Ships have docked! Addresses locking on Monday
about 3 years ago
– Sun, Mar 14, 2021 at 09:23:42 PM
Hi Rival Networks backer!
First off, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR PATIENCE while my partner and I dealt with her recovery from heart surgery. I don't like being silent for so long, but my gosh, it was a pretty rough few weeks. I was caregiving full-time, unable to reply to emails or do much else.
That said, the ships should have docked as of a few days ago. I hear ports are pretty chaotic these days, so it might take some time to unpack, clear customs, and get on the trucks to the fulfillment centers. But we're getting there!
On that note, I have set BackerKit to lock all addresses on Monday. So now would be a REALLY GOOD TIME to go to BackerKit and confirm that your address is correct.
Now I have a pile of emails and Kickstarter messages to catch up on! But I'm very thankful that you've all been understanding while I was underwater.
Can't wait for you all to get your games!
Two bits of EXCELLENT NEWS (and one bit of not-so-good news)
over 3 years ago
– Tue, Jan 26, 2021 at 12:23:24 AM
Hi Rival Networks backer!
In the last update, I detailed an issue with the chipboard houses, and suggested that we might not ship until Chinese New Year is over, which would be the beginning of March.
Well, ABOUT THAT...
It turns out we didn't need to reprint the boards. We just needed to change the die that cuts the punchboard. I've received the punchboard cut by the new die, and the houses assemble much more easily!
Keep in mind, as per my update when I reviewed the PPC proofs, these houses are a little on the "loose" side. If this is an issue, I suggest gluing the houses together to keep them assembled.
And to echo what I've said several times, I'd rather err on the side of the houses being loose than tight. Of course, we don't want them too loose, but I think we have a good setup now; they're easy to assemble, and they won't fall apart if you keep assembling them.
Okay, awesome update number two...
You know how I was worried we would have to wait until Chinese New Year for the games to ship?
That's thankfully not the case. The games are ON THE CARGO SHIPS and IN TRANSIT TO THE FULFILLMENT CENTERS!
This means we will likely fulfill in mid-March, and the game will be available at retail in mid-April. Huzzah!
This means that now is a good time to check your address in BackerKit and make sure it's current! I will be locking it in a few weeks, as we get closer to fulfillment.
Okay, with those two bits of good news, here's one small bit of bad news:
As you may have read from the High Rise update I just posted, my partner has been in and out of the hospital with a really nasty case of pneumonia since November. I haven't been able to maintain a regular working schedule for two months now, as I'm her primary caregiver.
If you've been waiting on a reply from me... this is why. I've just been run all over the place with this. We're hoping she'll be discharged from her latest hospital stay late this week or early next week, and I can get back into the groove soon after that.
I don't normally like to post this kind of personal stuff in my updates. But it's affected how well I communicate, so I wanted to make it clear what was happening.
But that's what's been happening. I'll post my next update when it's time to lock addresses!
New Rival Networks proof came... and it's almost perfect! Almost...
over 3 years ago
– Tue, Jan 12, 2021 at 11:21:56 AM
Hi Rival Networks backer! All copies of The Rival Networks have been printed. They just need to be assembled by the plant - that means the big card sheets need to be cut into individual cards, boxes need to be folded, and so on.
Before this is done, Panda always sends an MPC - the Manufacturing Proof Copy. You'll recall I posted photos of a proof last month. That was the PPC - the Pre-production Proof Copy. What's the difference?
The PPC is made before the printers all fire up. It's the last chance to find typos, extra cards, or anything like that.
The MPC is made after the printers fire up. It's the "last line of defense." If we find any typos or errors here, we would have to completely reprint the components. In fact, the MPC is one of the thousands of copies from the print run. In other words, they fire up the printers, print all the card sheets and components, assemble one copy, and send that to me as the MPC. Once I give them the go-ahead, they assemble the rest.
Thankfully, we found no major errors in most of the components. There's a discrepancy in the component list in the rulebook. Sadly, I don't seem to have gotten better at this - High Rise had the same problem, so I'm going to need to really work on this in my next game. But because we caught it now, I'm printing small errata sheets that will come in the box so that it's clear what the correct component numbers are.
But the spot UV finish on the box looks great, the cards look and feel great, the punchboard feels great. It was just a matter of assembling the houses.
Yeaaaaaaah. About that.
You'll recall that we've had two proof copies to test the fit of the houses. There was an unprinted "white box" copy that was just the punch-outs. That was too tight. We tried loosening things for the PPC, and I was happy on that. The houses were a little on the loose side, so if you really shook them hard, they'd fall apart. But that wasn't something that bugged me too much; I'd rather have too loose than too tight, and folks can always use glue if they really want the houses to stay together.
But something changed between the PPC and the MPC, and the houses do not assemble neatly anymore. Or, at all, in fact! Those four photos above are the result of me trying to assemble a house for about 10 minutes. I was sadly unsuccessful; all I accomplished was bending the tab.
There could be several culprits here. It's possible that the factory used thicker cardboard for the MPC and final printings. It could be that they used the white-box cut pattern instead of the PPC cut pattern. It's possible that something else accounts for the difference.
Whatever the case is, there's no way I can approve the MPC like this. Thankfully, it's just one set of punchboard we'd have to reprint. It's just a matter of making sure that this next printing lets us assemble the houses properly.
The one other complication here is that we have Chinese New Year coming up in a few weeks. Our factory will shut down for almost all of February. So we're going to do as much as we can until then, but there's a very strong likelihood that our games won't be loaded onto the cargo boat until March.
I know this is taking a while, but it's always been the case for my games that if I have a choice between releasing a product that has a major defect in it, versus spending some time to get the details right, I'll do everything I can to get the details right. This is an important detail; I want the houses to assemble easily and not tear or fall apart easily. So this is going to be something we'll get right before we ship.
One more note: the mark of a good manufacturer is not whether or not they have defects in their products, as there will always be issues like this, no matter who you use. Humans are involved in the process, and the process is complicated.
The reason I love working with Panda is because issues like this surface before it's too late, when we can still fix them. As always, they've been amazing to work with, and I have no doubt we're going to fix this before we ship.
I still remember spending months with Panda on High Rise, getting the buildings to fit nicely in the plastic stands. When Tom Vasel did an unboxing video, he tried putting a building in a stand; it fit perfectly. That moment, that second or two, took enormous effort and back-and-forth between a bunch of Panda workers to get right, so I know these houses will be good once we ship.
Hoping that our next update will be about the games being loaded on the boat! Until then.
Manufacturing has started!
over 3 years ago
– Sat, Dec 19, 2020 at 09:25:49 PM
Hello Rival Networks backer,
Just a quick note that we are manufacturing the games now, and hope to get them on the water before Chinese New Year.
There's not much else to report right now. I will let you know when the games are on the boat!
Proof copy arrived!
over 3 years ago
– Thu, Nov 19, 2020 at 11:34:32 PM
Hi folks, the proof copy for The Rival Networks arrived! Here are a bunch of photos for it.
First off, here the size of the game box, relative to the base game and Executives.
We intentionally made the Rival Networks box the same height and width as the Executives box, and each of them are half the size of The Networks base game box.
Some cards!
Here are the Viewer (circular) and Ratings Points (square) tokens. Note that the Ratings Points tokens have 1 point on one side, and 3 on the other, while the Viewer Tokens are the same on both sides. This isn't a problem in testing, as the Ratings Points tokens are always placed face-up, and are actually not technically necessary to play the game; they're more of an easy way to remind players of shows that got RPs through genre bonuses or Network Cards. Whereas Viewer Tokens are hidden inside player houses, so it's best that they're the same on both sides for easy counting at the end of the game.
Oh, the houses! Here they are, in their assembled glory.
You might remember from a previous update that we were working on the fit of the houses. I'm happy to say that these houses assemble without their tabs fraying! They're also sturdy enough to last the whole game, unless you deliberately shake them or hit them hard. All the same, if you want them to stick together permanently, you may want to use a bit of glue to make sure they stay stuck.
And now, to the one issue we found, and that we're currently working on fixing...
The box we got turned out to be 50mm deep; it needed to be 60mm deep to hold the houses comfortably! This is why we get proof copies; to find issues like this before the game goes to print.
We're working on increasing the box depth now, so you won't need to disassemble and reassemble the houses for each game, but the box will still close comfortably.
So that's where we are now! Looking forward to approving the final digital proof in the next few days, once this box issue is resolved. Then, onto mass production!
