Go Quest Young Man

Episode Transcript
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Dave (00:39):
Hello, and welcome to episode 249 of Effect. Go quest,
young man. I'm Dave.

Matthew (00:48):
And I'm Matthew. And as usual, we have a packed but
slightly changed program.

Dave (00:54):
As usual, do we do we usually have a slightly changed
program?

Matthew (00:58):
Well, as usual, the program is packed. Unusually, it
is slightly changed.

Dave (01:03):
That's better. Thank you very much.

Matthew (01:06):
We have no new patrons, to say thank you today, but
thank you to all our existingpatrons. You keep this podcast
going. And, we've got plenty totalk about in the world of
gaming, including one bit ofnews that affects what we were
gonna talk about. You mayremember that at the end of last
episode, I said I was gonna do acomparison of Western and tales

(01:28):
of the old west, And that isconsiderably written. But we
heard the news in the latterpart of the week, that is gonna
be the world of gaming that madeus say, let's postpone it for a
little while.
And we'll explain what that bitof news is when we get to that
stage in the world of gaming. Soinstead, we have replaced it

(01:49):
with the brilliant Craig Duffyor hoodoo voodoo, as you may
know him from the interwebs, whois gonna be our Zinequest
correspondent. For the last fewyears, we have done a little bit
of a roundup of Zinequest, orzine month as it was, a month,
last year. And, and this yearwe're returning to it, but

(02:09):
slightly bigger. More content.
So, that will be our our maincontent for today.

Dave (02:15):
Yeah. So, yeah. So so, stay tuned in. Stay tuned if you
wanna hear Craig talking allabout some, lots of great things
coming up on the Zinequest. Butwhat else?
So what else is in the game?What else is in the game of
worlding?

Matthew (02:32):
The game of worlding is is cracking full today.

Dave (02:36):
It's Sunday morning. I'm not really firing on all
cylinders. I have had 2 cups oftea.

Matthew (02:40):
You did have a late night. I I saw you up watching
American football in the earlyhours of the morning. So,

Dave (02:46):
I did stay up a lot later than I intended to and should
have.

Matthew (02:51):
And that was after a lovely evening at the theater as
well. So when you packed it in.

Dave (02:55):
I had a great day at the theater seeing Rocky Horror Show
with Jason Donovan as Frankie,Frank N Furter. It was very
good. But I won't bore people

Matthew (03:03):
It was very good. You saw it, in some sort of preview
mode, south Southend, but it isgoing on tour. Check out the we
may as well put a link in theshow notes.

Dave (03:13):
It was. If

Matthew (03:13):
you're UK based, then, given I've just found the
website, we might as well put aput a link in the show notes as
well. If you fancy seeing JasonDonovan as Frank N Furter.

Dave (03:25):
He was good. He was very good. I mean, the whole
performance was excellent. So,yeah. I recommend it, heartily.

Matthew (03:32):
Cool. And you were just saying somewhat racier than you,
previously remembered.

Dave (03:37):
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I I haven't seen it live for
probably 20 years, if not a bitlonger, in fact. Probably more
like 30 years maybe. And yeah.
So I think they've changed someof the, some of the some of the
direction for some of thescenes, which made it a little
bit saucier. But that was fine.That's fine. It's all good.

Matthew (03:55):
Excellent. Saucy is the name of the game. Isn't it?

Dave (03:58):
It is. Very much so.

Matthew (04:01):
So yeah. So we are kicking off though as you as you
struggle to, enunciate with theworld of gaming.

Dave (04:08):
Thank you.

Matthew (04:08):
That's how to say it, David.

Dave (04:10):
Thanks.

Matthew (04:11):
David. And When did you

Dave (04:12):
last call me David? Bloody hell.

Matthew (04:15):
Whenever I turn you off, David.

Dave (04:19):
Anyway, yes. World of gaming. Finally, let's talk
about the world of gaming.

Matthew (04:25):
The sinking tower, which is the brilliant adventure
that I emceed at UK Games Expolast year. A brilliant
tournament adventure, the likesof which we haven't seen really
since the eighties.

Dave (04:37):
Mhmm.

Matthew (04:39):
Is released for free as the newest quick start for
Dragonbane.

Dave (04:46):
Okay. They're they're doing a new quick start. Yeah.
Okay. That's interesting.

Matthew (04:51):
So it's quite in yeah. So the adventure itself was
timed. So in theory, it onlytakes 2 hours to play. But I've
got to say, it's got a lot itfeels to me like it's got a lot
more content in the adventurethan the older quick start that
they had, the the one with themounds and the fairy. Do you

(05:12):
remember when we played it, wefelt there wasn't very much for
the elf to do because it was allkind of dungeon based.
It was it was just a couple ofrooms.

Dave (05:22):
The elf the elf's special abilities were were not really
relevant to that scenario. Yeah.I remember Yeah. Because
Mohammed was playing the elf,wasn't he? And was kind of like,
I I can't really do anything,which is a bit a bit
unfortunate.

Matthew (05:36):
Yeah. And so that was a relatively small adventure. And
in comparison, this is massive.It's got some outside bits, some
proper outside bits. So, I'msure the elf can do well, I
don't remember in any of thesegames the elves, but it's the
same set of characters, the thesort of classic quick start
characters.

Dave (05:54):
Cool. They're

Matthew (05:55):
The candor, the duck.

Dave (05:56):
They're good characters. Yeah.

Matthew (05:58):
Yeah. And, you know, it it's got, as I say, lots of
rooms to get through. It's gotthis sort of timing mechanism
that means you've got to getthrough them or you'll drown as
well because clue's in the name.It's a sinking tower. I don't
think that's a spoiler.
It's, yeah. There's there thereis more than I think you can fit

(06:19):
into a couple of hours,genuinely, and lots of different
environments, lots of different,puzzles and obstacles. I think
it's a great value game. And, ofcourse, you've got the ability
to, you know, maybe take this toyour own, convention or mini con
and pick tables against oneanother. It yeah.
I think it will probably includethe scoring system that it has

(06:41):
so you can actually see howdifferent teams do. I think it's
well worth it and a greatintroduction to Dragonbane.

Dave (06:48):
Yeah. I mean, I haven't played I haven't played, the
Sinking Towers. I I wasn't I wasbusy working whilst you were
enjoying yourself during thetournament. Mhmm.

Matthew (06:55):
So I

Dave (06:55):
didn't I

Matthew (06:56):
was working too and seeing the tournament.

Dave (07:01):
But I think the ad, you know, having it having a a quick
start scenario that you can usein various modes is is is very
sensible. You know, having it sothere's plenty of stuff to do,
but but actually, you know, ifyou're gonna run it in a
convention in 2 hours, yourplayers have got some choices to
make. You know, do we stop andtry and, you know, empty that
chest of all its goodies becausewe're here as treasure hunters?

(07:22):
Or, you know, and take the riskthat that's gonna put us behind?
Or do we do we leave it?
Leave that lovely shining swordthat we can't quite reach, but
we might be able to get to if wetry hard enough, in order to get
away. So, yeah. I think that'sgreat. It's a lovely idea. You
know.

Matthew (07:35):
Yeah. I'm remembering tactically as well. I think I
can't remember whether Luke wasthe winning team, but one of the
highest scoring teams just racedthrough the adventure, went all
the way through to to get thefinal thing, and then had time
to go back and get some of thetreasure. Right. Yeah.
Which is interesting because youdo get you get points for

(07:57):
treasure as well as points forvarious other things. So

Dave (07:59):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Matthew (08:00):
They they were wise to do that. Having having slammed
right through in, I don't know,let's say an hour and a half,
They they then went back to gettreasure to earn them a few
extra points.

Dave (08:10):
Yeah. Yeah. Secure secure the place. Yeah. Exactly.
Securing your escape firstbefore you then go back and grab
what you can. Yeah. Yeah. Youknow what? Good tactic.
Well done them.

Matthew (08:21):
Well done them. Exactly. So, that is so, you
know, in a way, it is also worthpossibly mentioning that
discussions are on with UK GamesExpo and Free League. And
although we don't yet know thename of the adventure, there
will be another, Dragon Baytournament at UK Games Expo,

(08:44):
this coming year. And I think,actually, the word has gone out
to the League of Free Agentsthat if you're UK based or
you're planning on coming to UKGames Expo, and you wanna run a
game for free league in UK GamesExpo, put in your applications
now to become Dragonbane DMs,GMs one more time.

Dave (09:04):
Yeah. Cool.

Matthew (09:08):
Talking of conventions, Chaosium's 50th anniversary,
they've they've got rathergenerous offer to anybody that
holds a convention.

Dave (09:19):
Okay. Cool.

Matthew (09:20):
You want me to tell you about it, don't you?

Dave (09:22):
I I

Matthew (09:22):
think you might just

Dave (09:23):
I I do. I'm just I'm just Okay. I I've I've I've not
looked into Chaosium's 50thanniversary at all until now,
this very moment. And I'm so I'mnot getting much information. So
tell me all so I can actsurprised and gaffer.
Go ahead, mate.

Matthew (09:38):
Excellent. I was hoping you'd you'd be able to do that.
So it's our 50th anniversary.

Dave (09:42):
Not that I'm still a bit fucking bitter about that
comment.

Matthew (09:48):
It is our trailer and has been for well over a year
now.

Dave (09:55):
Busted.

Matthew (09:57):
So 50th anniversary. Chaosium was around, started in
1975. Mostly are board games tobegin with until they released
Runequest. And they've got aspecial gift for any conventions
happening in countries that theycan easily ship to, which I'm
just trying to read because thiscould be an important thing.

(10:18):
This year, if you are running aconvention this year, it doesn't
matter who you are.
You can write to Chaosium andtell them about your convention,
and they will ship you $500worth of Chaosium products to
use as you will. Mhmm. So,

Dave (10:39):
It's quite generous, isn't

Matthew (10:41):
it? Prizes or giveaways, gifts of appreciation
to special guests, or forvolunteers, or GMs, or add them
to your conventions game libraryentirely up to you, they say.
And they're gonna include inthat their 2,025 convention demo
adventures, which are gonna befor Call of Cthulhu, Runequest,

(11:03):
Pendragon, and Rivers of London.We got some more news about that

Dave (11:06):
Oh, yeah.

Matthew (11:07):
Later on. So, they will ship convention support packs
free of charge to shippingaddresses in the USA, Canada,
UK, Australia, New Zealand, andthe European Union. And, if you
live outside one of those areas,get together with somebody in

(11:28):
those areas, so they can ship itthere. And they will ship that
to you, to your friend in one ofthose areas too. So that you can
you can somehow get it off them,and enjoy it.
So it doesn't limit it toconventions in those places, but
it does limit it conventions whocan get it from a shipping
address in one of those,regions. So that looks really

(11:52):
exciting, really generous. And Ithink, you know, what a great
way to celebrate an anniversaryYeah. Just to say, here's a
bunch of free stuff. Spread theword.

Dave (12:03):
Yeah. No. That's a great idea. They're also holding 3
Chaosium cons this year.

Matthew (12:08):
Yes.

Dave (12:09):
So there's 1 in the

Matthew (12:10):
So the

Dave (12:10):
1 in the UK, 1 in the US, and 1 in Australia.

Matthew (12:14):
Mhmm.

Dave (12:15):
All looking good. So in the USA, it's in April. In the
UK, it's in May in Cranfield.And then it's in Melbourne in
Australia in June.

Matthew (12:26):
Is that at Cranfield University? Yeah. I went to I
did a training program, afabulous training program, I
remember, for work at CranfieldUniversity. And that would be a
lovely venue to run games. Ishould check that one out.
Maybe I should go.

Dave (12:38):
So well, it says it's at the Cranfield Management
Development Centre. So whetherthat's part of

Matthew (12:41):
the Oh, that sounds a lot like the place that I'm

Dave (12:45):
Yeah. Yeah. That might well be part of the university
perhaps.

Matthew (12:51):
Yeah. Yeah. It's a it's a it's a stately home style
place. And, yeah. Very nicevenue.
That looks I recommend you. I'mjust

Dave (13:02):
looking at the website. That front that front looks very
familiar. I wonder if I've beenthere in my old incarnation as a
civil servant.

Matthew (13:08):
You might have been there for some management
training as well. Yeah.

Dave (13:12):
Yeah. Interesting. Okay. Yeah. So that's that's cool.
So I don't know how big theseconventions are. How many people
are getting ready to go? You canget your tickets. So if you go
on to the, if you look if youlook it up, there's a website,
all about it and they've gotlinks there to get,

Matthew (13:29):
to

Dave (13:29):
get your badge, which is a a nice looking little pin. But I
think that might be your activeregistration. So, if

Matthew (13:37):
you're interested

Dave (13:38):
in those, go and have a look. They've obviously gone all
in for their 50th anniversary,which is a good thing. I think,
you know, well well well donethen.

Matthew (13:47):
Yeah. No. I think I I think I think that's great. I
think that's absolutely great.Oh, yeah.
And, also, I noticed as part ofthat package, they give you a
code so that all your attendeescan get 10% off products at
chaoship.com. Right. What's nexton our list of things?

Dave (14:12):
You had mentioned Rivers of London. I'm saying there was
some more news. Now Rivers ofLondon is a game that has never
really appealed to me. I'venever read any of the books, and
the the game itself hasn'thasn't reached out and grabbed
me. So, so what's what's thenews?

Matthew (14:28):
Right. So, again, this is actually a game that has
grabbed me. I bought it. I haveone autograph by Ben Aronovich.
I I I'd ordered it from ChaosShield, delivered, and then I
took it to a convention.
Can't remember if it's UK GamesExpo or Dragon Meat, whichever
one it was, first thing in themorning. Soon as I saw Ben and

(14:52):
Ron sitting me down at thecalcium stand, I rushed over
with 2 copies. I think I thinkone yeah. I think it was UK
Games Expo because I think Yeah.Bruce was there as well.
And, I got I got them to signBruce's copy and and mine. And
Ben's a lovely bloke. I and I'mgonna do a plug here for another
podcast just by the by. I justlistened to an interview that

(15:13):
Ben did with the Grognard, Filespodcast. And Ben's a gamer
through and through.
And so this was how about how,he went from being a gamer,
writing stories around hisgames, then trying to get be a
scriptwriter and writing acouple of the best of the latter

(15:35):
part of classic Doctor Whoseries including remembrance of
the Daleks, which I alwaysadmired because it had the
Daleks hot levitating upstairsand, something else as well. Oh,
and it started the the the bitthat was a brilliant series
because it started with DoctorWho from 1963 or whenever it

(15:57):
started on the telly, playing onthe telly just as the TARDIS was
landing somewhere else. So itwas, lovely. Lovely. Anyway,
great episode.
So and then, as he said, hewasn't much of a novelist. He
thought script writing was gonnabe the easier way to do things.
But then he got paid to do theadaptation of his own Doctor Who
story into novel writing. And hesaid, the best way to learn

(16:18):
about writing novels is to getpaid to do it. So Yeah.
So that was great. Lovelyinterview. Although I've now
spoiled the best bit for you. Irecommend that. Anyway, but I
haven't played it yet.
I haven't actually had time tosit down and play it. I I kinda
don't wanna run a game. I want

Dave (16:36):
You want to play

Matthew (16:36):
a game?

Dave (16:37):
To yeah.

Matthew (16:38):
To run a game for me to play in.

Dave (16:39):
What's the, what's the mechanics for the game?

Matthew (16:42):
It's it's basic role

Dave (16:43):
playing. Right. Yeah.

Matthew (16:45):
But it uses some of the basic role playing mechanics
that make it, to my mind, a1000000 times better than Call
of Cthulhu. You know, I haveproblems with there being too
many skills in Call of Cthulhu.And arguably, I mean, I I think
it's right they do this. There'stoo much chance of failure in
Call of Cthulhu, which is rightbecause you're meant to be

(17:09):
totally incompetent against theouter dark. Yeah.
So, you know, it fits Call ofCthulhu. The only way you can
win Call of Cthulhu is by losingand going mad. But that that
that has never appealed to me asas an as a player of games. And

(17:29):
so this, you know, the emphasisis on solving the crime and
defeating the bad guys. So youare more likely to succeed in
this game in all sorts ofmechanical ways, which just make
it, for my mind, better thanCall of Cthulhu.
Smaller skill set, morespecialized around police work
and stuff like that. And, youknow, and it you know you know

(17:51):
me, and you know I'm alwaysbanging on about loving police
procedural, role playing games.And this is a police procedural
role playing game. So whywouldn't I love it? But I
haven't played it.
I haven't played it. Now,there's a couple of new things.
There's a new adventure out oror, something which I can't

(18:13):
quite remember what it's called.But the interesting thing is
they're also doing a USsupplement, which was, according
to the interview I heard, it wasgonna be part of the core rules
because obviously, calcium wannabe able to sell it to their
American chums as easily as theycan sell it to us in Britain.

Dave (18:32):
Yeah.

Matthew (18:33):
But then they decided, I guess, probably, there's lots
of stuff to go in this bookanyway. Let's split it out and
do it as a separate book. Andthat separate book is coming and
is going to, I think, be alittle bit less police
procedurally as far as I cangather.

Dave (18:48):
Okay.

Matthew (18:50):
Partly because well, for reasons to do with
perceptions of our individualpolice forces, in in in public
gamers' minds, I think. And alsobecause the literature, I you
don't you won't know theliterature here, but in in in

(19:10):
the world of Rivers of London,the Metropolitan Police have a
special unit Mhmm. Yeah. Toinvestigate magical crimes. But
also, effectively, that specialunit has got Britain's chief
wizard in it without making toomany spoilers.
And so it effectively runs, theBritish, magical effort. Now, I

(19:34):
think in where where they'vedone crossovers with what
what's, you know, stories thattouch on America, I think the
FBI may have a sort of, like, XFiles type

Dave (19:44):
type unit

Matthew (19:45):
that that that does it. But the the people that run
Magic in America is actually theLibrary of Congress. If I'm no.
I'm not the most in-depthreader, so I'm sure there are
people there that might shout,no. You're wrong, Matthew.
But as far as I can remember,there's this there's this, the
division or subsection withinthe Library of Congress who are

(20:05):
the guys who are the real Oh,

Dave (20:06):
alright. Okay.

Matthew (20:07):
Power in US magic. Anyway, where there's organized
government centered magic,obviously, there's a bunch of
heads of wizards and shaman andstuff like that all over the
place. But in terms ofnationalized magic, I think it
happens in the Library ofCongress, which I really like
that idea. So I think theAmerican settlement's gonna be a
little less police focused and abit more, dare I say it, Wild

(20:29):
West because, I dare say itbecause we're doing a Wild West
game. There's gonna be nocrossover between our Wild West
game and the world of Rivers ofLondon, though, because we don't
have magic in our game.
But, anyway, so that thatsupplement's coming out this
year. They've released a coverfor it. It seemed to be set. Or
there's the the the cover actionart seem to be San Francisco

(20:51):
based.

Dave (20:52):
Right. Okay.

Matthew (20:53):
I'm gonna probably,

Dave (20:56):
Is this a Kickstarter or, or is it?

Matthew (20:59):
No. I think there may be a preorder. I don't think
they're gonna Kickstarter withit. Right. So we shall wait and
see on that regard.
Yeah. Yeah. That's probablyenough shit battering on about
that. You talk next. Oh, no.
You can't talk next because youknow nothing about the next news
item like that.

Dave (21:19):
No. So, you know, diamond distribution goes bust is on our
notes. So I don't I don'texplain. Tell me all about
diamond distribution.

Matthew (21:26):
Okay. Well, so this has

Dave (21:29):
Well, this is good because this is a this this is a podcast
where I'm actually having to doalmost none of the work. So that
that suits me fine. Crack on.

Matthew (21:36):
But all the guffawing and acting surprise.

Dave (21:38):
That's fine. That's easy. I'll do that anyway.

Matthew (21:41):
So back when I were a lad, and collected comics,
diamond distribution was one ofthe 2 big players in comic
distribution.

Dave (21:49):
Right. Okay.

Matthew (21:50):
And I think in a way they became the one big player
in comic distribution. They usedto a thing that you could buy at
comic shops, in fact, wasDiamond Distribution's, you
know, catalog of upcomingcomics, which is really, you
know, published for comic shopmanagers, but then started
getting interest for for a whileas well. So they were a huge
power in comic distribution.And, obviously, they're in

(22:11):
tabletop gaming as well, becausethere's a big crossover between
comic shops and game shops. Andin fact, they have a sort of,
what they had, I should say, asubsidiary called Alliance
Games, which which specialize inthe tabletop market.
They've had to sell AllianceGames because they are in

(22:33):
chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Dave (22:35):
Right.

Matthew (22:35):
So part of this is me going, oh, crikey. That's, you
know, that's a distributors, youkind of feel as a sort of power
behind the throne, themiddleman, they just make money.
They can't they, you know, theydon't they don't particularly
invest in in art and, you know,making comics and stuff. All
they do is take a cut of prettymuch every comic you buy. Mhmm.

(22:58):
Yeah. So I kind of thought theirrole in the world was, you know,
relatively safe,

Dave (23:05):
low risk.

Matthew (23:06):
But they've they've gone bust. They they owe a bunch
of money to, you know, peoplelike Hasbro, Wizards of the
Coast, and, quite a few gamingcompanies. And it's, you know,
reasonably large amounts ofmoney. You know, we're talking
100 of 1,000 of dollars, whichdoesn't mean it's lost forever

(23:27):
to forever to those gamecompanies. They may get some
portion of that back becauseit's chapter 11, and that's how
bankruptcy works in

Dave (23:35):
In the States.

Matthew (23:37):
In the States. So, you know, they may well survive.
They're selling off assets. Theythey may offer, you know, 90¢ to
the dollar or 50¢ a dollar orsomething. So they'll probably
not lose all that money,whatever the worst situation is.
But still, it's I'd I'msurprised because diamond
distribution were, like, justone of the behemoths that you

(23:57):
never thought would die. And andand in fact, Diamond UK is part
of that sale of, AllianceDistribution. So there will be
no disruption of service. That'sall been taken over by another
company called UniversalDistribution.

Dave (24:16):
Okay. I guess that's the the key thing for for customers.

Matthew (24:19):
Yeah. Yes. For customers in the UK, but yeah.
And they there's releasestatements saying there will be
no disruption to service.Everybody's getting their games
and stuff like that.
Yeah. But I do look at some ofthose big money, big money,
creditors. They they may befacing some sort of financial

(24:40):
risk. Yeah. So, yeah, that isthe last bit of well, that's not
the very last bit of world ofgaming news.
The last bit is we want to sendour best hopes to Anders
Gilbrink because in the latestupdate for the western RPG,

(25:02):
there there was a veryreassuring couple of paragraphs
that was making me think as Iwas reading it, this is this is
suspiciously reassuring. What'sgone wrong? The last bit of the
update email, and, obviously,you can read it on the
Kickstarter updates as well ifyou're a backer, is that Anders
Gilbrink went into hospital fora brain operation, and there are

(25:25):
now complications where so he'sbeen he's on an he's still in
the hospital and on antibioticsbecause of, an infection he's
got. So I just wanna wish him,well, the very best Yes.
Absolutely.

Dave (25:37):
For speedy recovery. Yeah. Indeed. So, yeah. I mean, not
much else to say really otherthan, good luck Anders and, get
well very soon.
And as a as a result, we wedecided that we'd postpone our
western conversation to anotherday, and just, you know, let's
not focus on focus on Anders andsending him all our best wishes

(26:00):
for a quick recovery.

Matthew (26:02):
Yeah. Oh, although one of the things I realized now
that I forgot to mention when Iwas saying what was coming in
the next episode is we do havesome old west news, don't we,
Dave? Here's a chance for you totalk.

Dave (26:14):
We always have some old west news. Yeah. Old west news.
So, what's the what's the updatetoday? So we have been working
round the clock, to get the thelayout finished for the,
initially to get the PDF, outto, out to our backers.

(26:34):
The news is we are very verynearly there. So with, a lot of
hard work and, our layout guy,Stefan, has been absolutely
brilliant and sterling in hisenthusiasm and energy in, in in
taking this forward. And hasdone a brilliant job. We are I'm

(26:55):
in the middle of proofing.Proofreading the the final
document which, you know, asanyone who's done a proofread
knows is is difficult, is, timeconsuming to do it thoroughly.
And actually is destined tofail, because you're gonna miss
some stuff. And somebody willsay did anyone proofread this?
So I'm I'm stealing myself forthat. But, so that's going quite

(27:18):
well. I'm about halfway throughthe book now.
I need a couple more sort ofworking days to to get that
finished. There's there's asyou'd expect, there's quite a
lot of small little things thatneed changing. But, I mean,
they're all very or most of themare gonna be pretty quick, on
the whole, typos or things thataren't quite right. But they're
pretty simple to change. There's1 or 2 things where I've picked

(27:39):
up a bit of text that shouldhave been expunged, earlier, but
I don't think it's gonna causeus a big problem.
It's not it's not great bigswathe of text. So it shouldn't
cause too much trouble for thelayout.

Matthew (27:56):
But,

Dave (27:56):
yeah. So I'm about halfway through. I will have finished
that, early next week, or bymiddle of next week. How long
it'll take?

Matthew (28:06):
And the important thing about what you're doing, I mean,
hoping hoping that we can justreplace that bit of text with a
little picture we've got. Youknow, we haven't we haven't
quite used all our art in thisbecause, frankly, there hasn't
been room for it. So if if aparagraph opens up a bit more
space for a bit of art, then wewill happily fill that with
that.

Dave (28:25):
Yeah. But the other thing

Matthew (28:26):
you're doing, of course, hopefully, is marking
now which when it says see pagex Oh, yeah. We're gonna know
which page to that be linked to.

Dave (28:35):
Yeah. So part of part of the thing that is really slowing
this down is all is doing allthose cross cross references.
Because, actually, there's a lotmore in the book than you'd
really realized. Although,actually, I'm mostly through the
rules bit. So until I hit thecampaign chapter, I'm thinking
that we won't have many of thosenow.
So it should speed

Matthew (28:56):
up a little bit. There'll be fewer of those.
Yeah.

Dave (28:58):
The other thing I'm doing whilst I'm doing this is
building up the index as well.Well.

Matthew (29:01):
So

Dave (29:01):
that that those two things on top of the proofread are
obviously slowing, making it upa slower, a slower task than I
would have liked. But we'regetting there. We're getting
there. I I I did kind of thinkit might take me a week, and, I
I'm gonna be right. It will havetaken me a week of work to do
that.
But anyway, so that is verynearly there. So we're not a
long way away from getting thePDF out to, out to backers. And

(29:26):
then we're obviously straightinto, the actual production side
of it. The pledge manager willbe opening as soon as we're able
to. We'll get the stuff over tothe printers to get all that
going.
And, yeah. So I think, you know,the upshot is the only other,
you know, the the headline iswe're very very nearly on target

(29:49):
for our end of January deliveryfor the PDF. I think we might
still just about manage that.

Matthew (29:55):
I think we will. I think we'll hit on target for
that first PDF. And if

Dave (29:58):
and if we don't, it'll only be a few days. So we're not
we are we are very, very nearlythere. And then, you know,
hopefully, in the beginning of 4months for our delivery target
of May. You know, at the moment,that feels entirely doable. So
Yeah.
Yeah. So it's good. It's allgood. It's, yeah. And it's it's
actually it's been because Iworked on this text so much over

(30:20):
the last however many years.
And then it's there's been verymuch polishing a bit of here,
changing a bit of rules there,this kind of stuff, or changing
a bit of text. I haven't satdown on Reddit from cover to
cover for ages. So it's actuallyreally quite nice doing that. So
I'm I'm enjoying the processeven if it is quite slow and a
bit laborious. But it's, yeah.

(30:42):
It's it's quite fun. And I thinkI think it's quite good, most of
what we've done. So I'm quite I

Matthew (30:49):
I thought something that, Stefan said was very
reassuring. Because, of course,he is coming cold to this Yeah.
As a layout guy. He hasn't beenlike our patrons who've, you
know, followed us from earlywork in progress versions,
because it was a reward for ourpatrons to to see us build this
game. So he's coming to it coldand new and knowing nothing

(31:10):
about it.
And he said, how much fun itlooked and how much work he got
into it. And he he was quiteimpressed by everything. So that
that's really good to hear.

Dave (31:19):
Absolutely. Yeah. Which is good. Because I think, you know,
it feels to me that it's quite ahard job doing the layout. And
it feels to me that there's alot of, you know, finickity
going backwards and forwardsover what might seem like very,
very minor points.

(31:41):
And it feels to me it would bequite easy for a layout artist
to get fed up with a particularjob. Yeah.

Matthew (31:48):
Or client.

Dave (31:49):
Or or client. Yeah. Yeah. I mean he hates you. And he
loves me, but he hates you.
But, you know, the fact thathe's he's been so enthusiastic
and and energetic, and maybe thefact that he is liking what he's
seeing, has helped helpedmaintain his enthusiasm for the
project. Yeah. But, yeah, we weonly we only

Matthew (32:12):
need more budget, more hours, and more money for
layout, I think.

Dave (32:17):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Definitely.
Cool. What else? So yeah.

Matthew (32:23):
Anyway What else?

Dave (32:24):
The final book is gonna be about 300 pages now. We're
that's where it's gonna landroughly. So it's a it's a
significantly bigger book thanwe sort of originally
anticipated going on on somesort of industry standard.

Matthew (32:38):
Yeah. It's it's

Dave (32:39):
half as per page. Yeah.

Matthew (32:41):
Half as much again.

Dave (32:42):
Nearly. Yeah.

Matthew (32:44):
And it isn't like we've done a layout that is
particularly word light,actually.

Dave (32:49):
No. No. Not at all. I think it's not. I think it's all
the tables.

Matthew (32:52):
Yeah. I think it's the tables too.

Dave (32:54):
A lot of the tables. And also, not every book. We we
we've got 20 pages of chapteropenings. Yeah. That's 20 pages
of nothing but chapter, youknow, chapter double spread.

Matthew (33:06):
Double page spread.

Dave (33:07):
With a nice picture. So there's 20 pages straight off
that we kind of perhaps haven'tfactored into our calculation.
But yeah.

Matthew (33:15):
I think we did factor those in. I seem to remember.
But anyway, yes. It but thenstill, I think even we factored
it in, it was like it was gonnabe 220 pages. Now I think the
tables have taken up a lot morespace than we imagined.
You know, part of that, most ofthe tables, obviously, we have
tried to fit, you know, on apage or on a spread. Some of the

(33:36):
ones in the appendix with we,you know, realizing how far over
budget we were on on printedpages. The appendix tables do
cross over, you know, and runover from one page into the
next. But, but there, justcreating those tables and then
realizing that that occupiedspace that I think has made made

(33:56):
the page count bigger than, weoriginally thought it would be.

Dave (34:00):
Yeah. But I'm, you know, I'm fine with that, actually. I
mean, it's a good lesson fornext time.

Matthew (34:06):
Mhmm.

Dave (34:07):
But also, for this being our first product, I don't mind
us going a bit going the extramile. Getting a book that's a
bit meatier and a bit bigger.Hopefully, when people get it in
their hands, it will feelsubstantial. Yeah. And it'll
it'll add to the to the woah.
This is alright. This is good.Kind of, I feel that I want
people to have when they openthe box when they finally get it

(34:30):
and get the book in their hands.Yeah. Yeah.
Cool.

Matthew (34:35):
So, that's okay. What else? We we the the other news
is oh, we had to create atalking of chapter spreads, we
felt we had to create anotherchapter spread, which we've done
for the for the appendix.

Dave (34:49):
Yeah.

Matthew (34:51):
More on that when you see it.

Dave (34:55):
Yes.

Matthew (34:57):
When And also, I

Dave (34:58):
It'll be interesting to see what was what we what
response we get to to that tothat image. It's a good image.
It's one that we talked aboutthat you you are advocated for a
long time ago. I I don't know. II I guess I'd I'd thought you'd
forgotten about it and, youknow, it wasn't gonna appear,
and then it appeared.

Matthew (35:17):
Well, I have forgotten about it because we'd we'd
changed the chapters around. Wethought we weren't gonna need
that one. Yeah. And then wedecided the appendix does need
it. So, so but I hadn't actuallyforgotten about it.
It just stopped talking aboutit. I think we need another
double page spread. I went, Iknow exactly what's going there.

Dave (35:36):
It's a good image. But it's, yeah. It's, it's I don't
know what's the right word. It'sit's not it's not a it's not a
courageous image. It's just maymaybe not every maybe not every
publisher would have thought toput an image like that in the
book.
But it's

Matthew (35:51):
I I'm a bit disappointed actually. I I I
said to, I said to Stefan, I betyou've never seen another role
playing game.

Dave (35:58):
Yeah.

Matthew (35:59):
That content in it. And he went, actually, yeah. That's
in, that's in Cult.

Dave (36:03):
Cult. Yeah. But then I I suspect in cult, it's
significantly more bloody

Matthew (36:08):
in the world. I'm sure it's I'm sure it's an entirely

Dave (36:11):
Our picture is a very, very sanitized image. Wholesome.
Wholesome. Yes. That's the word.
Yep.

Matthew (36:19):
And, I don't imagine that the the one in, anyway,
wait and see wait and see forthat one. And the other thing,
I've I've seen a picture back ofour new dice trays, the proof of
our new dice trays. So I'm aboutto press the go button on that.
I just

Dave (36:34):
wanted to

Matthew (36:35):
do another picture. It's looking a bit pale to me.

Dave (36:38):
And I

Matthew (36:38):
wonder whether that's them, the lighting Yeah. Yeah.
Or whether I need to say, no. Weneed it. We need we need to
bring out the color a little bitmore.
Yeah. But,

Dave (36:48):
That does look very good though. The image we've chosen
for that, for the dye straightis

Matthew (36:52):
really Chef's kiss, that image.

Dave (36:54):
Superb image. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Absolutely superb.

Matthew (37:00):
Cool. I think everybody would be very pleased with it.
We've shown it to our patrons.And our patrons one of our
patrons said, well, the onlyproblem with that image is it's
not in my house. Yeah.
So, where are we? Yeah. That'sthe end of, I guess,

Dave (37:18):
Yeah. That's probably the end

Matthew (37:19):
of manager coming soon. You've already said that,
haven't you? Yeah. So let's,click over to our interview with
Craig Duffy.

Dave (37:28):
Zoom quest. Exactly. Yes. And yes. And let's let's go over
to our to our correspondent atZinequest for the for the latest
news.

Matthew (37:36):
Well, we're very excited to welcome into the
hammam this evening themarvelous Craig or as you know
him on the interwebs, hoodoovoodoo. You've been on before,
Craig, but you're always welcomeback.

Dave (37:52):
You are.

Craig (37:52):
Well, I mean, it's a pleasure to be back, and thank
you once again. It's always funto come and talk about Zinequest
and Zinequest small gamesbecause not everything can be a
massive 300 pages view at themoment.

Matthew (38:10):
300 page. Page.

Craig (38:12):
For toto, which I just also want to say a massive
congratulations to the both ofyou on that one. That was a
fantastic campaign.

Dave (38:20):
Thank you.

Matthew (38:21):
Thank you very much. Thank you. We've got a new
sporter ones. Dave Dave needs aregular income going into the
future. And, actually, I thinkif Dave were to churn out
something kind of Zinequest sizeevery month, he could probably
get something approaching aregular income.

Dave (38:38):
Would be yeah. Would be nice. Yeah.

Matthew (38:40):
But but that's what you gotta do. I mean, it's taken us
6 years to get this one. Wecan't wait for another 6 years
for you to get what? Another Idon't know what our profit's
gonna be out of this. Maybeyou'll get a £1,000?

Dave (38:50):
Maybe.

Matthew (38:51):
Yeah. We'll see.

Craig (38:52):
I mean, 5 to 10000 words a month should be no problem for
a pro.

Dave (38:57):
Yeah. That's that's entirely doable, frankly. Yeah.
Anyway, we're not here to talkabout me. We're talking about
Craig and Zine Zine.

Matthew (39:06):
Right. So, yeah, you predicted what we wanna talk
about. Zinequest is coming up.You've got a new game that's
going to be, what do you callit? Crowdfunded on Kickstarter.

Craig (39:19):
Yep. I'm back on Kickstarter this year for the
words we leave behind, which isanother 2 player duet game about
time travel, changing histories,and the butterfly effect
inspired by the novella, this ishow you lose the time war.

Dave (39:40):
Oh.

Matthew (39:43):
Cool. So does this fit in with your whole, rock
hoppers? Is this part of thatsame big narrative that,
allegations And even with thetime war?

Craig (39:55):
Yes and no. I'm trying not to give away too much on
that answer, but I have beenusing it. Actually, one of the
things I've been using it for isto develop some of the history
for that setting. So some of thebits that came before, I thought
why not use my own games to todevelop it?

Dave (40:15):
Okay. And so so you're you're making use of all your
your nice bit of sort of Canonbackstory creation by making a
game that takes you back there?

Craig (40:25):
I mean, essentially. Yeah. So

Dave (40:26):
Yeah. Cool.

Craig (40:28):
The game is all about having 2 agents to 2 players
fighting over time by jumping todifferent bits and changing the
flow of history

Matthew (40:38):
and Oh, so it's not only a duet game, but it's PVP,
is it?

Craig (40:44):
I mean, it's PVP but collaborative in the same way.
So they're both fighting againstone another, but as players,
you're building the sharednarrative. But there's also
mechanics where you change whatthe other person has written.

Matthew (41:02):
Oh. Right. Dude, tiny wimey stuff.

Craig (41:06):
Exactly. That's one of the bits that I really wanted to
emphasize, that time travel hasconsequences. And Are

Dave (41:16):
you We all know Sorry. Karen?

Craig (41:19):
We wanna you obviously heard of the butterfly effect
that one small change step on abutterfly during the dinosaur
period and all of historychanges, and that's what the
game really embraces.

Dave (41:32):
Are you, are you are you tackling are you tackling
paradoxes? Or how are youtackling paradoxes? Or are you
just type are you just handwaving them like most most time,
like, media?

Craig (41:43):
I'm not really tackling paradoxes because you're not
interacting with your ownhistory in that regards. Right.
And so that's the big paradoxthat everyone always comes. If
you go and kill yourgrandfather, what happens to
you? I'm not really exploringthat side of things.

Dave (42:01):
Right. Okay.

Matthew (42:03):
I just wanted to, you know, promote my nerd
credentials by saying, ofcourse, the butterflies fact is
named after the short story, ASound of Thunder, isn't it, by,
Ray Bradbury, I believe?

Craig (42:16):
It's something like that. I will have to take your word on
it.

Matthew (42:19):
My I'm

Craig (42:20):
drawing a blank, unfortunately.

Dave (42:22):
That swap Matthew was just looking up on his iPad to try
and

Matthew (42:25):
No. No. No. No. No.
No. That is a story. I was a bigBradbury fan in my early teens,
and I remember that story sowell. And, yeah. Anyway sorry.
But I believe it's called thesound of thunder. Anyway, moving
on, can you give us a littlehint about any interesting game

(42:47):
mechanics?

Craig (42:49):
So it adapts the mechanics that I developed for
signal to noise, which would bemy 2 player game of loss and
distance as one person is onEarth and the other leaves the
solar system forever.

Dave (43:03):
Yeah.

Craig (43:03):
So you have cards that you're playing that give you
prompts, and each card tells youwhere in history you're gonna go
to. And then the suit tells youwhat sort of mission or how to
approach the mission that youryour bosses have told you. So if
you play a harp, for example,you might have been told go back

(43:25):
in time and seduce this personthat historically didn't fall in
love. You write your event, butthen the butterfly event effect
comes into play because ifyou've been sent, say, in the
middle of the established timeperiod, every event that comes
after it, you go and change onesentence. So Right.

(43:46):
Each turn, they each turn, theydrift slightly, and it just
accumulates and snowballs.

Matthew (43:55):
So the person of the mission has the is the person in
control of the changing ofeverything that happens
afterwards?

Craig (44:04):
Yes. Yeah. But then the next turn, the other person
might go even further back intime

Matthew (44:10):
Yeah.

Craig (44:11):
And change what you've just wrote in, or they might go
into the future and only changeone event.

Dave (44:17):
Right. Okay.

Matthew (44:18):
So how much do you expect people so people write a
response to the prompt. How howmany words or substances or what
how long is that response meantto be?

Craig (44:33):
I mean, I say in the guidance, I think it's at least
10 sentences. So it can beshort.

Matthew (44:42):
Right. Right.

Craig (44:43):
Or you can go long. I say I think it's 10 sentences up to
a page in the current draft. Soit doesn't have to be an entire
chapter describing your yearlong mission into the Roman
period. You could just cut tothe action. Talk about how you
save Caesar.

Matthew (45:00):
Say Andrew Gasco are playing this game together,
they'd have, you know, 3 or 4volumes by the end of their
first mission, wouldn't they?Well, I

Craig (45:07):
mean, if if that's the way you wanna play it, you
could, but then the changes youmake are gonna be much more
subtle, much smaller.

Matthew (45:15):
Well, obviously, they are good. Yeah. Yeah.

Craig (45:17):
Yeah. Whereas if you keep them to a page, you feel the
impact of each change when itcomes in.

Matthew (45:26):
I can see.

Dave (45:26):
Right. I can

Matthew (45:27):
see it. Yeah. Yeah. And, so what sort of format is
it gonna be in when you when yougo to the Kickstarter? What what
what do you I mean, obviously,it's a zine format, but have you
got any interesting, fix youyou've got planned for the
presentation of it?

Craig (45:43):
I mean, it's it's gonna be a zine format. I'm working
with a new artist, Carly AF,that's going to be doing the art
for it. She's already done a fewpieces, and the Kickstarter will
add to that.

Dave (45:57):
Cool.

Craig (45:57):
But it's gonna be very much a standard zine format.

Matthew (46:01):
Mhmm. Okay. And what glossy covers or anything?

Craig (46:05):
Nope. No. I'm keeping it simple unless we if it goes
really well, I've got a fewplans to maybe upgrade it to a
slightly fancier, but at itscore, it's a standard zine. This
is what I'm learning is that Idon't have the patience to write
longer, big, hardback games. Ilike small focused stories.

Dave (46:26):
Are you are you saying that we're not focused?

Craig (46:30):
I'm saying you have big imaginations.

Dave (46:33):
That was very cleverly done. Well done. Saved yourself
there.

Matthew (46:37):
So, Dave, you're going out to dinner after this
interview. What paid you up towith the proofing of the layout
of our game?

Dave (46:44):
A 133.

Matthew (46:47):
You see, that is a lack of focus, Dave.

Dave (46:49):
It's fucking hard work, I tell you. It really is.

Craig (46:52):
Whereas, I think my biggest game today is 52 pages,
I think it is. Something likethat.

Dave (46:59):
In in my defense, I'm also building an index and doing all
the cross referencing that's inthe book. So

Matthew (47:06):
Yeah. All the c page x x x. Yeah. Yeah.

Dave (47:10):
And that is taken up. That's kind of doubling the
amount of time it takes really.That's But it's

Matthew (47:16):
We're working very hard, Dave. But then so am I,
but I'm getting paid for mywork. That's Exactly.

Dave (47:21):
Oh, no. Sorry. What is going I've I've done something
seriously wrong here, haven't I?Yeah.

Matthew (47:29):
Yeah. You retired from a job you hated. That's what you
did.

Dave (47:32):
Well, that's true. That is true.

Matthew (47:34):
Now and this is a little unusual. As you said,
this

Dave (47:36):
is about Yeah. Completely digressing you.

Matthew (47:39):
Well, obviously, what we, the other thing I've noticed
you doing on the social mediasis you are publishing short
interviews with other Zinequestcreators, and, thus, a rising
tide lifts all the ships. Butbefore we get onto all those
other guys, and you are gonna beour, Zinequest correspondents.

(48:02):
But before we get onto them,let's just talk a little bit
about you, Lunar Shadow Designsas a business, because you've
been touting your games around,the conventions and stuff like
that. So, you know, you arebuilding on the success of
previous Kickstarters. You'rereprinting some stuff, are you,
and selling that at conventions?

Craig (48:23):
Yeah. No. I I've been fortunate enough. I think, I'm
just looking down at my shelf. Ithink almost everything that
I've done a print run has had atleast one one extra print run.
Cool. And I've this this year,last year, I was fortunate to
exhibit UK Games Expo as part ofthe Tin Stand Tabletop Scotland,

(48:49):
as part of the indie connectionstand, and my own stand at
Dragon Meat. So, yeah,conventions are a big part of
outside of Kickstarter, how Iget my games in front of people.

Matthew (49:03):
But I'm sensing there your sentence structure there is
about getting people yeah.Getting the game in front of
people. It's not about makingyour first £1,000,000. Mhmm.

Craig (49:13):
I mean, I take the first million and I take the second.
Yeah. I'm unlike Dave, I havenot been brave enough to just
take the dive into full time oreven part time. So it's just

Dave (49:27):
crazy stupid.

Craig (49:30):
You said that, not me.

Dave (49:31):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I no. I deliberately said that.
Anyway, yeah, carry on. Yeah.

Craig (49:36):
Yeah. No. I'm a hobbyist. I do this because I enjoy it. I
don't have to make money inpaying my living wage.
The money that I make goes backinto it. Most most of the money
I make gets me to conventionsbecause they're expensive.
Tabling Yeah. Accommodation,especially in London and

(49:58):
Edinburgh, is expensive. Yeah.
So selling these games means Ipay my way to the conventions
and have a fun weekend sellingmore games.

Matthew (50:09):
And I can

Dave (50:10):
do your next convention. Yeah.

Matthew (50:12):
And saving the money for your next convention. Yeah.
But not not yet getting rich.Okay. So, oh, the other thing I
just wanna briefly mention isyour blog.
You do kind of unpack thefinancial, impact of each of
your Kickstarters and yourconvention stuff. So if people
wanna find out more about thefinances of small press, you're

(50:35):
very honest and open with, youknow, what you're spending and
what you're earning out ofeverything, aren't you, Craig?

Craig (50:40):
Yeah. No. I I think it's really important because there's
other people that do it, but themajority of people that do it
are the ones that have made itin some sense. They're the ones
they've had that 50,000,£100,000 Kickstarter. They've
gone viral.

(51:00):
But most people that are doingthis are hobbyists. They're
selling a 100 copies a year orsomething. Yeah. So I think it's
really important not to peoplenot to put people off if they
have a successful Kickstarterthat's £500, that they don't
feel like that's a failure.

Dave (51:19):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Craig (51:22):
And, actually, just

Matthew (51:24):
as a

Craig (51:25):
as a brief summary, so my profit for the year is currently
sitting at £200 because I This

Matthew (51:33):
is not what I was getting to, actually, Craig.
This is where I was stewing thequestions.

Dave (51:38):
It it's still a profit, I guess.

Craig (51:39):
It's a profit. Is

Dave (51:40):
a profit. Yeah.

Craig (51:41):
But that that money that I've earned, that's taken me to
Edinburgh, paid for 3 nights inEdinburgh and travel and table
costs. It's paid for Londontravel to Dragon Meat, paid to
expo. And I'm in the luckyposition I could have afforded
that on my own, but if I can getmy games to do it, it's much

(52:05):
better for my bank balance.

Dave (52:07):
Yeah.

Matthew (52:09):
Excellent. Right. Okay. Now switch hats, Craig. Put on
your, effects, Zinequestcorrespondence hat, and tell me
what else in the world ofZinequest has caught your eye,
in Zinequest 2025?

Craig (52:28):
So I'm gonna start with another time travel game.

Matthew (52:31):
Oh, yeah?

Craig (52:31):
So we've got against time and death by Nick Bate who
anyone that knows Nick knows Ishare a store with him at Dragon
Meat. Mhmm. And this is alsoinspired by the how you lose the
time war.

Matthew (52:45):
That where Oh, great. 2 competing inspirations here.

Craig (52:49):
And I will be open. Nick started working on his game long
before I did. But Nick

Dave (52:56):
And you've watched in and nicked his idea and published
something first. Is that what

Matthew (52:59):
you're saying?

Craig (53:00):
Nope. No. You got out there first. His his game got me
to read the book. And then IRight.
But where my game focuses onchanging history and the records
of history, His really focuseson the interpersonal drama
that's at the heart of thatnovella. So you've got your 2

(53:20):
agents, but it's all about therelationship that they build as
they're trying to fight againstone another. So it's same
inspiration spinning off in adifferent direction.

Matthew (53:32):
Is this a kind of mister and missus Smith one
where, they fall in love aswell?

Craig (53:38):
I mean, it you can play it that way. One of the actual
plays that he's recorded of itwent that direction. You can
play it the complete oppositethat they end up hating one
another. And I'm a big fan ofNick's games in general. He did
stealing the throne that youmight know.
He's got this way of just tight,concise writing that's also

(54:01):
really evocative.

Matthew (54:03):
Mhmm.

Craig (54:04):
So I think that's gonna be great. That's launching on
the 11th February.

Dave (54:09):
Cool.

Matthew (54:10):
Actually, yeah, let's talk a little bit about the
mechanics of Zinequest becauseI'm suddenly thinking we didn't
have a Zinequest last year. Am Iright? The the

Craig (54:19):
No. We had one last year. The They changed the

Dave (54:21):
dates of it. Yeah.

Craig (54:24):
Yeah. So Zinequest for anyone that doesn't know it, you
might have heard of Zine Month.It started as a Kickstarter
initiative in 2019, I think, topromote small people, smaller
publishers.

Dave (54:40):
Just promote small people.

Craig (54:42):
Small people. Smaller publishers with a month of
celebrating zines, encouraged todo a 2 week campaign, small
goals, keep it simple, gotreally big, and then they
decided in 2022, I think it was,let's move it to August during

(55:03):
GenCon. And everyone went, no.No. Yeah.
So they they moved it back toFebruary. There's now also zine
month, which broadens it awayfrom Kickstarter. People wanting
to do back a kit, crowdfund theother sites. So it's not just
Kickstarter anymore. But, yeah,the focus is small games.

(55:28):
Get it out there rather thanworrying about how many 100 of
1000 you're gonna earn from it.

Dave (55:33):
Mhmm. Mhmm.

Matthew (55:35):
So, your game is gonna be on Kickstarter. Nyx is also
gonna be on Kickstarter. So allthe time wars that we are aware
of are on Kickstarter. Yep. Haveyou got any from the other side
of zine month from any of theother

Craig (55:52):
So on BakaKit, fear of a daily planet, and this is a
module for the wildly popularmothership. Mhmm. And I think
it's great. I've got a couple ofactually interviews of different
adventures for different systemsup on the blog at the moment,

(56:13):
but it's great that we're seeingmore adventures for systems.

Matthew (56:17):
As opposed to, inclusive zine whole games, you
mean?

Craig (56:25):
Yeah. Yeah. Obviously, I write whole games, but
adventures because we we wantthese games to be played. So
adventures are a fantastic wayof encouraging people to do
that. Mothership has done agreat, building that community
and ecosystem.
And fear of a daily planet is alost colony crawl for an outpost

(56:47):
that is built to endlesslyrevise and reprint employee
handbooks on plastic paper thatthat they then just throw into
space for people to acquire. Soit leans into that whole sci fi
industrial ethos that,obviously, mothership's a big
alien inspired by alien a lot.Yeah. Leans into that, leans

(57:11):
into this idea of corporatesuffering and just overbuild. So
I think that's gonna be a reallygreat one to keep an eye out
for.

Matthew (57:20):
Cool. Cool. Cool. And we will liaise with you and make
sure that we have links in theshow notes to all of these
games.

Dave (57:26):
Yeah.

Matthew (57:28):
But, got any more?

Craig (57:32):
So we're gonna jump to one that I know that you're
interested in as soon as thepage reloads. I'm sorry about
this. So this is a

Matthew (57:46):
This is a tail end Charlie?

Craig (57:48):
This is tail end Charlie. Typically, my page has just so
this is coming from Alex Whitewho you might know did A Cool
and Lonely Courage and Love andBarbed Wire. It's all about,
tail end gunners in World War 2bomber command. Mhmm. And Alex

(58:09):
has done this is his 3rd war inhistorical war inspired game.
He writes lovely games that justtouch on really emotional time
periods that we we hear a lotabout, but you don't think about
what was it actually like tolive through that period.

Dave (58:31):
Mhmm.

Craig (58:31):
So Love and Barbed Wire, for example, is all about a
soldier in World War 1 writingto their partner from the
trenches and telling that story.

Dave (58:42):
Yeah.

Craig (58:43):
This one is World War 2. You're the tail end gunner,
which was one of the mostdangerous positions in one of
the most dangerous parts of theforces to be in. And it's about
the contrast between the terrorof being in a bomber command and
then letting off steam whenyou're back home, the dancers,

(59:07):
the people you see, therelationships you build. So that
is coming on the 11th Februaryon Kickstarter as well.

Matthew (59:16):
And the reason I'm particularly interested in this,
of course, is, few episodes ago,I we talked about, masters of
the air and war stories day,didn't we?

Dave (59:27):
Yep.

Matthew (59:27):
We did. You know, I was saying the difficulty of doing
this, you know, a campaign basedaround the banality of and
safety and comfort of life athome waiting to go on a mission
and that well, even then on amission, even though it was
terrifying, it's kind of verymundane, like driving a bus in a

(59:48):
way. You know, you're not ayou're not flying an x wing when
you're flying one of theseLancaster bombers.

Dave (59:54):
And a

Matthew (59:55):
tail end gunner, obviously, all he's doing
basically is being a passengeruntil and a bit of an observer
sometimes, but, you know, untilthere's enemy fighters in its
sights, you know, it's it's Ithink must be almost a dullest
job in the world. And I'mintrigued about how we're gonna
capture that and

Dave (01:00:15):
see

Matthew (01:00:15):
what it does. But, I pointed out to Alex that we'd
had this article, and he did thedecency and listened to it and,
thought it was very good. So Ithink I'll I'll at least, back
his back his zine.

Craig (01:00:29):
Yeah. No. It's it's one that I'm really intro I mean, I
like historical games. I'm morea bit later focused on the cold
war, a lot of my focus, but thisis something that if it works,
it's gonna invoke that emotionalresponse, and I think that's
what small games can be reallygood at doing is evoking a

(01:00:50):
single focused

Matthew (01:00:52):
emotion. And that is a

Dave (01:00:55):
Yeah.

Matthew (01:00:56):
Solo game, isn't it? Not a not a duet game.

Craig (01:00:58):
Yep. That's a solo, although he has written duet
and, multiplayer games in thepast.

Matthew (01:01:06):
Cool. Excellent. Looking forward to that one.
We've got time for some more,haven't we, Dave, before you go
to rush off? What else have yougot?

Dave (01:01:13):
A few more minutes.

Craig (01:01:14):
So something a bit different. Growing thylacine. Do
you know what a thylacine is

Matthew (01:01:20):
or was? No. No. I'm vaguely remembering that from
science classes, biology, andstuff, I think. What remind me.

Craig (01:01:30):
So it was the Tasmanian tiger that's now extinct. So it

Matthew (01:01:36):
was a Yeah. Yeah.

Craig (01:01:37):
A native species of, Australia.

Dave (01:01:41):
There's there's a that yeah. Okay. Yep.

Craig (01:01:43):
So there's photos you might have seen from the early
20 late 19th century, early 20thcentury of the last one in Zoom.

Dave (01:01:52):
Yeah. It's thylacine, isn't it? T h y l a c. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.

Craig (01:01:56):
Yeah. So this is a small game about, cloning a thylacine
and imagining as you clone it,the life that it had, the
instincts as it comes back andfinds itself again, and then
eventually, hopefully, escapes.It's by an Australian creator

(01:02:19):
called Pitch. It's gonna be onKickstarter and, again, on the
popular date of 11th February,and it's a small sort

Matthew (01:02:29):
of

Craig (01:02:31):
I mean, the tone from what I Petrol just told me could
lean into a few different areas,but it's about embodying the
idea of this Philistine and itshalf remembered life and
thinking about the impact thatpeople have had on the planet
and animals in general.

Dave (01:02:53):
Sounds like a cheerful experience, that one.

Craig (01:02:56):
But, again, it's a it's about that specific focus story.

Dave (01:03:01):
Emotion. Yeah.

Craig (01:03:02):
Yeah. And immersion. Yeah.

Matthew (01:03:07):
Excellent. And that's coming for Australia. Of course,
the last, the last scene I gotfrom Australia was one from our
patron Thomas's family aboutgangster octopi doing various
claims. Yeah.

Craig (01:03:21):
I remember that one. I think I only backed out a PDF,
but I remember that one and somelovely art in that.

Dave (01:03:30):
Yeah. Yeah. And and just like a bonkers idea, frankly.

Matthew (01:03:36):
A bonkers idea? Someone like a really fun.

Dave (01:03:38):
Well, absolutely. I wasn't a criticism in the slightest.
That was that was a that was acompliment. Yeah.

Craig (01:03:42):
Yeah. But also that great idea because you can think
about, you know, animalsescaping from a an aquarium or a
zoo. And then it's just thatstep again that games are so
great at of going, well, ifyou've got this idea, what if I
add in a bit of gangster

Matthew (01:03:59):
and

Craig (01:04:00):
just give an octopus a gun?

Matthew (01:04:05):
Yeah. Alright. Alright.

Dave (01:04:06):
8 guns. Yeah. Exactly.

Matthew (01:04:09):
Right. We're we're running close on time, but we've
probably got time for 1 or 2more. Have you got any more?

Craig (01:04:14):
So I'm gonna jump to something related, actually.
It's not an actual game. It's awebsite to promote zenemonth
games at the moment called Iwant to play dot games.

Dave (01:04:26):
Oh. Okay.

Craig (01:04:29):
So

Matthew (01:04:30):
We will put a link in the show notes, obviously.

Craig (01:04:33):
One of the great things about zine quest, is the
community effort. Mhmm. Everyonereally does come together,
shares their own games, and thisis a website by Luke of Ether
Corp Games that is there so youcan submit your project. You can

(01:04:54):
search through projects bydifferent tags. And it's not
just for zine month.
It's gonna be a continuallypresent site. So, hopefully, we
can get people start using it,and it will be a nice focused
way because now we've got somany different crowdfunding
sites keeping track ofeverything.

Dave (01:05:14):
Yeah.

Craig (01:05:14):
It's quite hard. But this brings it all back together.

Dave (01:05:19):
It's a very clean site. I like it. I like its
presentation.

Craig (01:05:23):
Yep. And there's already a number of scene quest games up
there. I need to get my ownsubmitted. But I think anyone
that's interested in this sortof smaller side of crowdfunding
should really go and check itout.

Matthew (01:05:40):
Mhmm. Oh, yeah. It is a nice site. They always will
decide. You're quite right.

Dave (01:05:44):
Very nicely. Cool.

Matthew (01:05:47):
Excellent. Next year, we'll interview Luke from I want
to play games, and we'll we'lllet Craig off. No. No.

Dave (01:05:57):
He's he's on the team now.

Craig (01:05:59):
On the team now. I'm expecting a paycheck.
Correspondent.

Dave (01:06:04):
You're welcome. That's where there might be a problem,
Craig.

Craig (01:06:08):
I mean, it might be a paycheck for 0, but

Dave (01:06:12):
Can't afford to

Matthew (01:06:13):
pay anything to

Dave (01:06:14):
write it on. Yeah.

Matthew (01:06:18):
Well, as always, it's been a real pleasure. You're
you're launching on the 11thFebruary as well on

Craig (01:06:24):
Nope. I'm launching on the 4th February. Oh. Early.

Matthew (01:06:28):
4th of February.

Dave (01:06:29):
Wise. Get in early. Get in ahead of the other ones. Get all
the get all the early backers.

Matthew (01:06:33):
Well, that that And how long does the campaign last when
you do when you do a a quest onelike this?

Craig (01:06:40):
So they always say it should be 2 weeks, but I'm going
2 in a bit weeks to start on aTuesday, which supposedly is the
best day, and end on a Sunday,which, again, is supposedly the
best day. Whether that's justgroupthink, I don't know. But I
also just wanna get it done andover with. I'm sure you know how

(01:07:02):
stressful these campaigns canbe.

Dave (01:07:04):
No. Yeah. They are. They're all all they're all
consuming, aren't they? I meanYeah.
I've I've A

Matthew (01:07:10):
week 3 is worse, so your your accent just, cut that
bit out.

Dave (01:07:14):
I've I've been on Facebook probably less times since the
campaign finished than I did onevery single day during the
campaign. Yeah. Yeah. You know,Kickstarter and all the rest of
it. Yeah.
It's nice to

Matthew (01:07:27):
have a talking a little bit about that, just because I
want to try and make Dave latefor dinner. Social media now, we
we I'm just noticing, obviously,Facebook was a really good
friend to us during the, thecampaign, but I'm noticing we're
getting less engagement on ourFacebook posts in recent months.

Dave (01:07:50):
Mhmm.

Matthew (01:07:53):
We never had you know, blue sky has always been smaller
for us, but that that has stayedconsistent. Are you as you're
promoting your game on Zquestand and other games, what are
you noticing, Craig, aboutsocial media and where people
should be pushing their messageout?

Craig (01:08:12):
Yeah. I wish I had a a fun answer to this, but it
really has imploded in the lastyear and a half. I'm focusing on
Blue Sky because that's whereI'm most active. It's where the
community seems to be mostactive. Facebook for the the

(01:08:32):
scale that I'm targeting doesn'tmake much sense.
Right. Facebook, you need to begoing especially if you wanted
to do paid ads, the returnsaren't worth it at a, what am I
targeting, 12 to £15 zine? Yeah.The cost of each backer via a

(01:08:55):
Facebook ad is probably gonna bemore than you would actually
make back. Yeah.

Dave (01:09:02):
Yeah.

Matthew (01:09:03):
I'm not sure how many actual backers we got. We did
quite well when with Facebookwhen we were promoting pre sign
ups as it were. I thought wewere getting quite good value
for money from Facebook, but Idon't really think I saw that on
the Facebook ads while thecampaign was actually going
getting converted into realbackers.

Dave (01:09:22):
We got a few, didn't we? But it was We did

Matthew (01:09:24):
get a few. Yeah.

Dave (01:09:24):
It was a slack handful that we could guarantee. Well,
we, you

Craig (01:09:28):
know, we could assess all

Dave (01:09:29):
the from them from the

Craig (01:09:30):
Having talked to other people in the community,
Facebook ads are still reallyeffective if you are going for a
hardback book. They're probablyone of the most cost effective
ads out there.

Matthew (01:09:40):
Oh, yeah. I mean, they're cheap, which means cost
effectiveness.

Dave (01:09:43):
Yeah.

Matthew (01:09:44):
They're they're great. Yeah.

Craig (01:09:46):
I tried Fred's. That became as bad as Facebook. Mhmm.
Twitter, I can't remember thelast time I opened it because
I've my account's still therejust out of spite at this point.
But the blue sky seems to bewhere the the most active
community is at the moment.

Dave (01:10:07):
Right. Yeah.

Matthew (01:10:08):
Yeah. I think I think we're seeing, we're seeing the
community moving to Blue Sky.Cool. Cool. Shall we, let you
go, Dave, and say goodbye toCraig?

Dave (01:10:19):
Yeah. Thanks so much, Craig, for for coming in and
talking to us about all of that.That's really interesting.

Craig (01:10:25):
A pleasure as always.

Dave (01:10:27):
Excellent.

Matthew (01:10:28):
And good luck to you, Craig, and to everybody who's
running a Z month promotion onon BeckerKit or GameFound or or
Kickstarter or wherever you'regoing for your crowdfunding.

Craig (01:10:43):
Yep. I hope everyone's successful and makes a lot of
money.

Matthew (01:10:48):
So, plenty of exciting things. Definitely one that I'm
gonna back. Do check out thelinks to a bit in the show
notes. And also the I want toplay dot games website. I think
it's a lovely looking websitethat, isn't it?

Dave (01:11:02):
It is a very it's very clean. It's nicely done. Yeah.

Matthew (01:11:07):
So but I think everything that's been said on
Zinequest has been said.Probably. That could be said on
Zinequest has been said byCraig. We're really very smooth
around this whole Zinequestthing, aren't we?

Dave (01:11:21):
No one would ever guess it was a last minute filler for,
you know, a change of change ofattack for the episode. But no.
A a great thank you to Craig forcoming on the show at very short
notice to talk to us aboutZinequest, which we wanted to do
anyway, but it it obviously cameforward a little bit in our in
our thinking. Yes.

Matthew (01:11:38):
I mean, we we were gonna be reasons discussed
already. Yeah.

Dave (01:11:42):
So, thank you, Craig. It was it was a pleasure chatting
to you as always. And, yeah.Thank you so much.

Matthew (01:11:48):
In the spirit of making promises about what we're gonna
offer in our next episode, andthen maybe breaking them later
on, what are you promising us,Dave, for the next episode?

Dave (01:11:59):
Well, I was I've been thinking quite a lot about Rome
year 0.

Matthew (01:12:03):
Mhmm.

Dave (01:12:04):
I mean, we're we're obviously we haven't formally
decided what we might do for thenext

Matthew (01:12:09):
What our next thing might be.

Dave (01:12:11):
For the next game, line would be. But Rome year 0 is is
is on the list of on theshortlist. And anyway, I'm
interested in it so I've beendoing some thinking. One of the
things I wanna get right in thatgame is is how we manage
battles. You know, the to do itto do it properly.
So I thought why not, do alittle bit of analysis of a few

(01:12:34):
games where we've we've usedbattle rules, and then have a
bit of a conversation aroundsome of my thinking. What I've
done before. So I did the battlerules for war stories in a
particular way, which certainlyfrom the feedback from the from
few people seem to really likeit. So I thought, yeah. That
will help me actually as well inin some of my thinking for Rome

(01:12:54):
year 0.
So, I'll do that. Battles inrole playing games. I'll do that
for next time. Excellent.

Matthew (01:13:01):
We'll look forward to that.

Dave (01:13:03):
Cool. Well, it's, so so it's goodbye from me.

Matthew (01:13:06):
And it's goodbye from him.

Craig (01:13:08):
May the icons bless your adventures.

Dave (01:13:13):
You have been listening to the effect podcast presented by
Fiction Suit and the RPG Gods.Music stars on a black sea used
with permission of freelypublishing.

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