meet at the Novotel was a unique event, because it had a very different feel to UK Games Expo and Tabletop Scotland and those kind of things. It was a lot more intimate.
Dave:It was, yeah, a nicer setup. Everything was there. You never didn't go very far. The community was much closer together because it's all focused on the one hotel rather than spreading out into different hotels around the around the vicinity. And I loved that.
Dave:And I I was a bit there was a bit of me that was was very sad when when Dragonmeat went to Excel, although I could understand all the reasons why they did. But, yeah, I I I can't see us going back. They're not gonna go back, are they? Now they're at the Excel. They're gonna be at the Excel.
Dave:But I think, you know, we were talking offline the other day. There are certain things, I think, that the organization needs to tweak or do better or get right to make it a really good experience. And some of those are really sort of basic admin kind of stuff, like, you know, dealing with rubbish, for example.
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:So I think things like that. But hopefully, you know, John's very, you know, very experienced at all this stuff, so he'll iron these things out, hopefully. But yeah. I mean, he must be confident that there is the market to get people coming to DragonMeat for two or three days.
Chris:So
Dave:yeah. Well, we should we
Matthew:should Anyway.
Dave:Wait and see. Yeah. But good luck.
Matthew:Good luck. And see. Wait and see on that one. I'll put a link in the show notes. And then finally, last bit of World of Gaming, although really it's the introduction to our interview, is that there is a new Year Zero game being, crowdfunded even as we speak on GameFound, and we will put a link in the show notes.
Matthew:And that is to Grid Shock zero edition. What do you know about that, Dave?
Dave:Well, I I know pretty much what Paul and Chris told us. So why don't we have a listen to the interview?
Matthew:Let's do that. So hello to a crowded hamam because we've not just got Dave and I. We've got two Vermeeran brothers. Chris, we have met you before. Welcome back into the hamam.
Matthew:I see you're properly attired. Paul, you are new to the Effekt hamam.
Paul:Yeah. Well, thank you.
Matthew:I can tell that because you're still wearing your towel.
Dave:It's very, very creepy idea we have. There's this hamam, I mean, really, we should have thought about this a long time ago, which is very strange. But anyway, welcome, Paul. Welcome, Chris. Lovely to see you both.
Matthew:We're here to talk with mostly Paul because it's his game that is currently being crowdfunding, crowdfunded and we've already heard about Chris's life in gaming. So the first question that we always ask to a new guest is Paul, Please tell us about your life in gaming thus far.
Paul:Oh, okay. I'm I'm giving away my age here. My life in gaming started in 1985, when I and Chris who was who was here with me. Yeah. Yeah.
Paul:A little, you know, late late yeah. Latecomer to the to the to the hobby. We lived in The UK at the time. And I was introduced to, Dungeons and Dragons as well as game books like
Matthew:Like, fighting fantasy books like
Paul:Yeah. Yeah. Well, specifically Mhmm. Yeah. Specifically, Grail Quest was the one that, I was introduced to as well as Falcon, which was like a a sci fi one.
Paul:Chris had already been playing, D and D when we lived in The States, but that's around when I got introduced to it. And I was watching things like Robin and Sherwood and, like, all that stuff was happening at
Matthew:all the same time. That I Yeah. All the stuff in this in
Paul:this Yeah. So that that kinda primed me for it. But there that was very brief, and I was extremely young. And then maybe four or five years later when we had moved back to The States, I, again, gave D and D a try when second edition came out. That rule book was, you know, I it was discounted or something when AD and D second edition first launched.
Paul:And we played it a little bit, but we kinda bounced off of it. We didn't really understand a lot of things about it even though Chris had introduced me to it before and then had kind of run it for myself and some, like, childhood friends of mine just based on his memories of the books because we didn't actually have them.
Dave:Mhmm.
Paul:All we had was the monster manuals.
Dave:Good segue.
Paul:But, anyway, what actually got me started role playing for real and, like, running my own games and not being as confused. And, you know, this may surprise some people was actually palladium games.
Matthew:Woah.
Paul:So, yeah.
Matthew:Went straight from not remembering any of the rules to remembering a load of rules.
Paul:I still think that Palladium wasn't necessarily more rules than D and D, but for whatever sense it may for whatever reason, it made more sense to me at the time. And I think the fact that it was advertised in comic books, which I was very much into, still kind of am, and, the books were cheaper. They were easier to get. They were cheaper, and they were complete. They didn't have you didn't buy three palladium rule books.
Paul:You bought one, and it had what you needed. And it may not have been explained particularly well. Yeah. But it was all there in one book. So the Palladium games kinda dominated my gaming in the nineties, though I did play a lot of Marvel, the TSR Marvel game.
Matthew:Mhmm.
Paul:And I played a good deal of things like Earthdawn. I played Street Fighter, the storytelling game. I bounced off of White Wolf stuff except for Street Fighter. So you can probably tell I had a certain taste, that is, you know, maybe a little bit more over the top than a lot of the other games that were around at the time. Mhmm.
Paul:I played a lot of rifts. I played a
Chris:lot of Marvel.
Paul:I played a lot of Street Fighter. So yeah. And then from there, you know, I I don't know. The rest of it is trying lots of different systems over the years. I did put D and D has never been my my top choice, though I've always played some of it.
Paul:Lately, the last thing I ran was actually Dragonbane. Ran Dragonbane for about a year. Obviously, I do enjoy free leagues games quite a
Chris:bit. Okay.
Paul:And, the previous version of Grid Shock, I mean, you said that we're gonna get into that in a little bit, but I made that about five years ago as me dipping my toe into publishing something. And I made that, for a game called icons, which is sort of a fate based superhero game because I was sort of dabbling with fate at the time. But fate has kind of fallen by the wayside even at the, even its creators have kind of admitted that fate's time has kind of come and gone. Mhmm. So, yeah, I haven't really been messing with any of fate games in a a good while.
Paul:Like, in fact, by the time grid shot came out, the the zine version, I was already kind of, like, moving away from that.
Matthew:So that original Grid Shock is fate based then?
Paul:It's it's for a game called icons, which is created by Steve Kenson.
Matthew:I remember seeing the cover in my somewhere. I I've I've never looked between
Paul:the covers. Kind of an indie darling maybe about ten years ago. It was rather well received. Yeah. It was created by the creator of Mutants and Masterminds, but it's a much lighter, looser, kind of more narrative game.
Paul:No. I wouldn't say it's full narrative, but has more narrative elements than a typical superhero game. It's a little bit lighter in the rules. So that was what I made the original version of Grid Shock for. Grid Shock was something I had kicking around in my head for a while, but I decided to make it for an established system.
Paul:And a superhero system was something that accommodated what I wanted to do pretty easily, because superhero games usually have to handle a lot of different elements that other games may just kind of ignore. Icon seemed like a good fit for what I wanted to do, which was this kind of post apocalyptic characters have powers kind of game, that was sort of inspired by Rifts and Marvel and a lot of other stuff that I played when I was younger because I figured, you know, if Gary Gygax made a game that was basically him smashing together all the, you know, bad fantasy novels that he read as a kid, then, you know, I could do that too for all the junk that I grew up with. So I tried to do that.
Matthew:That is the spirit of creativity smashed together a bunch of stuff you've already you really enjoy.
Paul:Yeah. I think so.
Matthew:So that was but effectively, that was not necessarily a standalone system. It was a setting, for for icons. That's good. Chris, were you involved in graphic design for Yes. Your little brother then?
Chris:Yes. I was. Yes.
Paul:Yeah. Chris is also doing the graphic design for, the new version, just like he did for terminal state, which is his own game. And, like, I basically, we both try to back each other up on each other's products.
Chris:So Yeah.
Paul:Terminal state, I did, the editing, basically. You know? So if you read it and you're like, what is this? That's my fault. But
Chris:The source is I will
Dave:When I get it when I get it, I will I will look at it with a different eye this time, now and Yeah.
Chris:Coming very, very soon. I I apologize for that, though.
Dave:That's all mean. Whatever. It's Kickstarter. When it arrives, it arrives. It's cool.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:I mean But maybe we do need within the space of this interview to come back to you, Chris, and say, where the hell is I gay?
Chris:Go right ahead. Yeah.
Paul:The PDF is the PDF is done. It's just the actual printing
Chris:is the
Paul:is the thing. And, I mean, I don't wanna spoil, you know, whatever you wanna talk about later, but, basically, that's talking to retailers who contacted us recently and said, hey. We actually want more copies of this. This looks good because they look at the PDF, and they're like, oh, hey. So now now we have to adjust things
Chris:to the company. The numbers. Yep.
Paul:It's good stuff. It's good things.
Matthew:Good things. That is good to hear. That is good to hear. So, Paul, back to back to Grid Shock. You you start explaining a little bit.
Matthew:It's superheroes, but post apocalyptic. Do you want to fill us in a bit more on the setting? And I I know creators sometimes hate this, but what do you actually do in in this world?
Paul:I don't hate that at all. Okay. So Okay. The elevator pitch for the setting is that it was a superhero world. The superheroes failed to save the world in 1985.
Paul:Everything has gone wrong since then. Reality has gotten broken, and now the bad guys are in charge.
Matthew:Oh, a bit like the real world then.
Paul:Yeah. That's right. You know, there is a lot of commentary in there. There is a of satire in there.
Dave:It's a documentary then, clearly.
Paul:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, one of the things I was reading in The UK as a little kid, even though I probably shouldn't have been, was, you know, two thousand AD Prague. So there's a bit of that stuff in there. Excellent.
Paul:Nice. In terms of like, just sort of poking fun and well, not poking fun, but saying something about the the our current condition. But anyway, so yeah, superheroes have failed. The bad guys are in charge. It is set in North America.
Paul:There are different regions of the of the continent that are controlled by different bad guys, essentially. So there's different flavors of dystopia in different parts of the
Matthew:So that's a slightly rifty thing, isn't it? The different parts of the world Yeah. Of slightly different settings. So give us give us a flavor of some of the different flavors then if you can.
Paul:Okay. I can do that. But, did you wanna hear first about what your characters do? You want me to Okay.
Matthew:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry.
Paul:So the idea is is that your characters are a new breed of heroes and that you travel across the continent from place to place, you know, getting into trouble and fixing things and trying to right wrongs before the various flavors of bad guys, you know, figure out that you're there and really send their forces after you. Because, you know, you can make a difference on the on the small scale. You're not gonna be able to change the world right away. So it's a little bit different from the usual superhero up uphold the status quo against these bad guys who are sneaking up from below. And instead, it's, you know, more of like a punching upwards.
Paul:You know, the bad guys are in charge, we gotta take them down kind of thing.
Matthew:And you're on the run like, like David Banner was in the TV show the whole
Chris:Super superpowered a team.
Paul:Yeah. So, yeah, you are the a team. You know, you drive around in a super truck and then get out of Dodge before, you know, general whoever sends his forces after you to try to, like, haul you back in. So yeah. But, yeah, the Incredible Hulk TV show is also a good comparison.
Paul:You you come into town, some sort of complication happens, you have to fix it, then you got to get out of there.
Matthew:Okay. And just I just want to I am gonna unpack this in terms of instead of what you do. Where are you from? You talked about a new generation of heroes. So the old heroes have all been wiped out.
Matthew:Although Pretty that may not be entirely true, I guess. Yeah. Some of
Paul:them went bad. Some of them were in hiding. Yeah, stuff like that.
Matthew:Are we, are we the sons and daughters of those heroes? Are we,
Paul:can be.
Matthew:How are we powered? How do we get our powers?
Paul:So there are different character archetypes that are set up in the game. The intention is is that character creation will kind of walk you through the setting a little Mhmm. So that you'll have an understanding of what your character is and how they fit into this kind of, you know, unusual setup. I think people usually grasp the basics of the setup pretty quickly, but there are obviously, you know, elements to the setting that not everybody's gonna know right away. So the idea is is that your thing like, you know, you pick an origin, which is which part of the world you're from.
Paul:Right? Because that will tell you a little bit about how your character grew up. For example, like, if your character grew up in seaboard sector, which is kind of like a mega city one type situation where there's this, you know, big mega place Right.
Matthew:Across the East Coast sort of thing.
Paul:Yeah. Up across the East Coast into Canada where, you know, there's a totalitarian government in charge. That's gonna be different from a character who grew up in the sanction, which is like desert wasteland, oil field ruled by a superhero who's possessed by a demon. So Right. That's gonna be a different kind of situation if your character's from there.
Paul:And then you pick, an archetype, which basically tells you what kind of powers do you have roughly, but more importantly, like, where did you get them from? So there are a lot of different archetypes. I think there's a dozen of them. There may be more if we hit some stretch goals, which we'll see about that. It's looking a little iffy.
Paul:But, yeah, some of the archetypes, let's see here. There is the neogenic, which is kind of like your classic, x men style mutant, which is, you know, you were born with some sort of genetic mutation that gives you powers. And those people are usually Mhmm. Hunted down and found by whoever the various villains are because they want those people working for them.
Matthew:Yep.
Paul:So you may have had something like that happen to you. There are rogue bots, which is you're literally a robot that went haywire, and now you're off doing something else. There are ultra knights who are kind of like an order of heroes who, sort of, access their powers by having the spirit of a dead superhero. Inhabit them and advise them or try to advise them. Doesn't always work.
Dave:I like it. Yeah.
Paul:Lots of different archetypes like that. There's a revenant, is, you are literally undead. You were killed and resurrected. So you're a dead an old school dead superhero, basically, who's returned from the dead. Yeah.
Paul:Lots of different things like that. I'm playing around with the idea of kind of having the classic year zero engine age categories as well. I may or may not end up keeping it, but right now, there's, like, the young, adult, and old kinda categories that are probably gonna rename those. So you might be, like, an old veteran superhero from before everything went wrong, or, you know, you might be, like, a teenager or, you know, whatever or something in between.
Chris:Rookie, veteran, and something else. Yeah.
Paul:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like, rookie, veteran, and then, yeah, I don't know, something else. They'll come up with something.
Matthew:But Excellent. Very Days of future past. I've got
Paul:Days of future past is one of the huge influences on this. Yeah.
Dave:Cool. I am very much liking the archetypes here. So look just looking at some of them. When you were talking about it, was looking at Ultra Night before you mentioned it and thought, that sounds really quite interesting. No.
Dave:They look really good. I like them very much.
Paul:Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. If you look at the the game found page, it has a little, you know, one sentence summary of all the archetypes and what they're about.
Matthew:Yeah. And of course, we will put a link in the show notes.
Paul:Thank you. Mhmm.
Matthew:So so as you said earlier on, you're you're you're doing small things. You're not able to change the world. You're not able to to defeat all the evil overlords.
Paul:I mean, you you're definitely
Matthew:a bit of a campaign format that is gonna get us heading in that direction.
Paul:The goal yeah. The idea is is that as you play, you know, there is a little bit more of a focus on character improvement and gaining power than there is in a lot of your Zero Engine games. Mhmm. I think Invincible kind of already built a little bit of a framework for that. But, yeah, there is definitely a little bit more of the, I don't wanna say zero to hero, but you start off as, you know, relatively low level and gain in power as you play.
Paul:So eventually, you may actually be able to take on, like, those big villains who are in charge of a particular region or something like that. But early on, you're gonna be dealing more with, like, their flunkies, you know, who are being sent after you. And, yeah, you know, the idea is is that each of these regions is basically like, you know, a country. So eventually, you know, like, I don't know. Like, if you're playing, like, grand theft auto or something like that, if you just stay in the middle of town and just keep throwing grenades at the cops, eventually, they're gonna get you.
Paul:Yeah. So yeah.
Matthew:So you're moving you're
Dave:the move all the time. Also, of course.
Paul:Yeah. So the idea is that there will be, like, kind of, like, a heat meter type thing, which terminal state also has something similar to that, where the more attract more attention you draw to yourselves, the more careful you have to be about what you're doing.
Matthew:Cool. So obviously, this was a setting for icons originally five years ago. You're redoing it now as year zero. It seems a stupid questions question for us to ask because we know why year zero is special. But why did you choose year zero to do this new version in?
Paul:Year zero engine makes it easy for me to do to play with the type of things that I wanted to play within this setting, which is characters that have to be careful, that have to take risks, and, like, having those risks have cost. Mhmm. Really having to push themselves and not necessarily starting off as these oh, I mean, you start off pretty powerful. I won't I won't lie. But there are definitely you have to think about what you're doing.
Paul:And you can certainly, you know, take big risks and have big payoffs, but you can also take big risks and have it not pay off in a very dangerous way. And I that's one of the things I really do enjoy about the year zero engine. I thought it was a good fit. And everybody who I've talked to who has read the original version, including Steve Kenson, know, when I made it for originally made it for his game was like, wow. Year zero engine sounds like it would be a really, good fit for this, especially now that Invincible is out.
Paul:And in theory, anyway, those powers are gonna end up in the system reference document. Mhmm. You know, that will be extremely helpful for me to have something to work from. Or, you know, it already is. Like, you know, I'm already looking at Invincible and saying, oh, I see how they did this here.
Paul:I can change that a little bit and make it, you know, work the way I want it to.
Matthew:Okay. This is a couple of
Dave:about your yeah. So can you say anything about your, your sort of considerations around the, push mechanic, assuming you're you're maintaining that as part of this?
Paul:Absolutely. Yeah. I don't think you can do your zero engine and take take the machine out.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Paul:It's, key. It is fairly similar to, invincible, but I wanted to introduce a lot of the mechanics from Dragonbane that I like, which has had the sort of accidental effect of making it sort of similar to the great dark. Because, you know, if it's it's it's it's, it's an interesting mix of things. So pushing works like it normally does. You know, this is, dice pool based, not step based.
Paul:So pushing works like it normally does, which means, you know, you can reroll, but you can't reroll your ones and sixes. But you if you you have two, you have health and you have resolve. You know, stress reduces your resolve. Also, using most of your powers, not all of them, but a lot of them, reduces your resolve. It causes stress.
Paul:So when you run out of of resolve, you can't push anymore. If you you can keep trying to push at that point, but you're gonna get conditions. And this is one of the things that's different from Invincible. Invincible doesn't have conditions at all. They're not they're not interested in that.
Paul:So the conditions are more important. And depending on your character's background and origin, how you can deal with conditions, is different. Like, for example, as it is right now, if your character is young, it's easier for you to shake off physical conditions and if your character is old it's easier for you to shake off mental conditions.
Matthew:Like that. I like that a lot. That's a good argument for keeping the age things but I'm not gonna stop you from getting rid of them if you don't want to.
Paul:We'll see. I I'm worried that it may be a little bit much, but that's that's how it is right now. I do need to do some more play testing with that. You also have something called grid dice, and grid dice are sort of similar to forbidden lands artifact dice where you get a bigger die that you can roll along with your normal six siders. And that means that, you know, you're more likely to more likely to succeed when you use them.
Paul:You have a limited number of those. And, the problem is is that when you use grid dice, the GM gets shock points. And shock points are things that the GM can use to power up the bad guys or to introduce, like, disasters and other horrible stuff that can happen to you. There's a lot of, like, reality warp stuff in this game. So the shock points can be used to make that sort of stuff happen.
Paul:So, yeah, there is a bit of an adversarial, metacurrency thing going on here. And if you've read terminal state, this is familiar to you. Familiar state sorry. Terminal state has a mechanic Style. With style and edge.
Paul:Edge. Yep. That Mhmm. Where those Yeah. Those play off of each other.
Paul:So it is going to be somewhat similar to that. Though not to knock terminal state in any way. Terminal state is very crucial. It's more on the, Twilight 2,000 end of things, and this is more on the Invincible but maybe slightly simpler than Invincible side of things. So yeah.
Matthew:Cool. Cool. That sounds really interesting. Yeah. So you you you're learning from Invincible, but you are bringing a superhero game into a year zero market where there's a superhero game.
Paul:That's right.
Matthew:So
Paul:Which
Matthew:If I'm deciding which superhero game I'm gonna buy, I think, personally, I'm already more intrigued by your setting in Grid Shock than I am by Invincible. Invincible, frankly, I I'm not a fan of the comics. I'm not a fan of the TV animation. It's not gonna be a big pull for me, whereas you've already set us, you know, set an intriguing world out before me that's full of some of my favorite things like David Banner's Hulk, VA team, and, days of future past. I'm in.
Matthew:I'm in. Don't worry.
Paul:Right.
Dave:Yeah. Mean I mean, similarly, I mean, the thing that the thing that draws me to Invincible is is the artwork, actually, because it reminds me very much of villains and vigilantes. I don't know if you ever came across that game back in the day.
Paul:Yeah. The Jeff T.
Dave:One. Yeah. When I was a teenager. Absolutely loved it. And this gives me a real nostalgic feel of that.
Dave:And I'm again, I'm not into Invincible at all. Don't really know it. But as Matt said and it's quite interesting because having having had a quick look at the the the GameFound stuff before the interview, I thought, yeah, this looks quite interesting. You know, it'd be interesting conversation. But, actually, talking to you about it makes it significantly more interesting and and intriguing.
Dave:I'm I'm
Paul:most glad to hear that
Dave:disappointing. Really interesting. The reason why I
Chris:like waiting to rewrite some of the game found, babe.
Paul:Because it sounds like it sounds like I didn't catch it very well. But, yeah, thank you for that.
Dave:I haven't read all of it. I I give you that. So I've I've I've only skimmed it on the on Gamefound. So
Paul:Oh, that wasn't meant as a yeah. No. I I understand.
Matthew:But if our listeners Yeah. It wasn't meant
Dave:as that either. So
Matthew:I I've I've got some money to spend on a superhero game. Which one should I go for? What are you gonna say to sell them on grid shock rather than invincible?
Paul:I would say that if you are interested in a game that is, about smashing the status quo rather than upholding the status quo, if traditional superhero settings don't really do much for you, Invincible is a very traditional superhero setting. The the way the story is told is not traditional. But the world is very much just we've made Marvel and DC, and we've changed the names. And And you
Chris:turned off the dial to 11. Is it really what was? Yeah.
Paul:This is this is not turning the dial up. It's changing the channel a bit. It's, yeah. If you like things like, age of apocalypse or even, like you said, days of future past or those sort of, like, what if stories where superheroes are able to kind of, like, be put into a different situation. I mean, Invincible does that as well.
Paul:But Yeah. Is a
Matthew:very multiverses.
Paul:This is a very no. Different It's fine. This is a very different take on the genre if you even wanna say it's part of the genre at all. It is very much like a post apocalyptic game in the mold of something you know, Rifts is a is a major influence, though I'm trying not to make it too much like Rifts, but there is a similar sort of, like, fractured world setup to it. So if that type of thing interests you or if the idea of not necessarily being a pure power fantasy is interesting to you, then you might wanna check out Gridshock.
Paul:I think that invincible is a good move for Free League, but maybe a tough sell for many of its established fans. I think it's good because it brings people who are interested in superheroes or interested in invisible the series or the comics to take a look at it. Mhmm. But I think that a lot of the fan base of your zero engine that exists already is maybe not that interested in that. Think they like, you know, they like the show or whatever, but they're not that interested in playing superheroes.
Paul:Whether that's because such a large portion of the fan base is based in Europe and The UK, I don't know. But that would be a guess that I would take. I have no research to back that up. But
Matthew:Well, anecdotally, I didn't sell I was at tabletop Scotland, which is a big convention representing Free League. I we had a big stock of Invincible because it's the new game, and I don't I was slightly disappointed with sales. Sold a bunch of the starter sets, but Yeah. Four Rules didn't sell that many of. So may you may have a you may be right there.
Paul:May have an extra I certainly don't think that Invincible was, like, a disappointment to anybody. Like, I I don't I'm not trying to, like not trying to read anybody's tea leaves or anything like that. And it looks like there's a lot of support planned for that game, and I'm excited about it because I like invincible, obviously. But yeah.
Matthew:Even though I don't like the world, I created a character when I got my review set, and I was all for playing once I'd once I'd created my, my character.
Paul:It's it's very well done. I mean, I think it accomplishes what it set out to do. I mean, Tomas was very, open about it being heavily inspired by the Marvel TSR Marvel superhero game. Mhmm. And I think that it does a really good job of taking that, tweaking it for YZE, and making it work for Invincible.
Paul:I think that that's a very, very good game.
Matthew:Brilliant. And we're not talking about Invincible. No. We're talking about Grinch.
Paul:Well, you asked me to compare Yeah. It.
Dave:We could oh, well, we can edit that out if you'd rather at the end, you know, when
Chris:it comes
Dave:to Yeah.
Matthew:That's okay. Yeah. So, obviously, all our all our listeners now are either they've already bought Invincible or if they're tossing out a team or two, they're gonna come to the grid shot camp. They're gonna sponsor the campaign, and, get this kick started. But it is on GameFound
Paul:It is on GameFound.
Matthew:And not on Kickstarter. Chris, you did yours on Kickstarter. Correct. Tell me, Dave and I are gonna do a sequel to to our game, tells of the Old West shortly. And Nice.
Matthew:Guess we should be thinking, is Kickstarter still the place to be? Tell us about your experiences or compare those experiences on those two platforms so far for the two of you.
Paul:Yeah. I used Kickstarter to do Gridshock 20XX, which is the original version, which was the Zines. And it was fairly successful. It was part of, Zine Quest. Mhmm.
Paul:And similarly, for GameFound, the you know, just to peek behind the the curtain. GameFound, several months back, did a promotion where they're like, hey. Pitch us your game. We're doing this thing called RPG party. We wanna make a push for role playing games because GameFound is primarily set up for board games.
Paul:Mhmm. It's a it's a EU based company, and they specialize in board games. They want to try to get away from that a bit, I think. So I was like, okay. That's sort of interesting, I guess.
Paul:And then I saw that Free League was involved in selecting the winners for this pitch. Oh. So I was like, okay. It would be really cool if I pitch this and you know, because it they advertised it. They're like, okay.
Paul:These publishers are working with us, and they're gonna work with the creators to help them get their stuff, you know, crowdfunding. I was like, well, that sounds amazing because I was already thinking about doing this with your zero engine. So well, now I'm definitely gonna go ahead and apply. So I did, and it got in. It was chosen as one of the winners.
Paul:So that's really cool. Right? Cool. Very much. The issue for me has just been it just seems to be difficult to get traction, and I don't know if that has anything to do with it being on game found or if it's various other factors.
Paul:I mean, there's so many games right now that are crowdfunding. And I also think that there's an expectation that your game is already done when you crowdfund it, and that's not the case here. It's not done. It's maybe, like, half done. So that's, I think, a concern for some people, maybe.
Paul:I don't know. I'm taking a guess here. But I have gotten one or two comments from people saying like, oh, man, you know, that delivery date is kinda far out. And I'm like, I don't think it's that far out considering that I have to, you know, finish making the game. But I think that people now and, you know, Free League is part of this is that there's an expectation that when you crowdfund it, that means it's ready to go, you're and just getting the money to to put it out there.
Paul:And that's not the case here. So that might be something to think about. But, yeah, for me, Kickstarter was a similarly nerve biting sorry, a fingernail biting, nerve racking experience. So I won't really say that GameFound is any smoother or less smooth in that regard. But, Chris, did you wanna talk about your experience on GameFound?
Chris:GameFound, I don't have you know, other than helping you.
Paul:Sorry. Kickstarter.
Chris:Kickstarter. Yeah.
Paul:I know what you Kickstarter.
Chris:Your guys is probably because you actually closed yours and shipped pretty quick. Kickstarter has changed a lot from when I set mine up to to now, and they now have digital files can be sent right. Yeah. That's how I release my eyes. They have their own pledge manager now, which obviously Again, they didn't have so they didn't really say it so good.
Chris:That was Yeah. I will say that's got some work. That was a lot of hurdles to get through to get that pledge manager going right. That was a lot of my problems in this last one, getting that all sorted. And they also have something else new now.
Chris:I mean, they're just they're adding on new stuff. They're definitely trying to grow to be more capable of doing everything that, you know, people go outside of them afterwards from from the crowdfunding. They have a shipping thing I think they already had, but I think that's a different works differently now on how they can do all that. They're adding on is growing. A lot of it's very beta feeling when you get in there, the instructions are not good.
Chris:I'm pretty internet savvy. I mean, I do it for a week. It's hard to find things hard to you think you do something right and you go and it's not and whether you did it wrong or it's not working right or
Matthew:right. Yeah. So I remember that.
Dave:Obliging? Are Are they obliging use their manager?
Chris:They did. I mean, I found it, thought, you know, it's right there. It would be much easier trying to go out and source something else. Worked and well. I said some of it was me, of it was them.
Chris:I think the way they wrote it up on the parts I did wrong was weirdly set up, but it's also I interpreted it wrong. So you could go either way. Once I got it working, it's like, oh, this is kind of what it meant, even though it doesn't look like that. So once I figured
Paul:out something No.
Dave:Super intuitive, but then once you
Paul:No.
Dave:Once you work it out, you work it out.
Chris:Yeah. It's the way they set up the buckets for setting up your pricing was weird. It's like, no. It's all all based on the weight, but then the crossover was it was just weird.
Matthew:Yeah. Gotta say one of the things so when we did our when we did our game, I'm struggling to find the word. One of the things that bugged me about Kickstarter then and, in fact, persuaded us to go to Kick Track's pledge manager, which confusingly is the same title for the product Mhmm. Was that Kick Track offered way more personal support. So, you know, when we set it up, they said, oh, have a chat with with our guys, and we'll assign you lovely woman.
Matthew:What's her name? Lindsay? I think Lindsay. I can't remember.
Dave:Somebody yeah.
Matthew:And she was there for a whole of our campaign. And when she wasn't, in fact, and I'd written an email, and it was getting a bit crucial at some point, and I had a burning question to ask and not much time to answer it. They picked up on that, and, you know, somebody else was obviously reading her emails and said, hi. I'm not Lindsay. She's off on holiday at the moment, but I'm Tom.
Matthew:I can help you with this. Let me solve the problem. So that personal support was a thing that I didn't see any of from Kickstarter. Did you see any more doing a bit later on? Because I do feel that they're working a bit harder for RPG developers currently.
Chris:Full transparency, I'm not that type of person. I reached out when I had the billing problem because that I had to sort out with them and Stripe, whoever they use. So getting them to communicate right and get that. Otherwise, I'm a dig in and play around with it until I get it right type of person. So I didn't reach out to him much.
Chris:Honestly, I can't blame them on that. But But you didn't you didn't use him? Yeah. We're finding where it did.
Matthew:Do you offer more support? Do you have an account manager or something over at GameFound?
Paul:So, I should have mentioned this earlier. The promotion that I joined is called RPG party. It's a thing that they I think that they're probably gonna do it annually. When I started it, there was a person in charge of RPG party, and he left shortly after the winners were announced. Right.
Paul:He left to go work for Kickstarter as a matter of fact.
Matthew:Oh, you're right. Okay.
Paul:Yeah. It was it was apparently no no no ill will on any on any part. But, anyway, he left to go work for Kickstarter, and the person who took over for him, his name is Ella Carter. And Ella has done a fantastic job of supporting all the projects in Uh-huh. RPG party.
Paul:I can't, say enough about her. She's been fantastic to work with. Now whether everybody who uses GameFound gets that level of, attention or care, they probably don't. You know, they they are specifically going out of their way to support the projects that are in RPG Party. So I can't say that it's gonna be like that for everyone.
Paul:I also have a specific person that answers my technical questions about GameFound. I have found GameFound to be a little bit less intuitive than Kickstarter, and that's not to say that Kickstarter is particularly intuitive. So read into that, which you will. It's a little bit tricky to use. And, I don't want to I don't know.
Paul:As as an American guy, sometimes the, level of regulation that you have to deal with as an EU based company is surprising to me. That's not to say that it's bad, but there is often things around, I didn't even know that that was a thing. And they're like, yeah. You have to set up all these tactics in all these different countries. I was like, oh.
Paul:So, yeah, just a learning curve there.
Matthew:Right. Yeah.
Dave:Think just just for just for accuracy, we used Pledge Manager, not KickTrax for us.
Matthew:Your Pledge Manager is owned by KickTrax, though.
Paul:Yeah. Think I actually I used Pledge Manager for Gridshock twenty x x years ago, and I believe Lindsay was the person that I talked to, if I'm not mistaken.
Dave:Okay. Yeah.
Matthew:Could be wrong. So yeah. I'm I'm just using KitKat now to distinguish from Pledge Manager because Pledge Manager and, Kickstarter's product are both called Pledge Manager.
Paul:Pledge Manager. Everybody just calls them Pledge Managers.
Chris:Yeah. It's the name of the service now, not a brand.
Matthew:Yeah. One named
Paul:big guy.
Dave:Manager really helps the whole thing, obviously. Yeah.
Paul:Yeah. They got they got Kleenexed. It's just what people call it now. Yeah. It's too bad.
Paul:Yeah.
Matthew:Yeah. So I'm just I'm just running. I'm realizing we're we're we're hitting the the time clock as it were. I'm just trying to think. Have we got any more questions about Grid Shock?
Dave:I think the one question I would ask is, how gritty is it? Is this a game where you're gonna die if you do something stupid? Or is it quite forgiving in that regard?
Paul:It's it's it's a complicated question. It has conditions which can really mess you up in a way that you can't in other superhero games, you know, including Invincible. Sorry to keep talking about Invincible. But but, you know, it's the other YZE game where you have superpowers, so that makes sense.
Dave:Yep.
Paul:But it doesn't have the gory critical hits that Invincible has, you know, where it's like, you've had your arm ripped off or, you know, whatever. It doesn't get quite that level of detail in terms of critical injuries and stuff like that. But it is very easy for your characters to get ground down and lose hope and, you know, get into trouble that way.
Dave:Right.
Paul:Yeah. The lethality is maybe not super super high, but you can definitely die. Yeah.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah.
Paul:I'm there are some, things that I would like to include that I had sketched out for the original game, which was, not the original game, but the original zines. I wanted to have a table in there that explains how your character can come back to life. Ended up getting cut through space, but I want to kinda sneak something like that back in there where it's like, you didn't die. That was actually a clone or that was, you know, another version of you from another dimension or another timeline or, you know, whatever. And now you can introduce this new version of your character that's a little bit different.
Paul:And, you know, maybe take some some hits in terms of your your XP or something like that. But I don't know if that'll end up making the cut, but it's something that I've always thought about doing.
Matthew:Cool. It's appropriate for the genre, isn't it? I think, actually.
Dave:Very.
Paul:Yeah. Yeah. I just don't know how I don't know. I do maybe want it to be slightly grittier than that, so it may not end up in there. But yeah.
Dave:Maybe having that as an occasional thing that can happen rather than something that will always happen. Yeah.
Paul:Mhmm.
Dave:It's like having No. I'm looking regeneration in Dungeons and Dragons.
Paul:Might even be like a talent might be like a talent that you can buy or something like that. But yeah.
Dave:Okay. Yeah. Cool.
Matthew:So I I was looking at the campaign earlier on, and I have now lost the tab because I've got too many going up I did notice though that not enough people have backed it yet.
Paul:That's right. Yeah. And that's my too fine a point on it, but yeah, we're not looking super great in terms of funding right now. So we'll see. I thought that I had set my, my goal relatively modestly, but perhaps I didn't.
Paul:I don't know. The the 20XX Zines, the original version of Grit Shock did about $5,000 in funding. So I went slightly higher than that. And, so far, it's looking like it's gonna be difficult to reach that. So we could certainly use any any any support from anyone.
Matthew:No. I think I think I might, put out, not just, obviously, will you be appearing on our, and it's worth saying this. As recording this, there were twenty two days left. But when you, dear listener, are listening to this, there will be more like fifteen days left. So you've only got a couple of weeks.
Matthew:Do not delay. Get over to Gamefound and do the backing of the project. There's a big button here that says back this product, and then there's a a lot of options there for you. Right. Yeah.
Matthew:Let's just talk about some of these, levels. Yeah. Can we? These reward levels. So you've got the basic, you know, digital or print and digital.
Matthew:Mhmm. The higher ones, we've got two we've got a digital visionary and a printed digital visionary. Me about the difference between those. I guess you only get digital products, but what what's the visionary element?
Paul:So the visionary element is, I'm working with a pretty fantastic lineup of artists on this project, assuming if it funds. I've already worked with them a little bit. I would like to work with them all more. And those artists include, Stephen DeValle, who's a, Belgian comic book artist, as well as Giannis Milano Giannis and Simon Roy, who are both, comic book artists who have been published extensively in The US, but neither of them are actually from The US. Anyway, they're Mhmm.
Paul:Excellent artists. If you look at some of the artwork on the game found page for Gridshock zero edition, you'll see what I'm talking about. What the visionary
Dave:Some of it is super. Absolutely.
Paul:What the visionary visionary levels would let you do is let you describe to me a piece of artwork that you would like to see in the book, and I will work with you to make sure that it fits into the setting or whatever. And, we will work with one of those artists to get it in the book. So, essentially, you get to create a, art director order for a piece of artwork that you wanna see in the book. This is something that I saw RPGs do, like, a long time ago. I haven't seen it happen on Kickstarter in a bit, but I figured I would give it a shot.
Paul:I always thought it was a cool thing. I've done it before a long time ago. But, yeah, the the difference between them is just whether or not you wanna print copy of the book with that or not.
Matthew:But yeah.
Paul:But yeah. But I figured I would put those in there. Gamefound really encouraged me to put in some higher tiers because I tend to be a bare bones guy. I was just like, I just wanna make this book. And they're like, no.
Paul:No. No. You really gotta put in something else. So that's what I came up with.
Matthew:We've we've we've been on our on our Discord, and listeners who aren't patrons and aren't on our Discord, this is a call out to you. Join our Discord, and you can join in these conversations. We've been reading articles about whales, kick starting or should I say crowdfunding whales who always go for the the biggest level and all the extra stuff that you have to produce to make sure the biggest level looks really big.
Paul:And Yeah. That's the terminology. They they they messaged me when I was setting up my campaign. They said, you need whale tears. I was like, okay.
Dave:Yeah. Well, how do I go about getting one of those then? It's like Yeah.
Matthew:Yeah. Mhmm. Alright. Well, anyway, so, yes. Listeners, back this game.
Matthew:I will definitely having had this conversation, I'm pretty much ready to back this project. Although I don't know if I've backed anything off QuidShop before, so I've got work out how the payment works and stuff like that.
Paul:Game Sound is interesting because you can actually do this thing that they call stretch pay where you can pay for stuff in increments over time.
Matthew:Oh. And
Paul:I I did make that an option on there. So it makes it a
Matthew:little How does that affect you? So if I what the
Paul:It doesn't affect me at all because I set it up where it's like, by the time the book comes out, you've already paid for it.
Matthew:Pay for the whole. Right. Okay. Yeah. And, yeah, you mentioned a little bit about when it's coming out.
Matthew:What's your timeline? I'm just flicking over I that now, but
Paul:gave myself plenty of time to work on it because I looked at our previous project terminal state, and I saw that it took a little bit longer than we expected. So I decided to be more conservative in terms of how long it was gonna take or maybe more liberal would be a better word for it. But anyway, my goal is for it to come out in the spring of twenty twenty eight. It's possible it would come out sooner than that, but I just wanted to be safe and give myself plenty of time to work
Dave:on it. Yeah.
Paul:And Chris and the artists and all that stuff.
Matthew:Yeah. But this might be the right time to introduce, Chris back into the conversation and say, hold on. Where's my copy of Terminal 6?
Chris:Or getting the print proof set up soon and then allow give it to print. I had a issue with the collector's edition. When I looked at it, I didn't look based on quantity on what it would take to do what I wanted to do. And nobody would do it at the quantity I need moving forward what I wanted to do. I had to rework it and I had to
Paul:check, I checked with
Chris:the backers. Everybody who responded back was purely positive with my thoughts on how to adjust for it. So they're getting a better quality book, just not with the goal. Basically, I can't do the metallic that I wanted to do on the cover.
Matthew:Right. Right. Nobody And and the the printers are looking at a bigger print than for that. Yeah.
Chris:It's, like, triple of the amount I actually need. So
Paul:Yeah. We can't viable option. We we didn't raise enough to do that.
Dave:Yeah. So Yeah.
Chris:And, well, I don't so I don't wanna print, you know, three times of my own. I need to have them just sitting there because I don't they're the
Paul:Yeah. Yeah. Especially since it's a Kickstarter exclusive.
Matthew:Gonna sit in boxes in your lounge or whatever if you don't sell them, aren't they?
Chris:Could build a coffee table out of them maybe. So so I adjusted that and then I lost power for a week right after that. So once I got that sort thing, things got in the way, but we're moving forward now and we're good to go. I'm just getting the final print set up.
Matthew:But we were actually briefly discussing this, listeners. I I didn't just throw that question at Chris. I we we discussed it beforehand. Paul, you said something very interesting actually about a complication that's arisen actually because more retailers are ordering more of the standard print copy. Tell me tell me about that, Chris, because I'm very interested in American retailers ordering our book.
Matthew:It's also funeral.
Chris:You have backed it at just the retailer level and has come in and wanted more copies. So afterwards, it'll be available on exalted funeral to buy because they purchased a decent amount. And if it does well enough, they may that's what happened with grid shock zines as well. They they purchased some, sold them all out, and they did a second run, a printing run of their own. So Right.
Chris:Hopeful that could happen, but, you know, at least it'll be available there afterwards because I'm only printing enough to cover what was done. And for them, I won't have tons of extra copies of my own. Right. Yeah. It is what it is, and we'll move forward.
Paul:Mhmm.
Dave:Yeah. Cool. Cool. I should look forward to seeing it whenever it arrives, Chris.
Paul:Yeah.
Chris:Yeah. Coming soon.
Matthew:And we are exactly forty eight minutes in, which by my watch means, Dave, you have to be leaving to do the your next thing, and we should be saying goodbye to Paul and Chris.
Paul:Alright.
Dave:Yep. Thanks so much for joining us, guys. It's a real pleasure to to see you both. Fingers crossed. I hope everything goes really well for the rest of the campaign.
Dave:Definitely be plugging it at every opportunity. I don't think we should
Chris:see it, but your book's on the shelf right behind me too.
Matthew:That's good to see.
Chris:It's in in with all the YZ ebooks.
Matthew:So I'm shocked, genuinely shocked that this hasn't got more support on GameFound.
Dave:Yeah. It's
Matthew:Currently, at the time of recording, we've got 47 backers. It's about halfway towards its first target. But, you know, stretch goals are not gonna be met. And this is a good game. It it looks really good.
Matthew:It's a really good setting. And I am wondering whether I can't remember how well Chris's game, Terms State did. I seem to remember that was a bit of a slow mover.
Dave:It was a slow mover. It it ended up with 282 backers and pledged just just over $14,500. So what's that about? £11,000, £12,000, something like that? Yeah.
Dave:But I don't know what the target was, but that was obviously enough to get them past yeah, the target was $10,000. So they they got past that reasonably But comfortably in the I do remember, I think, there was definitely a concern on Chris's part at the time that it was moving slowly, and it was a to get over the line.
Matthew:Yeah. I urge people to back it, if only for the PDF, because I'd really like to see this come out. It's but there there are some issues with Gamefound, I feel. That yeah. I backed it straight away after that interview.
Matthew:After we recorded the interview, I should say. And two particular things with Gamepad. Obviously, one one of the things I wanted to do was encourage more backers. And normally on Kickstarter, there's a thing that says press this button, and it'll make a, you know, draft a social media page for you that says, I am proud to be backer number 47, I think.
Dave:Yeah. I
Matthew:was. On, you know, on this, and then you post that on your social media. It looks lovely. That thing doesn't exist on Gamefound, and I feel that's missing a trick.
Dave:That does seem to be a bit of a miss, isn't
Paul:it? But
Matthew:the big thing about Gamefound is VAT. And he talked a little bit in the interview, actually, about the complications of a European VAT. I don't think it should be that complicated. It isn't when we backed in Kickstarter. It wasn't.
Matthew:And I don't know whether yeah. I don't know. I can't quite remember how that went but it didn't feel a great burden. But here, when you go to the site, you see a pledge level, let's say it's £60. Then it goes to another page and you you say yeah I'll pledge on that.
Matthew:And it says now we're adding, £12.50 onto that for VAT. Which technically in most European states you're not allowed to do because you have to have the price advertised including VAT. I think this is a bit of a workaround they have. They, you know, they, so they haven't taken you quite to the checkout because saying that at the checkout is definitely illegal. What they kinda do is they take you to this interim page and they say, you know, we're adding the 20% on here.
Matthew:So actually, you know, do you want to go to Lushak out with £72? It feels like that might be within the letter of the law, but not the spirit of the law. And I reckon a whole bunch of people probably get to that page and think, fuck that. Yeah. And then Chris and Paul are losing backing.
Dave:Yeah. And particularly, you know, while postage costs are still pretty pretty high.
Matthew:Yeah. We haven't even added the postage yet.
Dave:Yeah. European and British backers I mean, I think twice about backing something that's being produced in The States, or outside of, you know, the EU and UK simply because, you know, the the you you get some eye watering postage costs. Now sometimes that's worth it if you really want the game, I'm prepared to pay it. But if it's something that's a little bit of a impulse buy, then then then that could put people off. And like you say, adding on the additional cost might just be another obstacle they can't they can't escape, can't get over.
Dave:Yeah. I also I mean, I mentioned it in the in the interview as well, but also, it's having spoken to Paul about it. I got a lot more excited about the game than I did just looking at their page. And I I wonder whether in just the way they presented it, it's it's the the key messages aren't punching you in the face. Because I think the game is probably a lot, lot better than I felt it might be by just glancing over their game found landing page.
Matthew:Yes.
Dave:So I think maybe they've they've, I don't know, somehow missed missed a trick. I mean, it's it's a very subtle art getting this kind of thing right, and it's it's very difficult. And each every every presentation is different, and sometimes might take a different approach to get it right. But, you know, they've laid out lots of the art, which is lovely, which is really cool. I like the art very much.
Matthew:Yeah. Was gonna say about that art as well. It feels very 2,000 AD, and I was fascinated to hear that they both actually grew up here in The UK reading 2,000 AD. So you can see that inspiration coming through.
Dave:Yeah. Anyway, carry on. There's there's even one character who's wearing judge dreads boots. It's like which is fine. It's a good look for for me, but like you say, maybe that doesn't hit The US market.
Matthew:But you could imagine this whole setting actually being a 2,000 AD strip actually, I think
Dave:as Yeah, And then nothing wrong with that at all.
Matthew:No, nothing wrong with that at all.
Dave:But I think, yeah, I think just their presentation sort of loses, doesn't have the oomph, doesn't have the doesn't doesn't reach out of the screen and grab you by the lapels and say, look at this. This looks fucking cool. Mhmm. And I I I got much more excited about it by talking to Paul, and that kind of figure should be coming out of their gamefound page. Now I'm not gonna back it, but simply because my financial situation is such that I can't just do a random impulse buy.
Dave:But if I had a bit more money, I would definitely have backed it. And if it succeeds and I find I see it in a shop somewhere, I might buy I might I might well buy it in the future.
Paul:It's
Dave:not it's not the game that's stopping me. And again, things like, you know, they're vector archetypes. So your character is called a vector. Some of those archetypes look really sound really cool. I really like the idea behind a lot of this.
Dave:So I I really hope that they get a bit of a bit of a drive. I absolutely encourage listeners, if you're interested, go and have a look. If you want to give it a punt, give it a go. They're nearly halfway there. I mean, they're, you know, they're it's not it's not impossible that they're not gonna get funded.
Dave:You know, they're they they've they've still got the chance. They've still got the opportunity.
Matthew:So Come on, guys. Listeners, let's let's just show the power of this podcast. Everybody go and back it. All our listeners, go and back it. Let's see over the next couple of weeks, suddenly, they burst through their
Dave:That would be
Matthew:test track goal. It would be cool. Just one point for our British viewers who are going, what do what do you mean VAT? It's a book. Books are
Dave:Mhmm. Mhmm.
Matthew:Zero rated for VAT. And in fact, I think, although PDFs weren't until recently, I think PDF Books as opposed to PDF Services are zero rated as well. Why are we being charged VAT? My best conclusion is actually it's not the books you're getting charged the VAT on. It's the fact that you're doing it through a service and therefore as a digital service
Dave:Uh-huh.
Matthew:Which is to say GameFound, you know, what you what what you're doing here is you're not buying a book from a store. You are using GameFound, to to to help co fund a book. That, I think, may be what's costing you, the 20%. However, I have challenged
Dave:to actually. Yeah.
Matthew:And sent them an I've sent them an email saying, hold on, though. Hold on. I live in The UK. Books and PDFs aren't batable. What have you got to say to that?
Matthew:Now interestingly, I knew it would happen this way. That got sent to Paul as creator. Mhmm. And I've said to Paul, when you get that, send it on to Gamefound.
Dave:Go back to Gamefound with the question. Yeah. Exactly.
Matthew:And no answer yet. So we will keep her informed if there is an answer. But Yeah. But yeah. I think I think that is probably the biggest off putting thing.
Matthew:And I think Paul says compared to Gridshock, he's got far fewer
Dave:Terminal state.
Matthew:European backers. And this is a European network, which is why, obviously, because GameFound are based in Europe. They've got to treat VAT seriously. Whereas Kickstarter, I think, just I can't remember quite how they do it. But Yeah.
Matthew:Okay. That's the thing. Anyway
Dave:think I think, you know, a message for us is this doesn't encourage us to consider changing our next
Matthew:crowdfunding campaign. Think we can stay with Kickstarter. Definitely not. Yeah. Cool.
Matthew:Okay. Well, that sounds like the end of our recording time.
Dave:It does. It does. Cool. Good stuff. Next time, what are we gonna talk about next time?
Matthew:Fact if I know, mate.
Dave:Okay. Fine. So, we'll think of something by next time, dear listeners.
Matthew:But anyway I did think No? I did wonder whether we ought to try and get in contact with our friends at Free League again. It's a long time since we spoke to them, so maybe. But then again, they'll be organizing Spell Congress, so I don't know. We'll think of something.
Dave:Spell Congress is happening as we speak. It's this weekend.
Matthew:Ah, right. Yeah. So this is not the time to phone them up and say
Dave:No. But next week might be. We're gonna do a retrospective of Spell Congress briefly and then talk about current stuff. We can we can always ask, can't we?
Matthew:Yeah. I guess oh, that's an important name to say, I guess, in terms of world I mean, we're not at Spell Congress this year.
Dave:No. No. No. We we we were invited, which is lovely of them to invite us, but all things considered, it just wasn't really gonna work for us this year. Hopefully, if we get an invite for next
Matthew:year Too much work to do on the bloody book we're gonna produce for next year.
Dave:Well, I mean, as as a very late little thing, I've now written about 25,000 words of Gold Country. Yeah. And pressing on. So the
Matthew:bulk of
Dave:text is gonna be, at least in first draft, written in the next six weeks.
Paul:Pretty
Dave:it's it's all coming along pretty well. But yeah.
Matthew:Okay. So it's goodbye from me.
Dave:And it's goodbye from him.
Paul:May the icons bless your adventures.
Dave:You have been listening to the Effekt podcast presented by Fiction Suit and the RPG Gods. Music stars on a black sea used with permission of Free League Publishing.