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Welcome again to Episode 137. 
The gate slam open and the crowd

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erupts and chaos spills into the
amphitheater of Doom. 

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What is he talking about? 
This is Legends of the Arena, a 

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high octane card combat team 
game from Toast Games that 

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captures the over the top thrill
of Super Smash Brothers and 

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brings it to your tabletop for 
two to six players. 

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It's a whirlwind of combos, 
counters and cutting plays where

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every card you draw could be 
your path to glory. 

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Go for brute force knockouts. 
Outsmart your foes with tactical

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positioning. 
The question players must ask 

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themselves when playing is are 
you playing chess or poker? 

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The strategic decisions are very
real. 

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Will you stack the right 
abilities to trigger a 

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game-winning chain of powers? 
There is no single road to 

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victory, only the one you carve 
in the heat of combat. 

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Today we'll dive into the 
mechanics of the madness and 

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most importantly, the story that
make Legends of the Arena a 

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knockout hit for competitive 
players and confusion lovers 

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alike. 
So pay attention as we chat with

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the designer Brian Toth about 
his journey and the journey of 

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this epic card game that will 
launched on Kickstarter last 

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week. 
Brian, thank you for joining. 

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How are you? 
Thank you. 

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I'm doing great. 
I mean, after that intro, I'm 

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doing fantastic. 
That's incredible. 

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Thank you. 
I I'm getting compliments on 

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those. 
I've been, I've been working 

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hard to kind of punch up my 
intros. 

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So yeah. 
So thank you for that and it's 

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so good to see you. 
I almost feel like I need to put

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that in like a Kickstarter video
or something. 

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Yeah, it's, it's good to see you
too, PJ. 

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Yeah, well, I will. 
I'll certainly send this off to 

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you so that you can use this 
video. 

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But yeah, so we want to talk 
about your game, Legends of the 

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Arena, but I guess I should 
state for the records for those 

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of you who don't know. 
OK, so Brian reached out to me 

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and he had listened to the 
podcast, heard about some 

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designers on the show and was 
like, we'd love to be a part of 

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it. 
And I'm like, this is this is 

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amazing because this is exactly 
what we want to do. 

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So I am sorry that I missed 
getting to see your game at Gen.

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Con. 
I know that you weren't there, 

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but the game was. 
So tell us a little bit about, I

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guess let's start here. 
Tell me a little bit about 

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yourself and what was the first 
game that got you into this 

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hobby? 
Oh man, OK, so yeah, let's let's

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let's go way back. 
I think probably so yeah, my 

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name is Brian and my brother and
I Co designed legends arena 

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together and we've been playing 
games together forever. 

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We were both just grew up on, 
you know, certainly chess and 

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then into a plenty of video 
games back to board games, back 

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to video games. 
I think the first game that 

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really well, so yeah, it might 
have been really start with 

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Magic the Gathering, which is 
not necessarily a hobby game, 

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but kind of opened the doors to 
games with a higher level of art

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and higher production value and 
like kind of a whole culture and

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community around games and 
especially like competing with 

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games. 
And then I think, you know, 

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Catan certainly hit like a like 
a like a whirlwind in the the 

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early 2000s and just like 
totally changed how people are 

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playing games. 
But even before then there were 

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a lot of pretty decent like game
right games actually, and some 

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kind of like a little bit off 
the beat in path US based games 

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when that comes to mind is 
attack, which is like a pretty 

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obscure title, but it's sort of 
like a risk with a little bit 

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more going on in terms of like 
the the RPS battle mechanics and

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technology trees and such. 
And yeah, I think we're both 

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really kind of fortunate to grow
up in a time when there was this

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just like not only explosion 
tabletop, but this like kind of 

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back and forth between like 
tabletop ideas going to video 

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games and then like video games 
ideas coming to the tabletop. 

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And like it didn't really feel 
like there was any kind of limit

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in terms of your imagination 
with what what you pull off. 

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And I think the game that sort 
of really the first one that we 

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got into like really modifying 
and really like trying to change

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the rules and make our own thing
out of it was actually Star Wars

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Epic Duels, which is OK. 
It was a mass market release in,

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I want to say like the 2010 kind
of time frame, and it was 

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actually eventually 
reimplemented as unmatched, 

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which you might know today is 
like a fairly big title. 

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Yep, and. 
I think everybody knows. 

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Unmatched. 
Yeah. 

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But yeah, that was like, we 
just, we, we played so much that

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game and it was designed for one
V1 duels. 

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But when we got our friends 
together, we would usually want 

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to play with more people. 
And so we spent a lot of time 

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kind of modifying the rules to 
support team play to be able to 

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get up to like 8 people playing 
at once. 

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You know, because we play a 
video game like say like a 

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Toyota or League of Legends or 
something, right? 

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It's kind of like asymmetric 
hero based thing. 

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Just felt like a natural fit, 
right? 

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Everyone does their own 
abilities, everyone kind of 

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works together as a team and 
then we want to play port that 

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back to the board game space. 
And so yeah, very long winded, I

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guess history there. 
But yeah, games have just always

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been a huge part of like, how we
spend time together and, like, 

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spend time with our friends and 
so. 

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Yeah, absolutely. 
I love that. 

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I mean, you're talking about two
huge communities, Magic the 

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Gathering, right? 
There's really, there isn't 

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anything I can say about Magic 
the Gathering that hasn't 

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already been said. 
It's its own, it has its own 

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community even, you know, it's 
got a a massive footprint at 

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Gencon, you know, So that's, so 
that's pretty fantastic. 

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And to be plugged into that, I 
could definitely see, I can see 

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that from what I've seen of the 
game on your website, on your 

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Kickstarter, your videos, I can 
definitely see that influence 

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for sure. 
And then the other community is 

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Katan, which we recently learned
about having. 

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You know, they celebrated their 
30th anniversary this year. 

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And just a few weeks ago, we had
the CEO of Katan on where we 

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learned that it's pronounced 
Katan, although you can 

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pronounce it any way you like, 
but that is how Klaus Toiber 

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pronounced it. 
So I promised that would do 

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better. 
It's Catan. 

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But so that's great. 
So you were, you were already 

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plugged into two tabletop 
communities, very different 

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communities, right? 
The Magic the Gathering 

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community versus the Catan, The,
the, the, the trading hex card 

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game, board game experience, as 
it were. 

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And they always, they haven't 
always been, how should we say, 

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friendly to one another. 
You know, yeah, I think I, I was

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like young enough to like not 
even really. 

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That all went over my head. 
They were just games, like the 

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games I'm having fun playing 
with my family, playing with my 

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friends. 
You know, I think like, you 

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know, looking back on it, they 
actually came from pretty 

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different places and like very 
different, like, like serving 

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very different market segments, 
Right. 

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And like that, you know, that's 
more clear now. 

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But as a kid, you just, you just
kind of in the, you just, you're

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like, yeah, this is cool. 
I like it. 

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You know, you don't have to even
necessarily. 

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Yeah, which is maybe a useful 
thing for, you know, not getting

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too caught on like existing 
paradigms. 

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Yeah. 
So would you say that that that 

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perspective influenced how you 
approach? 

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Your game design. 
I I think so absolutely. 

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So, you know, we wanted to make 
sure that we had a board game 

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experience. 
Like, I mean, I love Magic, it's

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a great game, but the, the TCG 
world, the like kind of the, the

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evolving meta and the sort of 
need to consistently stay on top

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is it's a, it's a lifestyle 
business and it's a lifestyle 

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experience. 
And like that is it's, it's, I 

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mean, it's, it's a ton of fun, 
But at the same time, 

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accessibility becomes an issue 
just for, you know, people who 

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want to have a couple friends 
over who've never seen this 

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before. 
We're all going to sit down, 

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have a game night. 
Like that's the experience. 

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That's where we really wanted to
prioritize like most of the 

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play, right? 
Like, I think people can play 

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competitively and like we've 
tuned it for that a bit. 

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But like, first and foremost, 
it's got to be like, all right, 

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everyone, you've never seen this
before, explain the rules to you

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in 15 minutes. 
We're going to play out of this 

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one box and we're all going to 
have fun with it. 

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And so that was kind of the 
mindset. 

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So, so tell us a little bit. 
I mean, I only spoke just just 

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the bare minimum in my 
introduction about the game. 

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So tell everyone about Legends 
of the Arena. 

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What's the game? 
How does it play 0? 

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Yeah, yeah, totally. 
Yeah. 

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So this is, this is inspired by 
Super Smash Brothers or just 

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kind of, I guess, you know, 
fighting games in general. 

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They do fighting games in 
general. 

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And the core mechanic is you're 
picking out cards, you're doing 

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a little programming like 3 
moves at a time and they're kind

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of your basics, your punch, your
shot, step back, lock. 

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Then every character has some of
their own special stuff on top 

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there. 
You might be a barbarian, jump 

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in there, spin your axe around. 
There's a character who 

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manipulates time, can kind of 
move things backward and 

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forward, you know, just kind of 
the whole gamut of what you 

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might imagine there. 
And so, and some of the classic 

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archetypes are there if you play
these games like a, like a 

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grappler is going to pull you in
or a zoner who's going to stay 

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at a distance. 
But even if you don't know those

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archetypes, they kind of 
correspond to other games. 

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And so, yeah, you pick out your 
cards, you put them face down. 

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Everyone does this at the same 
time. 

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And then everyone turns over the
top card that they've picked and

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they resolve in order of speed, 
which kind of lets you sort of 

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mostly placed simultaneously the
the decision making strategy 

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simultaneous. 
And then as you get hit, you 

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take what we call fatigue. 
And as your fatigue builds up, 

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you get easier to push. 
And that's kind of how the game 

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ultimately ends is when by 
people getting knocked out. 

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And so usually when you're 
playing multiple people, every 

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time you get a knockout on 
someone else, you score a point 

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and the first person to a set 
number, usually like 2-3 or four

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wins the game. 
And so every time you're knocked

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out, you just kind of come back 
in just kind of keep rolling 

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with the punches and it's all 
it's sort of a race to who can 

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land the most knockouts first. 
So it's very much like arena 

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combat brawling with a little 
bit of chaos in there and a fair

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bit of strategy, especially 
depending on, you know, how much

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you know your opponent and how 
much they know you. 

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Because there's a sort of a 
dialogue that evolves there. 

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It's like, oh, I thought you're 
going to do that, so I did this.

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But then you expected that, so 
you did this. 

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I love that. 
So you said that you could be 

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knocked out, but you're not 
knocked out of the game. 

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Oh yeah, that was big for us. 
We, we really didn't want player

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elimination here because like, 
you know, it's, it's a game 

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night, right? 
You, we want everyone to be in 

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the game. 
And so, yeah, you get knocked 

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out, you come back in, which is 
kind of actually fairly faithful

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to like a Smash Brothers 
experience where you sort of 

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just get to keep rolling with 
it. 

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But that is ultimately how the 
game does end when one person 

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scores enough. 
So is it, is it akin to having 

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not played a lot of video games 
in my youth, but a little bit? 

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Is it akin to like pressing the 
start button and just coming 

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back in a video game with like 
another? 

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Or do I draw a new character, a 
new legend, and I'm playing a 

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00:10:59,720 --> 00:11:01,680
new character? 
Yeah, it's, it's more like the 

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00:11:01,680 --> 00:11:02,880
same one just coming right back 
in. 

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00:11:03,000 --> 00:11:04,800
Yeah. 
So the same like same character 

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even because you've played those
3 cards right, you could get 

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knocked on. 
The first one we actually have 

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you drop right back in. 
Just keep playing the cards you 

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already set up. 
So it's very immediate and like 

225
00:11:14,480 --> 00:11:17,880
hopefully just feels like a 
small speed bump because you 

226
00:11:17,880 --> 00:11:19,800
know someone else is already 
advancing their victory 

227
00:11:19,800 --> 00:11:21,160
condition. 
There's no need to like, put you

228
00:11:21,160 --> 00:11:25,400
even further behind. 
Is there a symmetrical victory 

229
00:11:25,400 --> 00:11:29,040
conditions per legend that 
you're playing or? 

230
00:11:29,960 --> 00:11:31,960
Not exactly. 
So everyone is trying to race 

231
00:11:31,960 --> 00:11:34,720
towards the number of knockouts.
That being said, because they 

232
00:11:34,720 --> 00:11:38,560
all have their own like you know
style and their own kind of 

233
00:11:38,560 --> 00:11:41,000
moves, some of those can feel 
fairly asymmetrical. 

234
00:11:41,000 --> 00:11:44,360
Like some of them really it's 
like 1 big hit and that's their 

235
00:11:44,360 --> 00:11:45,800
whole play. 
They're trying to build that one

236
00:11:45,800 --> 00:11:47,960
big thing. 
Whereas other ones it's tons of 

237
00:11:47,960 --> 00:11:49,680
small hits. 
Other ones it's more about like 

238
00:11:49,680 --> 00:11:53,560
a timing or kind of lining up a 
combo in a certain quarter. 

239
00:11:53,720 --> 00:11:56,560
But like, although it's not 
different victory conditions, 

240
00:11:56,560 --> 00:11:59,120
they play fairly differently to 
the point, you know, some of the

241
00:11:59,120 --> 00:12:02,760
ones that are the more outlier 
ones can almost feel like 

242
00:12:02,760 --> 00:12:05,240
they're doing their own thing 
because it it looks so different

243
00:12:05,240 --> 00:12:07,360
from your baseline. 
Right. 

244
00:12:07,640 --> 00:12:11,880
So it it's plays two to six 
players and there's team play. 

245
00:12:12,480 --> 00:12:13,480
Yeah, that's my favorite 
actually. 

246
00:12:14,080 --> 00:12:16,360
Yeah, how does, how does that? 
Work, yeah. 

247
00:12:16,360 --> 00:12:21,240
So the team play is usually 2V2 
or 3V3 and you communicate with 

248
00:12:21,240 --> 00:12:23,200
your team, you talk as much as 
you want, you share hands, you 

249
00:12:23,200 --> 00:12:26,480
point at stuff. 
It's really about like kind of 

250
00:12:27,000 --> 00:12:28,600
trying to set up your big combos
together. 

251
00:12:28,600 --> 00:12:30,640
I'm going to pull them in and 
then you punch them or you know,

252
00:12:31,040 --> 00:12:33,000
we're both going to jump behind 
them and turn around and 

253
00:12:33,000 --> 00:12:35,040
surprise them, right. 
It's, it's really about that 

254
00:12:35,040 --> 00:12:37,800
kind of sort of team 
brainstorming sort of 

255
00:12:37,800 --> 00:12:39,560
experience. 
I think one thing we did that 

256
00:12:39,560 --> 00:12:45,000
like has has helped a lot is 
when one team is ready, they've 

257
00:12:45,000 --> 00:12:46,920
set all, all their cards, 
they're all ready to go. 

258
00:12:47,280 --> 00:12:49,600
There's actually a time where 
they can flip and that gives the

259
00:12:49,600 --> 00:12:50,920
other team one minute to wrap 
up. 

260
00:12:51,480 --> 00:12:54,160
So it's not like a real time 
game because if both teams want 

261
00:12:54,160 --> 00:12:56,160
to think forever, that's fine. 
But as soon as one team's done 

262
00:12:56,160 --> 00:12:58,400
thinking, the other team gets a 
minute left. 

263
00:12:58,400 --> 00:13:02,480
And so that kind of gives some 
idea of the, the, the, the, I 

264
00:13:02,480 --> 00:13:05,720
guess the, the cadence or the, 
the pacing right where it's 

265
00:13:05,720 --> 00:13:08,960
like, Oh, sure, it's it there. 
There's a little bit of goal 

266
00:13:08,960 --> 00:13:12,320
there to race and kind of play 
from your gut and like make 

267
00:13:12,320 --> 00:13:15,960
moves that feel right more so 
than it is like analyze out and,

268
00:13:16,480 --> 00:13:18,040
you know, triangulate everything
perfectly. 

269
00:13:18,040 --> 00:13:21,320
Because honestly, even if you do
that, the other team might just 

270
00:13:21,320 --> 00:13:22,840
zig when you thought they were 
going to zag. 

271
00:13:22,840 --> 00:13:24,160
So sure. 
Yeah. 

272
00:13:25,160 --> 00:13:29,920
So do they in the team play to 
the you, I assume you share 

273
00:13:29,920 --> 00:13:33,680
victory and you share. 
I'm thinking about and I believe

274
00:13:33,960 --> 00:13:37,760
you mentioned it in perhaps your
website, I'm thinking of two 

275
00:13:37,760 --> 00:13:41,800
headed giant in Magic. 
How you share where you share 

276
00:13:41,800 --> 00:13:44,240
life. 
Is there that kind of component 

277
00:13:44,240 --> 00:13:46,320
in legends or how does that 
work? 

278
00:13:46,560 --> 00:13:48,520
Yeah, it's actually exactly it. 
In fact, like 2 headed giant was

279
00:13:48,520 --> 00:13:51,600
a huge inspiration for us. 
Like I don't play so much magic 

280
00:13:51,600 --> 00:13:53,480
anymore, but my brother and I 
still try and get to all the pre

281
00:13:53,480 --> 00:13:55,960
releases and like play that 2 
headed giant together because 

282
00:13:56,280 --> 00:13:58,280
it's just, it's I don't know, 
it's just fun kind of getting to

283
00:13:58,280 --> 00:14:01,440
like talk with someone and like 
experience the same, you know, 

284
00:14:01,440 --> 00:14:03,680
things. 
So yeah, your team shares like a

285
00:14:03,680 --> 00:14:07,040
knockout count basically. 
And so, you know, when your 

286
00:14:07,640 --> 00:14:10,800
personal legend is knocked out, 
you come back in, but the team, 

287
00:14:11,160 --> 00:14:12,480
you know, suffers A knockout, 
right. 

288
00:14:12,480 --> 00:14:14,880
And when your whole team is run 
out, that's, that's when you 

289
00:14:14,880 --> 00:14:16,000
lose. 
So yeah, you win together, lose 

290
00:14:16,000 --> 00:14:19,560
together. 
OK, that's so that was a really 

291
00:14:19,560 --> 00:14:23,920
important factor for both you 
and your brother in designing 

292
00:14:23,920 --> 00:14:26,120
your game. 
Yeah, because because we wanted 

293
00:14:26,120 --> 00:14:28,000
to support teams and high player
counts, we want to make sure 

294
00:14:28,000 --> 00:14:30,760
everyone's in the whole time and
you, you know, you win or lose 

295
00:14:30,760 --> 00:14:33,240
together. 
And then also you're you're 

296
00:14:33,240 --> 00:14:36,280
incentivized to talk and 
coordinate and trying as much as

297
00:14:36,280 --> 00:14:40,840
possible to like not slide too 
much into that kind of someone. 

298
00:14:40,840 --> 00:14:43,040
See the captaining thing, like 
on certain type of dynamics 

299
00:14:43,040 --> 00:14:45,160
where one person's like you do 
this, you do that, you do that, 

300
00:14:45,160 --> 00:14:46,840
right? 
And we really wanted to make it 

301
00:14:46,840 --> 00:14:49,440
as much as possible. 
Like, people have their own 

302
00:14:49,440 --> 00:14:51,720
characters and there are 
incentivized to make decisions, 

303
00:14:52,360 --> 00:14:54,080
you know, in a reasonable time 
frame, right? 

304
00:14:54,080 --> 00:14:57,480
So instead of having one person 
like sit there and kind of plan 

305
00:14:57,480 --> 00:15:00,040
how everything is going to go, 
it's to your benefit to utilize 

306
00:15:00,040 --> 00:15:01,800
everyone on your team and their 
own strengths. 

307
00:15:01,800 --> 00:15:03,600
And they're all kind of like 
perspectives on the board. 

308
00:15:05,240 --> 00:15:09,480
So what was it like? 
Or I guess I should say is what 

309
00:15:09,480 --> 00:15:13,760
is it like to design A game with
your brother? 

310
00:15:14,760 --> 00:15:17,280
It's I. 
Mean that just seems to be rife 

311
00:15:17,280 --> 00:15:20,280
with duels of its own. 
It's, it's been, it's been 

312
00:15:20,280 --> 00:15:22,880
amazing, like it's been like for
a relationship, it's, it's 

313
00:15:22,880 --> 00:15:24,920
fantastic. 
We hang out so much more now, 

314
00:15:24,920 --> 00:15:27,160
like every week. 
So we start working on this in 

315
00:15:27,160 --> 00:15:29,400
2017, like like officially on 
this game. 

316
00:15:29,400 --> 00:15:31,840
Obviously the, the roots go back
earlier, but that's when we're 

317
00:15:31,840 --> 00:15:34,120
like, we're going to make this 
game that we've wanted to make 

318
00:15:34,360 --> 00:15:36,000
and we had this really clear 
picture. 

319
00:15:36,000 --> 00:15:37,800
It's like it's going to be this,
this dueling game. 

320
00:15:37,800 --> 00:15:39,560
It's going to work for teams. 
Well, it's going to work for 

321
00:15:39,560 --> 00:15:41,440
these higher player accounts. 
And that's, that's kind of all 

322
00:15:41,440 --> 00:15:44,000
we knew for sure, right? 
We didn't have a background. 

323
00:15:44,200 --> 00:15:46,360
I guess I had designed like one 
or two things before, but 

324
00:15:46,360 --> 00:15:49,000
nothing published, nothing 
really finished. 

325
00:15:49,000 --> 00:15:51,560
So this was the, we're like, 
we'll figure out how to do all 

326
00:15:51,560 --> 00:15:53,080
that. 
We know what we want to make. 

327
00:15:53,080 --> 00:15:56,960
And so it's, yeah, it's been 
great because every single week 

328
00:15:56,960 --> 00:15:59,520
we always meet. 
And like, that's been eight 

329
00:15:59,520 --> 00:16:01,640
years now. 
And I mean, there's been some 

330
00:16:01,640 --> 00:16:03,680
periods, right, where we made 
like no progress, but we'd still

331
00:16:03,680 --> 00:16:06,680
meet, we'd still hang out. 
And we used to, before that, we 

332
00:16:06,680 --> 00:16:09,320
used to live like 4 minutes 
apart at one point and we didn't

333
00:16:09,320 --> 00:16:12,280
see each other that often. 
And then once we started working

334
00:16:12,280 --> 00:16:15,600
on this together every week, and
even though we live much further

335
00:16:15,600 --> 00:16:17,880
apart, we have to like, you 
know, do video calls a lot of 

336
00:16:17,880 --> 00:16:21,040
the time. 
We still that we still hang out 

337
00:16:21,040 --> 00:16:21,920
with. 
And so that's that's been 

338
00:16:21,920 --> 00:16:24,880
awesome. 
Obviously it's not at all 

339
00:16:25,200 --> 00:16:27,320
upside, right? 
Like sure, differences of 

340
00:16:27,320 --> 00:16:31,040
opinion, you know, how do you 
some things have to be one way 

341
00:16:31,040 --> 00:16:34,200
or the other? 
And over the years we've, I 

342
00:16:34,200 --> 00:16:36,480
think we've made, I would say 
like 5 versions of the game, 

343
00:16:36,480 --> 00:16:38,560
right? 
And four of them we throw away. 

344
00:16:38,560 --> 00:16:42,400
And each one of those is like 
tough because we got like 

345
00:16:42,400 --> 00:16:44,040
attached to it. 
And usually one person be more 

346
00:16:44,040 --> 00:16:47,520
attached than the other. 
And it's like, how do we come to

347
00:16:47,520 --> 00:16:51,160
the agreement that this, this 
bent, this, this line this, like

348
00:16:51,600 --> 00:16:54,760
this whole system we've built is
never going to work as well as 

349
00:16:54,760 --> 00:16:56,240
we want, you know? 
Right. 

350
00:16:56,240 --> 00:17:00,720
So that is my question. 
Did you resolve whenever you had

351
00:17:00,720 --> 00:17:03,400
big disagreements? 
I mean minor ones obviously, but

352
00:17:03,680 --> 00:17:07,720
how did you resolve any 
potential conflicts during the 

353
00:17:07,720 --> 00:17:12,200
design process? 
The hardest thing has yeah, I 

354
00:17:12,200 --> 00:17:14,880
would say, I would say the, the 
most useful thing in resolving 

355
00:17:14,920 --> 00:17:17,839
the hardest questions has been 
external feedback. 

356
00:17:18,640 --> 00:17:21,319
Then I don't mean we set it up 
like, you know, who do you like 

357
00:17:21,319 --> 00:17:22,240
more? 
Like this is my idea. 

358
00:17:22,240 --> 00:17:24,119
This is his idea. 
No, no, it's like, you know, as 

359
00:17:24,240 --> 00:17:25,520
dispassionate as possible, 
right? 

360
00:17:25,520 --> 00:17:27,400
You take it to conventions, we 
take it to play testing events. 

361
00:17:27,400 --> 00:17:30,160
We put it down on the table and 
we just like watch people play 

362
00:17:30,160 --> 00:17:31,800
and like take notes on their 
behavior. 

363
00:17:31,800 --> 00:17:34,400
It's like, do they lean in? 
On the other hand, are they on 

364
00:17:34,400 --> 00:17:37,800
their phone when we tell them to
talk to their allies and, and 

365
00:17:37,800 --> 00:17:39,960
work with their teammates? 
Are they actually doing it when 

366
00:17:39,960 --> 00:17:42,240
they, when they work together, 
do they actually land those big 

367
00:17:42,240 --> 00:17:43,800
combos? 
Like are they having fun, right?

368
00:17:43,800 --> 00:17:46,280
Like the body language? 
Because, you know, we, we worked

369
00:17:46,280 --> 00:17:48,720
on this through the pandemic. 
There was a lot of remote stuff,

370
00:17:49,000 --> 00:17:51,680
really hard to get cues on 
whether people are having fun. 

371
00:17:51,800 --> 00:17:53,880
At the end, they'll tell you, Oh
yeah, I had a good time. 

372
00:17:54,440 --> 00:17:57,640
But like, they're being nice 
often, especially when it's your

373
00:17:57,640 --> 00:18:00,200
friends, right? 
But in person you get, you can 

374
00:18:00,200 --> 00:18:02,400
just watch for the, the body 
cues and that that is kind of 

375
00:18:02,400 --> 00:18:05,800
how we ultimately made those big
decisions, right? 

376
00:18:05,800 --> 00:18:08,080
It's like, you know, look like, 
like nobody's. 

377
00:18:08,600 --> 00:18:10,160
Nobody's. 
Liking, I shouldn't say no one, 

378
00:18:10,160 --> 00:18:13,240
right, because even with a game 
that's kind of only okay, it 

379
00:18:13,600 --> 00:18:14,720
will still have some great 
plays. 

380
00:18:14,880 --> 00:18:16,960
You can always have some awesome
plays, right? 

381
00:18:16,960 --> 00:18:19,720
And so, but if we go to 
convention, we play 10 games and

382
00:18:19,720 --> 00:18:23,520
two of those games went really 
well and the others were maybe 2

383
00:18:23,520 --> 00:18:27,360
went well, two went poorly, and 
then six were just like kind of 

384
00:18:27,360 --> 00:18:30,400
smiddling that that was 
ultimately how we'd like kind 

385
00:18:30,400 --> 00:18:32,120
of. 
And it's, it's, it's not an easy

386
00:18:32,120 --> 00:18:34,560
way to make a decision, right? 
You kind of dedicate a whole day

387
00:18:34,560 --> 00:18:36,640
to this and like, you know, 
you've made this whole prototype

388
00:18:36,640 --> 00:18:37,600
and you've gotten really 
invested. 

389
00:18:37,600 --> 00:18:40,600
But that is how we got through, 
like, the hardest decisions was 

390
00:18:40,600 --> 00:18:43,440
like, yeah, we just have to be 
really honest about, like, how 

391
00:18:43,440 --> 00:18:47,560
we see people experiencing this.
So those, those neuro 

392
00:18:47,560 --> 00:18:53,320
linguistical cues are huge. 
Being someone who is in a medium

393
00:18:53,320 --> 00:18:58,200
where I do not get to physically
and visually interact most times

394
00:18:58,200 --> 00:19:02,560
with my guests and almost all 
the time with my listeners, it's

395
00:19:02,560 --> 00:19:09,160
challenging because you only 
have their words in text. 

396
00:19:09,160 --> 00:19:11,560
So there's no tone. 
There's no. 

397
00:19:12,520 --> 00:19:16,200
Yeah, it's it's. 
I definitely, I definitely can 

398
00:19:16,200 --> 00:19:18,440
appreciate and identify with 
that. 

399
00:19:20,160 --> 00:19:23,680
So how easy was it? 
Now, I know your brother, you 

400
00:19:23,840 --> 00:19:26,600
and your brother have been 
working on this since 2017, like

401
00:19:26,600 --> 00:19:29,640
you said. 
And so it's, yeah, 88 years, 

402
00:19:29,640 --> 00:19:33,440
right? 
How easy was it for the two of 

403
00:19:33,440 --> 00:19:41,240
you to be willing to be 
vulnerable with each other, to 

404
00:19:41,240 --> 00:19:46,920
accept each other's feedback? 
And then the follow up question 

405
00:19:46,920 --> 00:19:50,920
is take that a step further with
play testers and opening up your

406
00:19:50,920 --> 00:19:54,120
idea to hopefully constructive 
criticism. 

407
00:19:56,440 --> 00:19:58,160
That is that's a that's a good 
question. 

408
00:19:58,160 --> 00:20:02,600
I think it's something where 
like we keep getting better at 

409
00:20:02,600 --> 00:20:06,760
it even when we think we don't. 
We you know, it's like, Oh yeah,

410
00:20:06,760 --> 00:20:07,880
that was like a good. 
That was like a good 

411
00:20:07,880 --> 00:20:09,880
breakthrough, right? 
We we totally were like we 

412
00:20:09,880 --> 00:20:11,040
really leveled with each other 
there. 

413
00:20:11,040 --> 00:20:13,200
And then it's like, that's just 
a start. 

414
00:20:13,200 --> 00:20:15,200
I mean, even even now, right 
like now that we're. 

415
00:20:15,600 --> 00:20:17,120
Trying to, you know, get the 
game out there and stuff. 

416
00:20:17,440 --> 00:20:20,680
It is sometimes so scary to 
share the thing you've made, 

417
00:20:20,680 --> 00:20:21,760
right? 
And it's, you know, we kind of 

418
00:20:21,760 --> 00:20:23,400
have to push each other. 
It's like, hey, you know, go 

419
00:20:23,400 --> 00:20:26,480
post that designer diary, right?
You know, like, go, go get on 

420
00:20:26,480 --> 00:20:29,280
the podcast, you know, like, 
like things that, you know, get 

421
00:20:29,280 --> 00:20:32,000
you outside your comfort zone 
because it's like you're trying 

422
00:20:32,000 --> 00:20:35,120
to be honest with the thing you 
made, right? 

423
00:20:35,120 --> 00:20:38,160
You're trying, you're trying to 
like, but yeah, so in terms of 

424
00:20:38,800 --> 00:20:41,840
feedback to each other, right. 
And be more honest there. 

425
00:20:41,840 --> 00:20:46,440
I think it's been very useful to
talk about the going back to the

426
00:20:46,440 --> 00:20:48,600
big, you know, goal, right? 
It's like, is this serving that 

427
00:20:48,680 --> 00:20:50,440
that big goal, you know, where 
we had that goal, right, You 

428
00:20:50,440 --> 00:20:53,600
know, and then also just giving 
each other some space to kind of

429
00:20:54,480 --> 00:20:56,920
run with ideas that don't pan 
out. 

430
00:20:57,160 --> 00:21:02,560
You know, like I, I spent years 
kind of doing a lot of basically

431
00:21:02,560 --> 00:21:05,560
simulations, you know, to like, 
understand, to try and 

432
00:21:05,560 --> 00:21:08,360
understand some of the difficult
people or places people were 

433
00:21:08,360 --> 00:21:10,680
getting to in the game with 
like, we used to have a hex 

434
00:21:10,680 --> 00:21:13,720
board and there would be a lot 
of kind of ways the pieces could

435
00:21:13,720 --> 00:21:16,080
get lined up. 
And then you kind of got locked 

436
00:21:16,080 --> 00:21:19,000
into something and your play was
very restricted. 

437
00:21:19,440 --> 00:21:22,360
And, you know, I spent a lot of 
time analyzing that. 

438
00:21:22,360 --> 00:21:24,280
And then it's like, yeah, why 
don't we just get rid of the 

439
00:21:24,280 --> 00:21:26,680
heck store entirely? 
And I was like, but I think I 

440
00:21:26,680 --> 00:21:31,640
understand it now, you know, so 
it's been sure, but sometimes 

441
00:21:31,640 --> 00:21:34,080
you just need space to be like 
wrong for a while, you know, and

442
00:21:34,080 --> 00:21:37,240
then like, but yeah. 
And then with like play testers,

443
00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:42,040
I think it's been really, I used
to be so much more attached to 

444
00:21:42,080 --> 00:21:45,400
obviously the, the feedback. 
And now it's like, you know, 

445
00:21:45,400 --> 00:21:46,800
it's the feedback's going to the
game. 

446
00:21:46,800 --> 00:21:49,960
It's it's not going to me. 
And like, feedback is like a 

447
00:21:49,960 --> 00:21:51,320
gift, right? 
It's like the best when a play 

448
00:21:51,320 --> 00:21:53,760
tester is like, you know what, I
didn't like that that's like the

449
00:21:53,760 --> 00:21:55,760
second best. 
Sometimes it's like the best 

450
00:21:55,760 --> 00:21:57,480
thing you could hear, right? 
Especially if it's early on. 

451
00:21:57,480 --> 00:22:02,640
And if they are able to like 
tell you of not what they would 

452
00:22:02,640 --> 00:22:05,040
fix necessarily, but like 
they're able to call out a 

453
00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:08,960
couple things that Yep, they 
experienced and how it made them

454
00:22:08,960 --> 00:22:09,880
feel. 
It's like, yeah, I felt like I 

455
00:22:09,880 --> 00:22:14,560
didn't do anything there. 
I felt like I was doing the same

456
00:22:14,560 --> 00:22:17,440
thing every turn or whatever. 
Just like little things like 

457
00:22:17,440 --> 00:22:19,480
that can just, you just, you 
have to hear them. 

458
00:22:19,480 --> 00:22:22,680
You have to capture them. 
I do a lot of notes, but however

459
00:22:22,680 --> 00:22:26,160
you do it, and then just being 
able to like, yeah, that 

460
00:22:28,040 --> 00:22:29,640
sometimes it just comes down to 
it's like, yeah, if I hear it 

461
00:22:29,640 --> 00:22:31,360
like two or three times, like 
it's probably real. 

462
00:22:31,360 --> 00:22:33,360
You know, it's not even that 
scientific. 

463
00:22:33,360 --> 00:22:35,480
It's just like, yeah, if one 
person says it, OK, you know, 

464
00:22:35,680 --> 00:22:36,880
maybe they had a bad game, 
whatever. 

465
00:22:36,880 --> 00:22:40,000
But like, keep hearing that you,
you got to like take it 

466
00:22:40,000 --> 00:22:42,160
seriously. 
Absolutely, yeah. 

467
00:22:42,640 --> 00:22:46,840
Did you find that getting 
feedback from play testers, did 

468
00:22:46,840 --> 00:22:50,720
you find having your brother as 
a as a partner in the design, 

469
00:22:51,000 --> 00:22:57,680
did you find that to be helpful 
rather than a hurtful? 

470
00:22:57,680 --> 00:22:59,560
I guess yeah, hurtful and 
helpful. 

471
00:23:00,080 --> 00:23:02,800
So I think like the the one 
thing that works super well, 

472
00:23:03,280 --> 00:23:05,280
we're in different like spots 
now about an hour apart. 

473
00:23:05,400 --> 00:23:06,720
We go to different play testing 
events. 

474
00:23:06,720 --> 00:23:08,720
So sometimes just cover more 
ground, right? 

475
00:23:08,720 --> 00:23:10,800
And especially not doing the 
same play testers all the time. 

476
00:23:11,120 --> 00:23:13,880
That is super useful. 
And then also just logistically 

477
00:23:13,880 --> 00:23:15,920
when we go to the same event 
together, like we're taking 

478
00:23:15,920 --> 00:23:19,600
breaks, we're tapping each other
out, like we don't always both 

479
00:23:19,600 --> 00:23:21,160
need to be there. 
I mean, sometimes we are and 

480
00:23:21,160 --> 00:23:24,040
sometimes that's like helpful if
it's sort of a logistically 

481
00:23:24,040 --> 00:23:26,400
challenging convention, maybe 
with the seating or with the, 

482
00:23:27,040 --> 00:23:29,880
the getting set up, passing out 
components and stuff. 

483
00:23:29,880 --> 00:23:31,720
So it's really great to have a 
second person there. 

484
00:23:33,080 --> 00:23:35,600
I one, one thing I'm kind of 
surprised about is I would say 

485
00:23:35,600 --> 00:23:38,000
like the games that we watch 
together, I think we almost 

486
00:23:38,000 --> 00:23:41,040
always come away with very 
similar conclusions, which I 

487
00:23:41,040 --> 00:23:42,880
think is helpful because I think
we both like watch the same 

488
00:23:42,880 --> 00:23:44,720
playthrough and then we both 
can't really agree what 

489
00:23:44,720 --> 00:23:47,080
happened. 
That would make it a lot harder 

490
00:23:47,200 --> 00:23:49,440
to come to some decision about 
what to do next. 

491
00:23:49,440 --> 00:23:51,880
Sure. 
And I think we do put a lot of 

492
00:23:51,880 --> 00:23:53,400
trust in each other because 
like, when we're doing like play

493
00:23:53,400 --> 00:23:55,320
separately, we'll come back with
their notes, like, hey, this 

494
00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:58,080
thing isn't working. 
And I know it's also the thing 

495
00:23:58,080 --> 00:24:01,040
you really liked. 
And I wasn't trying to like bias

496
00:24:01,040 --> 00:24:02,720
them or anything. 
I'm just reporting what 

497
00:24:02,720 --> 00:24:04,480
happened. 
And, you know, I think we both 

498
00:24:04,480 --> 00:24:06,040
been pretty open to like, yeah, 
OK, that's fair. 

499
00:24:06,040 --> 00:24:08,320
You know, I know I, I trust you 
a lot. 

500
00:24:08,320 --> 00:24:11,440
And you're not going to try to 
like, tell them like what you 

501
00:24:11,440 --> 00:24:12,840
think about that. 
That that looked pretty bad 

502
00:24:12,840 --> 00:24:15,160
there, didn't you know? 
You got to trust each other. 

503
00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:17,200
So where did? 
OK. 

504
00:24:17,200 --> 00:24:21,840
So it's my understanding, so you
are you're in the Bay Area, 

505
00:24:22,200 --> 00:24:23,920
right? 
And I'm assuming your brother's 

506
00:24:23,920 --> 00:24:26,840
in the Bay Area too. 
I mean an hour can be anywheres 

507
00:24:26,840 --> 00:24:28,320
in California. 
These are the mountains over in 

508
00:24:28,320 --> 00:24:29,400
Lake Santa Cruz. 
Yeah. 

509
00:24:29,400 --> 00:24:32,880
OK. 
So where did you both of you 

510
00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:35,560
play test your games? 
Was it pretty much in the 

511
00:24:35,560 --> 00:24:41,360
Central California area or how 
far out did you go to pool your 

512
00:24:41,400 --> 00:24:43,240
play testers That's. 
A good question. 

513
00:24:43,240 --> 00:24:45,280
So like the the first, you know,
the first couple years is mostly

514
00:24:45,360 --> 00:24:48,200
local stuff around here. 
There's a fair number of 

515
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:49,840
conventions. 
It's sort of an interesting 

516
00:24:49,840 --> 00:24:51,080
feature. 
I think almost every three day 

517
00:24:51,080 --> 00:24:54,160
weekend here has a convention. 
They're all small, but they, you

518
00:24:54,160 --> 00:24:56,200
know, I think the biggest one is
Kublikan and that tops out of 

519
00:24:56,200 --> 00:24:58,240
like 5006 thousand people, so 
not huge. 

520
00:24:58,560 --> 00:25:00,680
Yep. 
But it's like competing that 

521
00:25:00,680 --> 00:25:03,880
same weekend is fanimate, which 
is like a large pop culture con,

522
00:25:04,280 --> 00:25:05,760
which also has board game 
presence. 

523
00:25:05,760 --> 00:25:07,720
So like just to give some idea 
of like how many choices you 

524
00:25:07,720 --> 00:25:11,320
have of where to go. 
And then the first time we 

525
00:25:11,320 --> 00:25:13,640
really took it on the road was 
actually Origins. 

526
00:25:13,640 --> 00:25:15,640
That was a really interesting 
experience because like really 

527
00:25:15,640 --> 00:25:17,000
different set of people over 
there. 

528
00:25:17,080 --> 00:25:19,360
And we came back, we made a lot 
of changes after that. 

529
00:25:21,160 --> 00:25:23,320
Yeah. 
And you know, since then we've 

530
00:25:23,320 --> 00:25:26,960
we've obviously online you, you 
get people from all over. 

531
00:25:26,960 --> 00:25:30,640
But yeah, most of our test units
been around here a little bit in

532
00:25:30,640 --> 00:25:33,760
like LA. 
And also my brother went to PAX 

533
00:25:33,760 --> 00:25:35,680
Unplugged and played some there 
as well. 

534
00:25:36,320 --> 00:25:40,320
And so, yeah, it's been mostly 
like big cons, right, or or the 

535
00:25:40,520 --> 00:25:47,960
smaller cons around here. 
Is there a community of play 

536
00:25:47,960 --> 00:25:52,000
testing events in the area? 
So an hour away from here in 

537
00:25:52,000 --> 00:25:55,800
Saint Louis there's Proto Steel,
which is like just a three day 

538
00:25:55,800 --> 00:25:59,240
weekend at a gaming store where 
you just break. 

539
00:25:59,240 --> 00:26:02,080
It's all prototypes, play 
testers. 

540
00:26:02,080 --> 00:26:04,840
I think it's like $5 for the 
weekend or $10. 

541
00:26:05,440 --> 00:26:08,080
Obviously for designers, it's a 
little more, but is there things

542
00:26:08,080 --> 00:26:12,320
like that as well in your area? 
And if so, how helpful was that?

543
00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:14,800
Oh, yeah, I should, I should 
shout out to Golden Gate Game 

544
00:26:14,800 --> 00:26:16,240
Makers. 
If you're listening to this and 

545
00:26:16,240 --> 00:26:18,600
you're anywhere near the Bay, 
look them up. 

546
00:26:18,760 --> 00:26:20,840
It's fantastic. 
It's a pretty good group. 

547
00:26:20,840 --> 00:26:24,280
It's so there's a development 
group called Bringer Creative, 

548
00:26:24,480 --> 00:26:26,240
which is like a big force down 
here in the South Bay. 

549
00:26:26,240 --> 00:26:29,840
They've worked on all sorts of 
stuff like Cartographers or 

550
00:26:29,840 --> 00:26:32,280
River Valley Glass Works. 
They've had a lot of titles come

551
00:26:32,280 --> 00:26:34,880
through. 
And so they've been really 

552
00:26:34,880 --> 00:26:37,760
helpful in running these meetups
at this point now. 

553
00:26:37,920 --> 00:26:39,240
I mean, I was just that one last
night. 

554
00:26:39,560 --> 00:26:43,040
There's at least one a week, 
often 2 if you're willing to 

555
00:26:43,040 --> 00:26:44,920
drive a bit. 
Some are, you know, very well 

556
00:26:44,920 --> 00:26:47,640
attended, maybe 30 people, Some,
some are smaller, maybe 8 

557
00:26:47,640 --> 00:26:50,000
people. 
And then each of the cons has a 

558
00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:52,360
produce build room as well, 
often run by the same Golden 

559
00:26:52,360 --> 00:26:55,960
Gate game makers group. 
And so it's, it's been an 

560
00:26:55,960 --> 00:26:57,800
essential, right? 
Like for the first year or so, 

561
00:26:57,800 --> 00:27:00,920
we mostly were building our own 
thing, testing and playing it. 

562
00:27:00,920 --> 00:27:05,520
But the moment we took it to an 
event, we had just completely 

563
00:27:05,520 --> 00:27:09,120
step change in our development 
or like lightspeed or right. 

564
00:27:09,280 --> 00:27:11,800
You might spend weeks and weeks 
trying to perfect some little 

565
00:27:12,040 --> 00:27:13,760
card interaction. 
And then you go to one of these 

566
00:27:13,760 --> 00:27:15,920
things you're like, Yep, back to
square, back to square 1. 

567
00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:18,200
You know, it doesn't turns out 
that thing didn't even matter 

568
00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:19,400
and there's so many big 
problems. 

569
00:27:19,400 --> 00:27:22,480
So getting real people in front 
of it and especially having some

570
00:27:22,480 --> 00:27:25,240
of them be it's a mixer. 
Some people are like in the 

571
00:27:25,240 --> 00:27:27,880
industry, and they can tell you 
right off the top there, they're

572
00:27:27,880 --> 00:27:29,280
like, yeah, this is going to be 
expensive to make. 

573
00:27:29,280 --> 00:27:30,880
You're not even thinking about 
that when you're designing a 

574
00:27:30,880 --> 00:27:32,000
game. 
But they're like, yeah, you 

575
00:27:32,000 --> 00:27:33,400
know, consider a different 
component, right? 

576
00:27:33,400 --> 00:27:36,640
Or they can tell you, like, have
you played this game, this game,

577
00:27:36,640 --> 00:27:38,120
this game? 
Because, and these are titles 

578
00:27:38,120 --> 00:27:39,240
that you've probably never heard
of. 

579
00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:41,320
I mean, some of these folks are 
playing like hundreds of games a

580
00:27:41,320 --> 00:27:43,840
year. 
So, you know, so that's great. 

581
00:27:43,840 --> 00:27:45,720
But then also people are just 
like, yeah, I like games and I 

582
00:27:45,720 --> 00:27:47,600
want to play test. 
And that's also valuable 

583
00:27:47,600 --> 00:27:50,400
because, you know, you see how 
hard it is for someone to pick 

584
00:27:50,400 --> 00:27:53,800
up a game if they're only 
experienced to game is like, I 

585
00:27:53,800 --> 00:27:56,800
played Sagrada twice and I, you 
know, we played exploring 

586
00:27:56,800 --> 00:28:00,320
kittens and like, how can they 
make the jump over to your game 

587
00:28:00,320 --> 00:28:02,520
and understand the rules? 
Absolutely. 

588
00:28:02,760 --> 00:28:05,040
My wife and I are both avid play
testers. 

589
00:28:05,400 --> 00:28:07,640
Awesome. 
We love to play test, which is 

590
00:28:07,640 --> 00:28:10,280
cool because you get we're 2 for
one, right. 

591
00:28:10,800 --> 00:28:16,840
So we both, while we both look 
at game design differently, when

592
00:28:16,840 --> 00:28:20,680
we're play testing, we've play 
tested enough and after we leave

593
00:28:20,680 --> 00:28:24,600
a play test session, we have a 
lot of conversations about the 

594
00:28:24,600 --> 00:28:28,200
games we play tested and just 
about the concept as a whole. 

595
00:28:28,400 --> 00:28:31,200
And we both recognize the 
importance of constructive 

596
00:28:31,200 --> 00:28:33,360
feedback. 
A lot of times we see play 

597
00:28:33,360 --> 00:28:37,120
testers who are just like, oh, 
that was fun and I like the art.

598
00:28:37,880 --> 00:28:39,760
OK. 
And I'm like, that doesn't help 

599
00:28:39,760 --> 00:28:43,160
the designer at all. 
Let me tell you what I really 

600
00:28:43,160 --> 00:28:44,400
think. 
So like I have a notebook 

601
00:28:44,400 --> 00:28:47,560
specifically for play testing. 
So it's, it's, it's funny when I

602
00:28:47,560 --> 00:28:50,600
walk up to a play test table, 
pull out my notebook, got my 

603
00:28:50,600 --> 00:28:53,960
pencil ready and I'm ready to 
take notes because I, because I 

604
00:28:53,960 --> 00:28:58,040
don't want to forget what I'm 
thinking in the moment and I 

605
00:28:58,040 --> 00:29:01,160
don't want to interrupt your 
teach of the game. 

606
00:29:01,920 --> 00:29:04,520
So I can tell you what I thought
about this thing and how you can

607
00:29:04,520 --> 00:29:07,160
make it better or why it's great
or whatever. 

608
00:29:07,240 --> 00:29:10,720
And it's really helpful to 
synthesize my thoughts in such a

609
00:29:10,720 --> 00:29:13,960
way that makes it constructive 
to you as a designer. 

610
00:29:13,960 --> 00:29:16,400
And I wish more play testers 
would, you know, think that 

611
00:29:16,400 --> 00:29:17,760
through because. 
That's how. 

612
00:29:17,960 --> 00:29:19,600
Games. 
That's how games get better. 

613
00:29:20,040 --> 00:29:21,360
Hats off to you. 
That's that's incredible. 

614
00:29:21,360 --> 00:29:23,920
I mean, as a designer, you 
appreciate any play tester, but 

615
00:29:24,240 --> 00:29:25,680
right, that's that's on another 
level. 

616
00:29:25,680 --> 00:29:27,320
That's, that's something else. 
That's yeah. 

617
00:29:28,040 --> 00:29:31,480
Well, as a fellow creative, you 
know, I know the importance of 

618
00:29:31,480 --> 00:29:35,000
feedback and yeah, so we want to
give you good feedback. 

619
00:29:35,200 --> 00:29:38,760
So that is Golden Gate Game 
Makers. 

620
00:29:38,800 --> 00:29:39,760
Is that right? 
Yeah. 

621
00:29:39,760 --> 00:29:42,640
OK, so guys, if you're not 
listening to this podcast, you 

622
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:46,520
should, Brian, should after this
recording, go and tell all of 

623
00:29:46,520 --> 00:29:49,640
the people from Golden Gate Game
Makers how great this podcast is

624
00:29:49,800 --> 00:29:52,200
and maybe they'll start 
listening to them, particularly 

625
00:29:52,200 --> 00:29:54,400
this episode since we're talking
about them so much. 

626
00:29:57,600 --> 00:29:59,960
So yeah. 
How? 

627
00:30:00,200 --> 00:30:01,760
I had a question, then I lost 
it. 

628
00:30:01,800 --> 00:30:04,840
Isn't that great? 
Yeah, that's how that goes. 

629
00:30:05,520 --> 00:30:09,560
You got to love that. 
So what was Who went to Origins?

630
00:30:09,560 --> 00:30:11,520
Was it you or your brother? 
We went together. 

631
00:30:11,840 --> 00:30:14,080
We did. 
So what was that like? 

632
00:30:14,080 --> 00:30:15,440
Right. 
It's the first time taking this 

633
00:30:15,440 --> 00:30:19,760
thing on the road. 
And it's like, you know, Origins

634
00:30:19,760 --> 00:30:22,720
is, I mean, it's a big deal. 
We've devoted several episodes 

635
00:30:22,720 --> 00:30:26,120
to it this summer. 
So, So really, what was that? 

636
00:30:26,200 --> 00:30:29,240
What was that like? 
That first sit down and bam it. 

637
00:30:29,800 --> 00:30:32,160
Was it was something because it 
was right after pandemic. 

638
00:30:32,160 --> 00:30:35,440
And so like we OK, we were like 
just excited to get out and see 

639
00:30:35,440 --> 00:30:37,520
people and like, you know, 
mingle and stuff. 

640
00:30:37,520 --> 00:30:38,880
Is that that was very 
exhilarating. 

641
00:30:38,880 --> 00:30:40,360
And it was the two of us on our 
own. 

642
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:43,400
And I was away from the kids for
a bit. 

643
00:30:43,400 --> 00:30:46,240
So that was like, you know, I 
had really not been away at that

644
00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:48,320
point. 
They were like, I think my 

645
00:30:48,320 --> 00:30:51,960
oldest was 2 and so it was, it 
was just fun. 

646
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:54,120
It would have been fun if 
nothing else happened, right? 

647
00:30:54,440 --> 00:30:59,160
But I think like the, I think 
one thing that's really cool 

648
00:30:59,160 --> 00:31:00,920
about origins, part of the 
reason we went there is because 

649
00:31:00,920 --> 00:31:03,720
we, we had heard from other 
people like it gets a really 

650
00:31:03,720 --> 00:31:07,400
good level of industry presence 
and people who are like actually

651
00:31:07,600 --> 00:31:09,120
have a little bit of time to 
chat with you. 

652
00:31:09,480 --> 00:31:11,880
You know, you go to a 
convention, like I've not been 

653
00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:13,440
to Jen Con yet. 
I want to go. 

654
00:31:13,440 --> 00:31:16,440
But even like a packs unplugged 
where it's like folks are busy, 

655
00:31:16,440 --> 00:31:18,880
they're making sales like they 
they don't have to take out 

656
00:31:18,880 --> 00:31:22,000
their schedule. 
And we had a missed gamma and 

657
00:31:22,000 --> 00:31:23,680
that was like kind of the other 
one we were considering. 

658
00:31:23,680 --> 00:31:25,640
And we're like, OK, well, let's 
let's go to origins then. 

659
00:31:26,160 --> 00:31:30,080
And it was real awesome because 
like people who were real 

660
00:31:30,200 --> 00:31:33,200
industry pros con and creators 
would just come to the the 

661
00:31:33,200 --> 00:31:35,680
produce spiel room and just play
your game. 

662
00:31:35,720 --> 00:31:39,480
Which in comparison, out here in
the on where we are in the Bay 

663
00:31:39,480 --> 00:31:42,840
Area, there are many more 
designers than there are, I 

664
00:31:42,840 --> 00:31:44,920
guess industry professionals at 
these kind of events. 

665
00:31:44,920 --> 00:31:47,640
Whereas I could origins feel 
like the ratio was much more 

666
00:31:47,920 --> 00:31:51,640
weighted towards like people 
would be coming around from like

667
00:31:51,640 --> 00:31:53,320
the OP or something and come 
play your game. 

668
00:31:53,440 --> 00:31:56,040
And like, that's pretty cool. 
And you know, they've got pretty

669
00:31:56,040 --> 00:31:58,760
good feedback to give. 
They've seen a lot of games and 

670
00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:03,880
that was that really like, I 
think also like to having having

671
00:32:03,920 --> 00:32:06,200
a period of time with nothing 
else to do but think about the 

672
00:32:06,200 --> 00:32:08,360
game. 
Like you'd come home every night

673
00:32:08,400 --> 00:32:11,080
after the con, It'd be late. 
We'd be like frantically 

674
00:32:11,080 --> 00:32:12,600
changing these. 
We're like, OK, OK, this isn't 

675
00:32:12,600 --> 00:32:13,520
working. 
This isn't we got it. 

676
00:32:13,520 --> 00:32:16,640
We got to get this better. 
And there was one play test. 

677
00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:19,880
Actually, I will always remember
this play test. 

678
00:32:21,520 --> 00:32:27,320
One of one of the people who's 
playing like was giving us 

679
00:32:27,320 --> 00:32:29,200
feedback and like, you know, 
there's some positives and some 

680
00:32:29,200 --> 00:32:31,280
negatives. 
And the positive thing they 

681
00:32:31,280 --> 00:32:34,680
brought up was this little kind 
of spin down dial thing we had 

682
00:32:34,680 --> 00:32:38,280
that we just we just bought 
like, you know, off the Internet

683
00:32:38,280 --> 00:32:41,200
to just kind of work as a we 
weren't even thinking about 

684
00:32:41,200 --> 00:32:42,600
putting in the game. 
It was just something that was 

685
00:32:42,680 --> 00:32:45,000
sure you count like, yeah, they 
really like this style thing. 

686
00:32:45,000 --> 00:32:47,200
And I mean, this is coming on 
top of a lot of other feedback, 

687
00:32:47,200 --> 00:32:49,600
but that was kind of the to the 
point where we're like, yeah, I 

688
00:32:49,600 --> 00:32:53,000
think we need to change a lot 
about this game because the most

689
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:55,920
positive thing is that we've got
a nifty component and that 

690
00:32:55,920 --> 00:32:57,080
component's not the centerpiece,
right? 

691
00:32:57,080 --> 00:32:58,800
If your game is about a 
component and the component's 

692
00:32:58,800 --> 00:33:00,360
the centerpiece of the game, 
you're doing perfect, right? 

693
00:33:00,360 --> 00:33:02,560
But, but it's just like an 
ancillary thing you happen to 

694
00:33:02,560 --> 00:33:05,080
throw in there. 
It was like, all right, we got 

695
00:33:05,080 --> 00:33:06,480
to go back to drama. 
So. 

696
00:33:06,600 --> 00:33:08,720
So it was kind of bittersweet in
a way, because we had tons of 

697
00:33:08,720 --> 00:33:09,960
fun. 
All these really great people, 

698
00:33:09,960 --> 00:33:12,240
some of them who are still, 
like, I still chat with about 

699
00:33:12,240 --> 00:33:16,560
the game, but we also came away 
with like, yeah, we have to, 

700
00:33:16,560 --> 00:33:19,000
like, fix a lot about this game.
So yeah. 

701
00:33:20,040 --> 00:33:22,880
But that's OK. 
You, as you just said earlier, 

702
00:33:22,880 --> 00:33:26,280
you were willing to be 
vulnerable and take that 

703
00:33:26,280 --> 00:33:29,480
feedback and make your game 
better. 

704
00:33:29,480 --> 00:33:34,080
So, so kudos. 
How, how supportive did you find

705
00:33:34,080 --> 00:33:37,800
the network of fellow designers 
from Origins? 

706
00:33:37,800 --> 00:33:41,680
And the follow up question is 
how supportive is the greater 

707
00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:45,840
design community that you've 
experienced nationwide, 

708
00:33:45,840 --> 00:33:48,440
worldwide, wherever you've been?
You know, I would extend that 

709
00:33:48,440 --> 00:33:52,680
out beyond designers like 
publishers, content creators, 

710
00:33:52,760 --> 00:33:56,800
even manufacturers, like really,
everyone's been super patient. 

711
00:33:57,000 --> 00:33:59,160
I feel like with, with us 
throughout this process, you 

712
00:33:59,160 --> 00:34:01,320
know, because like, man, when 
you're new, you have so many 

713
00:34:01,320 --> 00:34:04,680
questions and it's just like 
you, you just don't know. 

714
00:34:04,760 --> 00:34:07,520
It's like, wait, how do I set up
an e-mail list? 

715
00:34:07,800 --> 00:34:11,239
How do I make a prototype? 
What, what do you use to cut 

716
00:34:11,239 --> 00:34:13,040
your paper out? 
You know, I'm using scissors. 

717
00:34:13,040 --> 00:34:15,000
It's taken forever. 
They're like, get a cutter, you 

718
00:34:15,000 --> 00:34:19,440
know, it's like, hey, should I 
like, should I like, you know, 

719
00:34:20,560 --> 00:34:22,960
get a nice version of the 
prototype or is paper OK? 

720
00:34:22,960 --> 00:34:24,480
Like what what's, what's the 
etiquette? 

721
00:34:24,480 --> 00:34:26,199
Even if I'm showing up in front 
of play testers, what am I 

722
00:34:26,199 --> 00:34:28,480
supposed to put on the table? 
And just all these things you, 

723
00:34:29,639 --> 00:34:31,560
you know, you take for granted 
once you once you know all them.

724
00:34:31,560 --> 00:34:33,880
But when you. 
And so, yeah, it's been like for

725
00:34:33,880 --> 00:34:37,120
designers in particular, of 
course, like there's always slow

726
00:34:37,120 --> 00:34:40,199
times in this approach, field 
rooms and designs just get up 

727
00:34:40,199 --> 00:34:41,320
and start playing other people's
games. 

728
00:34:41,320 --> 00:34:43,480
And it's just like, it's like 
you put your game away and you 

729
00:34:43,480 --> 00:34:46,719
go play someone else's. 
And that's like a really nice 

730
00:34:46,719 --> 00:34:49,320
thing to do, right? 
Because you're not, you're there

731
00:34:49,320 --> 00:34:53,120
to work on your game ideally. 
But ultimately, I think most 

732
00:34:53,120 --> 00:34:55,080
designers in my experience, like
myself at least, like you 

733
00:34:55,080 --> 00:34:57,680
probably spend about half the 
time playing other people's 

734
00:34:57,680 --> 00:34:59,200
games and half the time playing 
your game roughly. 

735
00:34:59,200 --> 00:35:01,400
You know, I mean, sometimes 
there's tons of people in there 

736
00:35:01,400 --> 00:35:03,520
who just want to play. 
But when it's slow, you know, 

737
00:35:04,240 --> 00:35:07,160
and then some of those works you
stay in touch with, like, there,

738
00:35:07,160 --> 00:35:09,520
there there's some folks who, 
like, hit something like, oh, 

739
00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:10,920
we're actually doing some 
content creation now. 

740
00:35:10,920 --> 00:35:12,840
Do you want us to feature your 
game in a little like they're 

741
00:35:12,840 --> 00:35:14,840
doing like a little kind of one 
minute video? 

742
00:35:14,840 --> 00:35:16,400
Sounds like that. 
Thank you so much. 

743
00:35:16,400 --> 00:35:18,800
Like, I had no idea. 
Like, you know, we knew him as 

744
00:35:18,800 --> 00:35:20,000
designers and they're like, 
yeah. 

745
00:35:20,000 --> 00:35:22,840
But they kept us in mind when 
they kind of like, decide to 

746
00:35:22,840 --> 00:35:24,000
expand out what they're working 
on. 

747
00:35:24,000 --> 00:35:27,360
Or there's some of the some 
local folks who've seen this 

748
00:35:27,360 --> 00:35:31,200
game, a local publisher, you've 
seen this game, you know, since 

749
00:35:31,200 --> 00:35:33,080
2017, right. 
Every few months. 

750
00:35:33,120 --> 00:35:36,880
And, you know, when I need to 
figure out how to like, who to 

751
00:35:36,880 --> 00:35:40,360
partner with for manufacturers, 
like, hey, how do I do this? 

752
00:35:40,360 --> 00:35:42,160
Who do I talk to? 
Who, you know, who's going to 

753
00:35:42,160 --> 00:35:44,040
like, give me a like, here's 
this quote. 

754
00:35:44,560 --> 00:35:46,520
What does this line mean? 
You know, what is, what is VOB 

755
00:35:46,520 --> 00:35:48,240
intercoms, you know, and like, 
right. 

756
00:35:48,680 --> 00:35:51,280
It's so. 
Yeah, it's been like, yeah, I 

757
00:35:51,280 --> 00:35:55,680
think it has the feeling of a 
much, I guess it is a small 

758
00:35:55,680 --> 00:35:57,840
industry, but it has a feeling 
of an even smaller one. 

759
00:35:57,920 --> 00:36:02,080
And that's been really helpful. 
Yeah, I have heard that from 

760
00:36:02,080 --> 00:36:06,080
other designers that no matter 
how big this hobby is or small, 

761
00:36:06,080 --> 00:36:10,320
depending on what side of the 
aisle you're on, it's definitely

762
00:36:10,320 --> 00:36:13,360
a close knit supportive group 
amongst designers. 

763
00:36:13,360 --> 00:36:16,120
So I'm really encouraged to hear
that and glad you had that 

764
00:36:16,120 --> 00:36:19,280
experience. 
So let's talk about the art. 

765
00:36:20,600 --> 00:36:24,440
Who's responsible for the art? 
I didn't mean that. 

766
00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:26,520
I didn't mean for that question 
to sound so oh. 

767
00:36:26,640 --> 00:36:29,080
No, no, he's. 
Responsible for that art, like I

768
00:36:29,080 --> 00:36:31,680
asked it, and I'm like, that's 
not, wow, that sounded kind of 

769
00:36:31,680 --> 00:36:32,400
mean. 
Yeah. 

770
00:36:32,400 --> 00:36:34,080
So like, who's, who's the 
artist? 

771
00:36:34,080 --> 00:36:36,440
What was the inspiration for the
artwork? 

772
00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:43,920
Yeah, 'cause it's, I don't, it's
not whimsical, but it's not, 

773
00:36:44,840 --> 00:36:49,320
it's not like Magic the 
Gathering's got that full, 

774
00:36:49,320 --> 00:36:54,000
vibrant, very detailed art. 
It's not that either. 

775
00:36:54,040 --> 00:36:56,480
Talk to me about that. 
Yeah, it's it's great that you 

776
00:36:56,480 --> 00:36:57,920
brought Terry. 
That was the that was like the 

777
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:01,560
hardest part of kind of in terms
of like my brother and I working

778
00:37:01,560 --> 00:37:03,880
together and like what we had to
decide on. 

779
00:37:03,880 --> 00:37:05,920
It's it's certainly not where 
like most of the time went or 

780
00:37:05,920 --> 00:37:10,480
like it wasn't like the most, it
wasn't like the most emotionally

781
00:37:10,480 --> 00:37:13,560
draining, right. 
But it was just, we basically 

782
00:37:13,560 --> 00:37:16,280
agreed that both of us had veto 
power on the art. 

783
00:37:16,680 --> 00:37:18,800
It was something we both, it was
like super important to us and 

784
00:37:18,800 --> 00:37:20,480
it was something that we really 
wanted to get right. 

785
00:37:20,480 --> 00:37:22,760
And we had a lot of things in 
mind we didn't want to end up 

786
00:37:22,760 --> 00:37:25,280
as. 
And that's not super useful, 

787
00:37:25,280 --> 00:37:26,440
right? 
Because the beautiful thing 

788
00:37:26,440 --> 00:37:30,880
about art is there's infinite 
possibilities, and just knowing 

789
00:37:30,880 --> 00:37:32,880
that there's a couple you don't 
like doesn't really solve it for

790
00:37:32,880 --> 00:37:33,720
you. 
And. 

791
00:37:33,880 --> 00:37:35,200
You don't have a background? 
Absolutely. 

792
00:37:36,120 --> 00:37:37,880
Neither have a background in 
art, so we didn't even have like

793
00:37:37,880 --> 00:37:40,320
really the language to even 
describe right. 

794
00:37:40,320 --> 00:37:43,080
So that was that was very 
challenging and mostly we just 

795
00:37:43,200 --> 00:37:46,320
sat down together and we looked 
through art station after art 

796
00:37:46,320 --> 00:37:49,200
station after Cara Deviant Art. 
You know, I think we probably 

797
00:37:49,200 --> 00:37:51,240
went over at least 200 something
profiles, right? 

798
00:37:51,240 --> 00:37:53,680
Of just like, sure, I like this.
I like where this is going. 

799
00:37:53,680 --> 00:37:56,640
Like is this, you know, can we 
do more of this? 

800
00:37:56,640 --> 00:38:01,240
Let's reach out, you know, and 
like trying to even explain even

801
00:38:01,240 --> 00:38:02,920
once we found an artist who we 
thought the style was like 

802
00:38:02,920 --> 00:38:04,640
trying to explain, like what 
about their style? 

803
00:38:04,640 --> 00:38:07,920
We liked and show them a couple 
things that were like really 

804
00:38:08,600 --> 00:38:13,840
helpful for us kind of to move 
it forward was taking art that 

805
00:38:13,840 --> 00:38:16,320
was like not ours, right, but 
like kind of representative of 

806
00:38:16,320 --> 00:38:18,560
the style and then putting on 
the cards and showing it to 

807
00:38:18,560 --> 00:38:21,040
people in like a prototype form.
Like does this resonate with 

808
00:38:21,040 --> 00:38:22,520
you? 
Does this kind of like like you 

809
00:38:22,520 --> 00:38:25,360
just did this move? 
Like which one of these pictures

810
00:38:25,360 --> 00:38:28,280
kind of captures that? 
You know, it's like we're not 

811
00:38:28,280 --> 00:38:30,080
even tell asking people just 
putting it on there and then 

812
00:38:30,080 --> 00:38:33,960
just seeing how they if they 
look, you know, look past it, if

813
00:38:33,960 --> 00:38:37,520
they kind of like if they're 
like surprised when, you know, 

814
00:38:37,520 --> 00:38:39,400
the rules don't match the 
picture, right. 

815
00:38:40,480 --> 00:38:45,240
But yeah, so how we got to where
we ended up was actually kind of

816
00:38:45,720 --> 00:38:49,720
a Street Fighter was sort of the
the like specifically a Street 

817
00:38:49,720 --> 00:38:53,200
Fighter two. 
Yeah, Street Fighter two mostly 

818
00:38:53,240 --> 00:38:56,560
like was was the main 
inspiration there and like, yes,

819
00:38:56,800 --> 00:39:01,880
super turbo and kind of I think 
that blended with like a modern 

820
00:39:01,880 --> 00:39:05,200
comic book style. 
So sort of like, you know, it's 

821
00:39:05,200 --> 00:39:08,480
it's got reasonably involved 
lines. 

822
00:39:08,480 --> 00:39:12,280
There is some shading, but it's 
not like heavily rendered. 

823
00:39:12,560 --> 00:39:16,240
And we I think also some 
inspiration were like a League 

824
00:39:16,240 --> 00:39:18,960
of Legends type thing like, you 
know, kind of like a like a 

825
00:39:18,960 --> 00:39:21,320
mobile look to it as well. 
Right, right. 

826
00:39:21,440 --> 00:39:23,880
But yeah, we definitely wanted 
something a little bit playful, 

827
00:39:24,040 --> 00:39:26,800
a little bit like fairly 
colorful and a little bit 

828
00:39:27,400 --> 00:39:29,640
conducive to kind of over the 
top action, right. 

829
00:39:29,720 --> 00:39:33,520
Not too realistic, not too 
grounded, not to like fantasy 

830
00:39:33,520 --> 00:39:36,560
necessarily, right. 
But fantastic. 

831
00:39:36,560 --> 00:39:40,360
So yeah, it was, it was, yeah. 
So it's a Christian Araba is is 

832
00:39:40,360 --> 00:39:43,440
an artist down in LA who did 
some of the pieces for us. 

833
00:39:43,800 --> 00:39:46,240
But one thing about the games, 
it's fairly art intensive. 

834
00:39:46,240 --> 00:39:47,920
So he wasn't able to cover 
everything. 

835
00:39:47,920 --> 00:39:50,320
And so there's a, we had, we had
a studio doing some like more 

836
00:39:50,320 --> 00:39:52,760
pieces for us kind of based on 
what he had started for us, you 

837
00:39:52,760 --> 00:39:57,320
know, And then, yeah, it's, it's
been, I mean, we're, we're 

838
00:39:57,320 --> 00:39:59,600
really happy with how it landed,
of course. 

839
00:39:59,600 --> 00:40:03,400
And like, I think it does mesh 
pretty well with, you know, 

840
00:40:03,440 --> 00:40:05,600
people talk a lot about like 
theme and mechanics matching, 

841
00:40:05,600 --> 00:40:08,040
but like art is kind of the 
third pillar of that, right? 

842
00:40:08,040 --> 00:40:11,200
In your theme, mechanics and art
all need to stick together. 

843
00:40:11,200 --> 00:40:13,840
And I've definitely experienced 
games where like they actually 

844
00:40:13,840 --> 00:40:16,280
nail 2, but not all three, 
right? 

845
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:19,160
And so that was that was 
something that we we really want

846
00:40:19,160 --> 00:40:20,560
to make sure we were able to 
pull together. 

847
00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:25,280
So what is it like? 
So you're designing a combat 

848
00:40:25,280 --> 00:40:30,880
card game in an area that in an 
era that has there's a plethora 

849
00:40:30,880 --> 00:40:32,840
of TCGS. 
You said you didn't want to 

850
00:40:32,840 --> 00:40:37,000
produce a TCG for obvious 
reasons, one that Magic the 

851
00:40:37,000 --> 00:40:40,600
Gathering has completely 
dominated, and rightfully so. 

852
00:40:40,600 --> 00:40:43,160
And yet there are so many just 
card games. 

853
00:40:43,360 --> 00:40:47,120
Like I've featured so many 
designers who are publishing 

854
00:40:47,320 --> 00:40:50,680
combat card games right now. 
What? 

855
00:40:51,760 --> 00:40:53,320
What is? 
What is? 

856
00:40:53,720 --> 00:40:58,920
What is the feeling you get 
about doing that while everyone 

857
00:40:58,920 --> 00:41:00,400
else is doing? 
Like how do you punch through 

858
00:41:00,400 --> 00:41:02,760
the noise? 
Oh yeah, for sure. 

859
00:41:03,200 --> 00:41:05,000
Yeah. 
Because it's like part of it 

860
00:41:05,000 --> 00:41:08,240
too, is, you know, a lot of the 
games I play are not combat card

861
00:41:08,240 --> 00:41:09,440
games. 
I mean, obviously I play some of

862
00:41:09,440 --> 00:41:11,560
those too, right? 
But there's so many. 

863
00:41:11,680 --> 00:41:15,040
I think one thing that's been 
amazing in the past, like 7-8, 

864
00:41:15,280 --> 00:41:17,760
even 10 years now really is the 
explosion of like thematic games

865
00:41:18,160 --> 00:41:20,040
or they will take, it's not just
like paste it on, you know, 

866
00:41:20,040 --> 00:41:22,720
they'll be like, we're going to 
do a game about birds or 

867
00:41:22,720 --> 00:41:26,560
mushrooms or whatever. 
And they just like really nail 

868
00:41:26,560 --> 00:41:29,400
it, you know, and it's, it's 
really cool to like see 

869
00:41:30,080 --> 00:41:35,680
designers exploring the space of
like how mechanics can be 

870
00:41:35,680 --> 00:41:39,400
purposed for not just not just 
surface level, right, but like 

871
00:41:39,480 --> 00:41:41,720
very deeply, like, you know, 
food, drinks, whatever, right. 

872
00:41:42,120 --> 00:41:45,360
And so combat is one of the ones
I think it's always been 

873
00:41:45,640 --> 00:41:49,400
relatively easy to make a game 
where your combat mechanics make

874
00:41:49,600 --> 00:41:51,400
make sense as as board game 
mechanics, right? 

875
00:41:51,400 --> 00:41:53,880
Like there's a lot of good 
examples out there and there's a

876
00:41:53,880 --> 00:41:55,600
lot to draw on. 
So that that's how it's kind of 

877
00:41:56,000 --> 00:41:58,640
nice in that you have a lot of 
prior to work from. 

878
00:41:59,280 --> 00:42:03,000
I think for us, it was always 
about having that team and like 

879
00:42:03,000 --> 00:42:06,560
multiplayer thing, because I 
think so many games really 

880
00:42:06,560 --> 00:42:08,000
nailed the one V1, which makes a
lot of sense. 

881
00:42:08,000 --> 00:42:10,360
I think most people play these 
games 1V1, right? 

882
00:42:10,360 --> 00:42:13,440
It's like it's really easy to 
get two people together and it's

883
00:42:14,080 --> 00:42:15,680
really easy to run a tournament 
that way, right. 

884
00:42:16,600 --> 00:42:19,920
And the void we kind of felt was
that, well, how do you scale 

885
00:42:19,920 --> 00:42:22,240
that up to game night? 
Like do you always have to leave

886
00:42:22,680 --> 00:42:26,200
the combat, you know, battling 
world when you sit down more 

887
00:42:26,200 --> 00:42:28,920
than three people? 
And so that was what we really 

888
00:42:28,920 --> 00:42:30,880
want to make sure because like 
we have so many friends who 

889
00:42:31,960 --> 00:42:36,560
either enjoyed these like 1V1 
games a lot or they enjoyed the 

890
00:42:36,560 --> 00:42:38,200
video game kind of equivalence. 
Right. 

891
00:42:38,200 --> 00:42:40,680
And then right. 
Like, yeah, OK, you know, let's,

892
00:42:40,680 --> 00:42:44,080
let's let's mix up a game night.
You know, there's that you can 

893
00:42:44,080 --> 00:42:47,320
kind of get that feeling of like
that sort of intense dual 

894
00:42:47,840 --> 00:42:50,640
thinking, reading your 
opponent's mind, you know, in in

895
00:42:50,640 --> 00:42:53,360
a group setting. 
And I think that's kind of where

896
00:42:53,360 --> 00:42:55,400
we sort of really wanted to 
fall. 

897
00:42:55,400 --> 00:42:58,280
And I think there's definitely 
it's a sort of thing where it's 

898
00:42:58,280 --> 00:42:59,480
like, we really want this thing 
to exist. 

899
00:42:59,480 --> 00:43:02,720
So like if somebody had beat us 
to the punch, we just want to 

900
00:43:02,720 --> 00:43:06,600
make a game, you know, like, OK,
you know, it's like, yeah, if we

901
00:43:06,600 --> 00:43:08,800
already were playing this game, 
like we would have never felt 

902
00:43:08,800 --> 00:43:11,280
the need for it. 
So I think that was kind of kind

903
00:43:11,280 --> 00:43:15,640
of what drove us there. 
I think that you had mentioned 

904
00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:21,160
in previous emails between each 
other in some of your notes that

905
00:43:21,160 --> 00:43:24,040
I thought were interesting and 
would be interesting to discuss.

906
00:43:24,040 --> 00:43:28,400
At this moment, you were talking
about the fine balance between 

907
00:43:28,680 --> 00:43:33,080
chaos and control in the 
simultaneous revealing of cards.

908
00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:39,040
Talk about that mechanic of the 
simultaneous revealing and how 

909
00:43:39,040 --> 00:43:43,920
you managed that balance. 
Yeah, yeah, that is, that is 

910
00:43:43,920 --> 00:43:46,960
something right there. 
Because I feel like you have to 

911
00:43:46,960 --> 00:43:49,080
welcome in the chaos as soon as 
you've got two people putting 

912
00:43:49,080 --> 00:43:50,680
shorts face down. 
You know, you might say your 

913
00:43:50,680 --> 00:43:53,880
game has no luck or something, 
or no randomness, but you don't 

914
00:43:53,880 --> 00:43:55,960
need to be rolling dice to have 
that experience. 

915
00:43:55,960 --> 00:43:57,440
As long as you don't know what 
your opponent's doing. 

916
00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:01,200
There's some uncertainty there. 
And that is like the thing that 

917
00:44:01,200 --> 00:44:02,480
you sort of have to embrace a 
bit. 

918
00:44:03,160 --> 00:44:07,200
And I think you can have a lot 
of fun, just like good old 

919
00:44:07,200 --> 00:44:09,560
fashioned fun with leaning into 
that. 

920
00:44:10,080 --> 00:44:11,960
And I've started to play a lot 
of games where it's like you 

921
00:44:12,440 --> 00:44:14,840
feel like a very little control 
over the outcome, but everyone's

922
00:44:14,840 --> 00:44:19,320
just kind of on this crazy ride.
And so where we wanted the game 

923
00:44:19,320 --> 00:44:22,000
to fall was like maybe pulling 
that back a little bit just 

924
00:44:22,000 --> 00:44:24,760
because we did want to have in 
more of those kind of like 

925
00:44:24,760 --> 00:44:27,520
dueling, knowing your opponent 
kind of feelings. 

926
00:44:27,520 --> 00:44:29,880
And if you can make no 
predictions about your opponent,

927
00:44:30,360 --> 00:44:32,920
it's really hard to to read 
them, you know, to feel like 

928
00:44:32,920 --> 00:44:34,680
you, you got the drop on them 
right. 

929
00:44:34,680 --> 00:44:39,440
If if it feels purely chaotic. 
And so it does depend a lot, of 

930
00:44:39,440 --> 00:44:42,640
course, on like, the table and 
how well everyone knows each 

931
00:44:42,640 --> 00:44:43,960
other and knows their characters
and stuff. 

932
00:44:44,560 --> 00:44:47,560
But for us, what we found is 
like, you know, we put the three

933
00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:50,240
cards face down. 
We tried two, we tried one, we 

934
00:44:50,240 --> 00:44:52,840
tried four, we tried 5, right. 
And we tried all kinds of 

935
00:44:52,840 --> 00:44:56,440
schemes where like, certain 
numbers would be maybe face up 

936
00:44:56,440 --> 00:44:59,120
in your discard so your opponent
could, you know, math out a 

937
00:44:59,120 --> 00:45:02,400
little bit what you had left. 
We tried versions where people 

938
00:45:02,400 --> 00:45:04,840
could, there were a lot of 
effects that would restrict what

939
00:45:04,840 --> 00:45:06,200
you could play in certain 
scenarios. 

940
00:45:06,480 --> 00:45:08,600
I almost feel like we just sort 
of tried everything until we 

941
00:45:08,600 --> 00:45:11,000
found something that felt good. 
We didn't have that like big 

942
00:45:11,000 --> 00:45:12,360
intuitive leaflets, like, ah, 
it's three. 

943
00:45:12,360 --> 00:45:14,760
I mean, 3 was one of the first 
thing we tried just cuz like, 

944
00:45:15,080 --> 00:45:18,280
it's a very manageable number 
and it turned out to be right. 

945
00:45:18,280 --> 00:45:21,400
But we didn't know that until we
kind of were like, OK, 3 is 

946
00:45:21,400 --> 00:45:24,280
good, but what about four? 
It's like, no, that's not good. 

947
00:45:24,280 --> 00:45:26,800
Like by the time you get that 
fourth card, no one has any idea

948
00:45:26,800 --> 00:45:29,240
what's going on. 
And it's, it's a mess, right? 

949
00:45:29,240 --> 00:45:31,280
But, but when you only play like
one card and we, we try to 

950
00:45:31,280 --> 00:45:33,200
version that, it does feel very 
rock, paper, scissors. 

951
00:45:33,400 --> 00:45:36,160
And that can be super fun. 
There's, there's a lot of games 

952
00:45:36,160 --> 00:45:38,400
that do that. 
But at that point we felt like 

953
00:45:38,400 --> 00:45:42,640
it was a little too, a little 
bit too abstract. 

954
00:45:42,760 --> 00:45:46,760
You know, it's like one punch 
and if you have your block up, 

955
00:45:47,120 --> 00:45:49,520
you're fine. 
And if you tried to run away, 

956
00:45:49,520 --> 00:45:52,440
maybe I'd get you first, right? 
And like, it was just this very 

957
00:45:52,440 --> 00:45:55,560
staccato kind of repetition of 
did you do it or not? 

958
00:45:56,160 --> 00:45:58,960
And with the three, we left a 
little bit of space there to be 

959
00:45:58,960 --> 00:46:00,880
like, OK, maybe you got me on 
that first hit. 

960
00:46:00,880 --> 00:46:04,760
But then I was prepared for 
maybe messing up on my first 

961
00:46:04,760 --> 00:46:06,600
move. 
But then I I had a contingency 

962
00:46:06,600 --> 00:46:09,080
plan of stepping back and then 
then shooting up my fireball. 

963
00:46:09,080 --> 00:46:13,120
So it all kind of comes from the
video game idea of like you, 

964
00:46:13,240 --> 00:46:15,760
you've got your controller, you 
can cue up your inputs, right? 

965
00:46:15,760 --> 00:46:18,320
You make some movements, but you
don't really have time to know 

966
00:46:18,320 --> 00:46:20,600
what the opponent's moves are 
when you're doing yours. 

967
00:46:21,080 --> 00:46:24,840
And so to give that feel on the 
tabletop, we wanted to have kind

968
00:46:24,840 --> 00:46:29,080
of spread that needle between 
making just one choice and 

969
00:46:29,080 --> 00:46:33,120
making like a whole series of 
things that could go off the 

970
00:46:33,120 --> 00:46:35,040
rails. 
And by the time you're halfway 

971
00:46:35,040 --> 00:46:37,040
through, you're already kind of 
holding your head because it's 

972
00:46:37,440 --> 00:46:40,840
it's too far gone. 
That's a fairpoint. 

973
00:46:40,960 --> 00:46:44,400
That's fair. 
So it says that in the 

974
00:46:44,400 --> 00:46:47,080
description. 
It talks about how you play a 

975
00:46:47,080 --> 00:46:50,600
legend. 
Can you tell us about the 

976
00:46:50,600 --> 00:46:53,120
characters that you play these 
legends? 

977
00:46:53,520 --> 00:46:56,680
Who are they, where they come 
from? 

978
00:46:56,680 --> 00:46:59,880
Is there a lot of lore behind 
the game or? 

979
00:47:00,240 --> 00:47:01,600
Yeah. 
That's fair. 

980
00:47:01,600 --> 00:47:03,200
Yeah, yeah, yeah. 
That's a great questions. 

981
00:47:03,200 --> 00:47:06,040
Yeah. 
We we went fairly lore light. 

982
00:47:06,320 --> 00:47:11,720
The basic world is 1 in which 
anybody who's really good at 

983
00:47:11,720 --> 00:47:15,240
something is like maybe the the 
very best in their field 

984
00:47:15,760 --> 00:47:18,040
actually kind of gained some 
magical prowess from that. 

985
00:47:18,240 --> 00:47:20,400
So, you know, we've got like the
world's best opera singer. 

986
00:47:21,040 --> 00:47:23,680
And it's not just that she's the
best opera singer. 

987
00:47:23,680 --> 00:47:27,840
Like she can also use her voice 
to, you know, explode crystal 

988
00:47:27,840 --> 00:47:29,920
glass, but on like a amazing 
scale. 

989
00:47:29,920 --> 00:47:32,640
Or she can use her stage powers 
to kind of disappear from the 

990
00:47:32,640 --> 00:47:36,480
arena and appear somewhere else.
And so OK, we've got kind of 

991
00:47:36,480 --> 00:47:41,560
people from characters from all 
sorts of different like areas, 

992
00:47:41,560 --> 00:47:43,160
even like time periods a little 
bit. 

993
00:47:43,160 --> 00:47:46,560
And sort of the arena in this 
world is kind of like, OK, if 

994
00:47:46,560 --> 00:47:49,000
you've already achieved, you're 
the best at whatever you're 

995
00:47:49,000 --> 00:47:53,120
doing, you've you've kind of 
gain these magical powers. 

996
00:47:54,480 --> 00:47:58,760
There's the only like challenge 
left is other people from like 

997
00:47:58,880 --> 00:48:02,040
totally different disciplines 
who also have these kind of 

998
00:48:02,040 --> 00:48:04,400
powers, right? 
And so it's sort of like a it's,

999
00:48:04,400 --> 00:48:06,440
it's, it's purely like a 
spectator sport, you know, kind 

1000
00:48:06,440 --> 00:48:08,560
of like a maybe like a 
professional wrestling 

1001
00:48:08,560 --> 00:48:10,360
equivalent, right? 
Where like, you know, they're 

1002
00:48:10,360 --> 00:48:12,880
just kind of having fun, but 
they're expressing themselves 

1003
00:48:12,880 --> 00:48:14,080
through whatever they've 
mastered. 

1004
00:48:15,840 --> 00:48:18,840
So what would you say to someone
who's who plays your game and 

1005
00:48:18,840 --> 00:48:20,880
they're like, well, this is just
like a video game. 

1006
00:48:20,880 --> 00:48:23,720
I can go ahead and play video 
game X. 

1007
00:48:24,120 --> 00:48:28,800
Why do I need this card game? 
What makes it stand out? 

1008
00:48:28,800 --> 00:48:30,120
What do you say to someone like 
that? 

1009
00:48:30,400 --> 00:48:32,640
I mean, one, I would take that 
as a huge compliment because 

1010
00:48:32,640 --> 00:48:35,880
like if they say it's just like 
video game XI mean I feel like 

1011
00:48:36,040 --> 00:48:38,080
hitting video game notes in a 
board game is so hard. 

1012
00:48:38,200 --> 00:48:40,440
Just the pacing and the tempo 
and the timing and the 

1013
00:48:40,440 --> 00:48:43,760
engagement, like video games, 
they get a lot of that for free 

1014
00:48:43,760 --> 00:48:46,680
because they have so much 
control over the the display and

1015
00:48:46,880 --> 00:48:48,160
the graphics, the animation, the
sound. 

1016
00:48:48,160 --> 00:48:50,080
It's a very immersive thing, you
know, and if someone's like 

1017
00:48:50,480 --> 00:48:52,080
you're bored and you can feel 
like a video game, I feel like, 

1018
00:48:52,400 --> 00:48:53,760
yeah. 
But to address the second-half 

1019
00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:54,880
of the question, they're like, 
Oh yeah. 

1020
00:48:54,880 --> 00:48:57,080
Especially when we're playing, 
actually moving back a little 

1021
00:48:57,080 --> 00:48:58,680
bit, we're playing with like 
younger audiences, right? 

1022
00:48:58,680 --> 00:49:01,920
That's like one of my favorite 
play tests to watch is like when

1023
00:49:01,920 --> 00:49:04,520
like a like a 13 year old or 14 
year old is playing because like

1024
00:49:05,360 --> 00:49:08,800
they're kind of in that place 
where they maybe didn't set out.

1025
00:49:08,800 --> 00:49:10,360
They're they're not they haven't
like chosen. 

1026
00:49:11,160 --> 00:49:12,400
They haven't like chosen like 
I'm a board gamer. 

1027
00:49:12,400 --> 00:49:15,000
They're just playing games and 
they all get stack ranked in 

1028
00:49:15,000 --> 00:49:16,720
their mind. 
Like I like this game, I like 

1029
00:49:16,720 --> 00:49:18,760
that game, I like this game. 
And it's like, it's like when 

1030
00:49:18,760 --> 00:49:21,080
when those people really engage 
with it, I love it. 

1031
00:49:21,120 --> 00:49:24,680
Like it's like, this is this is 
great because it's like they're 

1032
00:49:24,680 --> 00:49:26,720
comparing this directly against 
Fortnite or they're comparing 

1033
00:49:26,720 --> 00:49:29,040
this directly against among us, 
whatever, you know, and like, 

1034
00:49:29,120 --> 00:49:31,360
right. 
But yeah, so, but to the answer,

1035
00:49:31,360 --> 00:49:33,560
the second-half of the question,
like, you know, why would I just

1036
00:49:33,560 --> 00:49:36,360
go play video game instead? 
I think a lot of that comes down

1037
00:49:36,360 --> 00:49:40,680
to, I mean, for the older folks,
it's reflexes, right? 

1038
00:49:40,680 --> 00:49:43,240
Like my fingers do not move that
fast anymore. 

1039
00:49:43,560 --> 00:49:47,760
Like the the level of like time 
and discipline it takes to be 

1040
00:49:48,040 --> 00:49:49,920
good at a game like Super Smash 
Brothers or something. 

1041
00:49:50,680 --> 00:49:53,920
It's that's gone away from me. 
So, you know, for for me, it's 

1042
00:49:53,920 --> 00:49:56,080
like, yeah, that, that. 
And then it's also about, you 

1043
00:49:56,080 --> 00:49:57,400
know, different skill levels, 
right? 

1044
00:49:57,400 --> 00:49:59,200
Like having a bit of that 
leveling factor. 

1045
00:49:59,200 --> 00:50:01,320
It's like if somebody needs to 
take a long time to pick out 

1046
00:50:01,320 --> 00:50:04,000
their moves and stuff. 
Easy to do in a tabletop game. 

1047
00:50:04,120 --> 00:50:06,520
And it's, it's about the social 
aspect as well. 

1048
00:50:06,520 --> 00:50:09,960
Like you might sit down, play a 
game for, for an hour, but hang 

1049
00:50:09,960 --> 00:50:12,520
out for two hours, you know, 
right. 

1050
00:50:12,680 --> 00:50:15,960
Video game can also be social. 
You know, I've done plenty of 

1051
00:50:15,960 --> 00:50:18,880
like couch stuff, couch stuff, 
but it's a different like 

1052
00:50:19,200 --> 00:50:21,600
barrier to entry. 
And like you need to have a game

1053
00:50:21,600 --> 00:50:24,280
console, controllers, TV, you 
know, sure. 

1054
00:50:24,280 --> 00:50:27,560
So yeah, I really, I would say 
like mostly I'd be, I'm super 

1055
00:50:27,560 --> 00:50:29,360
excited if people like, feel 
like it hits the same notes 

1056
00:50:29,360 --> 00:50:31,320
because it's like, yeah, that's 
what I want to bring to the 

1057
00:50:31,320 --> 00:50:35,200
tabletop. 
What's the recommended age 

1058
00:50:35,200 --> 00:50:37,320
group? 
Like how young for this game? 

1059
00:50:37,720 --> 00:50:41,920
Yeah, the box says 14 plus and I
think I've every fortune we've 

1060
00:50:41,920 --> 00:50:44,080
tested with it like had had no 
problem whatsoever. 

1061
00:50:44,320 --> 00:50:48,240
I think in general most people 
who have like because that age 

1062
00:50:48,240 --> 00:50:51,240
have like played video games at 
all, like immediately have a 

1063
00:50:51,320 --> 00:50:52,760
pretty good idea what's going 
on. 

1064
00:50:52,960 --> 00:50:55,360
Certainly younger, younger 
people played it all the way 

1065
00:50:55,360 --> 00:50:58,600
down to like 10 or so. 
And it just depends on it. 

1066
00:50:59,040 --> 00:51:02,160
I don't want to say it's like a 
text heavy game, but relatively 

1067
00:51:02,160 --> 00:51:05,720
speaking, you know, there, there
are moves that require a couple 

1068
00:51:05,720 --> 00:51:09,320
sentences to describe and 
there's like a bit of a like, I 

1069
00:51:09,600 --> 00:51:12,800
think this oddly like mid weight
game, you know, in in the sense 

1070
00:51:12,800 --> 00:51:16,720
of like it could, there are 
lighter, there are lighter ways 

1071
00:51:16,720 --> 00:51:18,600
to do this kind of game, but 
then you lose out on some of the

1072
00:51:18,600 --> 00:51:21,400
cinematics, some of the like 
wackier stuff. 

1073
00:51:21,400 --> 00:51:23,280
And we wanted to learn more into
that. 

1074
00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:28,200
So yeah, I think generally 
speaking, it's yeah. 

1075
00:51:29,040 --> 00:51:34,640
So for parents who have children
that are preteen to early teen 

1076
00:51:34,640 --> 00:51:39,120
years, who are maybe playing a 
lot of video games and they're 

1077
00:51:39,120 --> 00:51:44,160
looking for a analog shared 
experience with their kids at 

1078
00:51:44,160 --> 00:51:48,280
the table, your game seems to be
compatible with that. 

1079
00:51:48,280 --> 00:51:52,200
Parents can play this with their
kids and the kids can pick up on

1080
00:51:52,200 --> 00:51:55,080
it because if they can reference
it to what they already know. 

1081
00:51:55,680 --> 00:51:59,120
And so that seems to be 
encouraging of that family 

1082
00:51:59,120 --> 00:52:00,400
interaction. 
Absolutely. 

1083
00:52:00,400 --> 00:52:02,360
But but you have to be prepared 
to lose like your kids are going

1084
00:52:02,360 --> 00:52:03,960
to be sure. 
I don't know how to put, I don't

1085
00:52:04,000 --> 00:52:06,720
know how to tell you this. 
Like your kids are probably way 

1086
00:52:06,720 --> 00:52:08,680
better at this sort of game than
you are. 

1087
00:52:08,680 --> 00:52:10,920
And you know, that's OK, you 
know, but as long as you're 

1088
00:52:10,920 --> 00:52:12,920
prepared for that because you 
know, we've tested with plenty 

1089
00:52:12,920 --> 00:52:15,520
of families and stuff and I 
don't, I'm not saying I've got a

1090
00:52:15,720 --> 00:52:18,560
stat, but I think the kids are 
beating the parents like I don't

1091
00:52:18,560 --> 00:52:20,400
80% of the time. 
So as long as you're OK with 

1092
00:52:20,400 --> 00:52:23,160
that. 
OK, there you go. 

1093
00:52:23,560 --> 00:52:26,560
All right, well, that, that's 
all that I've got for you. 

1094
00:52:26,560 --> 00:52:29,800
Is there anything, any other 
final thoughts, final ideas that

1095
00:52:29,800 --> 00:52:33,560
you want to share? 
Well, yeah, thank you so much 

1096
00:52:33,560 --> 00:52:35,080
for for having me on. 
That's that's awesome. 

1097
00:52:35,080 --> 00:52:38,720
And you know, it's been, I don't
know, like, I guess, I guess I 

1098
00:52:38,720 --> 00:52:40,800
would say to people who are like
in the position of like maybe 

1099
00:52:40,800 --> 00:52:41,840
you have some friends you play 
with. 

1100
00:52:41,840 --> 00:52:43,560
Maybe it's maybe it's your 
brother, sister. 

1101
00:52:44,080 --> 00:52:47,000
And you're like, you know, we 
could we could make our own 

1102
00:52:47,000 --> 00:52:48,200
game. 
We could make something, you 

1103
00:52:48,200 --> 00:52:50,840
know, this is better than this 
or, you know, we love what this 

1104
00:52:50,840 --> 00:52:52,840
is doing, but it's we want to 
take it further. 

1105
00:52:52,920 --> 00:52:55,040
You can totally do it. 
You know, I would say I would 

1106
00:52:55,040 --> 00:52:57,600
encourage you to try like the 
sooner you get in front of 

1107
00:52:57,720 --> 00:52:59,880
someone outside your group, the 
better, you know, find that 

1108
00:52:59,880 --> 00:53:02,960
local group, find the find the 
Potter spiel, finds the 

1109
00:53:02,960 --> 00:53:06,080
convention, you know, get get it
out of your heads. 

1110
00:53:06,080 --> 00:53:10,400
But at the same time, it's like,
it's not, I think I forget who 

1111
00:53:10,400 --> 00:53:12,960
said this, so I won't attempt to
quote them exactly, but the 

1112
00:53:12,960 --> 00:53:15,880
paraphrase is kind of the taste 
comes before your ability to 

1113
00:53:15,880 --> 00:53:18,240
like execute. 
You know, like, like you can 

1114
00:53:18,240 --> 00:53:20,120
tell something isn't quite right
or you can tell something isn't 

1115
00:53:20,280 --> 00:53:22,720
the way you want it to be before
you're able to make the thing 

1116
00:53:22,720 --> 00:53:25,480
you want. 
And so like you spend a while 

1117
00:53:25,560 --> 00:53:27,360
being very frustrated by the 
thing you're making because 

1118
00:53:27,360 --> 00:53:29,000
you're like, this isn't, this 
isn't as good. 

1119
00:53:29,000 --> 00:53:31,600
Why isn't it good? 
And it's not because your taste 

1120
00:53:31,600 --> 00:53:33,480
is wrong. 
It's because you're learning how

1121
00:53:33,480 --> 00:53:35,680
to like make that thing. 
And that's something I've 

1122
00:53:35,680 --> 00:53:38,280
definitely felt, but like, you 
know, trust your taste, right? 

1123
00:53:38,280 --> 00:53:40,960
Because like, that's right. 
That's the part that like is 

1124
00:53:41,360 --> 00:53:43,320
coming from all your experiences
at that point and is like super 

1125
00:53:43,320 --> 00:53:46,840
valid. 
And then I guess to the the 

1126
00:53:46,840 --> 00:53:50,680
other thing I want to say is, 
you know, to people who are out 

1127
00:53:50,680 --> 00:53:52,880
there trying to like, maybe 
maybe play testing games, 

1128
00:53:52,880 --> 00:53:55,040
looking at games, approach 
fields are like wondering, you 

1129
00:53:55,040 --> 00:53:58,720
know, like sort of, you know, 
wonder one about maybe Legends 

1130
00:53:58,720 --> 00:54:00,520
Arena or, you know, whatever 
game you see, like, you know, 

1131
00:54:00,840 --> 00:54:02,560
definitely, definitely come say 
hi. 

1132
00:54:02,560 --> 00:54:05,120
You know, like we've been 
talking a lot here about all the

1133
00:54:05,120 --> 00:54:08,240
people who've who've helped us 
in the industry and like, you 

1134
00:54:08,240 --> 00:54:11,160
know, all the people we've 
connected with and how sometimes

1135
00:54:11,160 --> 00:54:13,960
those people like end up making 
their own relationships. 

1136
00:54:13,960 --> 00:54:15,760
Like definitely, yeah, 
definitely. 

1137
00:54:15,760 --> 00:54:18,400
Just come, come, come say hi. 
And like Chad, I think when I 

1138
00:54:18,400 --> 00:54:20,640
before I was a designer, I 
didn't really realize how like, 

1139
00:54:21,000 --> 00:54:22,200
you know, small the whole world 
was. 

1140
00:54:22,200 --> 00:54:25,200
And now it's like, yeah, it's 
like if there's a game I like 

1141
00:54:25,200 --> 00:54:27,920
and I and I see a designer, you 
know, I'm absolutely going to go

1142
00:54:27,920 --> 00:54:31,880
just like go say hi and stuff 
because I know like, yeah, it's,

1143
00:54:31,880 --> 00:54:33,520
it's the coolest thing when 
somebody wants to talk about 

1144
00:54:33,520 --> 00:54:34,840
your creation with you. 
So. 

1145
00:54:35,280 --> 00:54:37,240
Right, absolutely. 
I get that. 

1146
00:54:37,320 --> 00:54:40,240
I get that. 
So, so the episode is going to 

1147
00:54:40,240 --> 00:54:41,960
drop. 
At the time of recording, it 

1148
00:54:41,960 --> 00:54:45,280
hasn't launched, but you'll 
notice that I did mention last 

1149
00:54:45,280 --> 00:54:47,720
week is when it launched because
I believe that's correct. 

1150
00:54:47,880 --> 00:54:50,520
This episode drops on September 
3rd. 

1151
00:54:50,520 --> 00:54:55,040
So tell everyone where they can 
find Legends of the Arena where 

1152
00:54:55,040 --> 00:54:57,200
they can find you on all the 
socials. 

1153
00:54:57,360 --> 00:54:58,480
Yeah. 
Oh, yeah. 

1154
00:54:58,480 --> 00:54:59,240
Thanks, VJ. 
That's right. 

1155
00:54:59,240 --> 00:55:01,200
Yeah. 
So launch date was August 26th. 

1156
00:55:01,360 --> 00:55:04,680
You can find us on Kickstarter, 
look for Legends of the Arena, 

1157
00:55:04,680 --> 00:55:11,120
and we're at Tooth Games on 
Instagram, Facebook, Discord. 

1158
00:55:11,480 --> 00:55:12,920
Yeah, we got we got a bunch of 
them. 

1159
00:55:12,920 --> 00:55:16,080
And so yeah, come, come drops a 
line and say hi, be happy to 

1160
00:55:16,080 --> 00:55:17,400
chat with you. 
Yeah. 

1161
00:55:17,520 --> 00:55:21,400
And so to be fair to all of my 
friends in New Orleans who are 

1162
00:55:21,400 --> 00:55:27,080
used to Toth being spelled with 
an H, this is Toth. 

1163
00:55:27,680 --> 00:55:32,040
This is Brian's family name. 
This is not named after the 

1164
00:55:32,040 --> 00:55:37,240
Egyptian God Toth, who is the 
messenger of the gods in 

1165
00:55:37,240 --> 00:55:40,400
Egyptian mythology. 
So, you know, being that I'm 

1166
00:55:40,400 --> 00:55:44,240
from Louisiana, my Louisiana 
gaming friends will know that's 

1167
00:55:44,240 --> 00:55:46,320
where I went right away. 
I was like, oh, Tooth Game. 

1168
00:55:46,360 --> 00:55:50,080
Oh, that's his last name. 
Oh, there's no H Yeah. 

1169
00:55:51,480 --> 00:55:53,120
That's a deep cut there. 
Yeah, yeah. 

1170
00:55:53,160 --> 00:55:56,800
But yeah, not. 
That that is where my head went.

1171
00:55:56,800 --> 00:55:59,240
And I know that some of my 
friends will go there as well, 

1172
00:55:59,240 --> 00:56:03,000
so clear up that. 
But yeah, you can definitely 

1173
00:56:03,000 --> 00:56:05,360
find them on Instagram. 
So guys, make sure to hit the 

1174
00:56:05,360 --> 00:56:07,560
like and subscribe button, 
please. 

1175
00:56:07,560 --> 00:56:11,240
We're really close to our one 
year goal for subscribers and 

1176
00:56:11,240 --> 00:56:14,520
we'll hit 100 hundred 
subscribers and then we're going

1177
00:56:14,520 --> 00:56:17,320
to move on to year. 
Two Big things coming. 

1178
00:56:17,360 --> 00:56:19,520
Once again, Brian, thank you for
joining me. 

1179
00:56:20,000 --> 00:56:23,000
This was a great conversation. 
I always love to hear the first 

1180
00:56:23,320 --> 00:56:26,280
time designer perspective, 
especially with everything 

1181
00:56:26,280 --> 00:56:29,080
that's been going on globally 
right now. 

1182
00:56:29,080 --> 00:56:33,400
So guys, be kind to each other 
and let's continue to play more 

1183
00:56:33,400 --> 00:56:33,920
games.