What is James Up To?

It has been a busy month, so I thought I’d write up a little recap.

For starters, I launched this website, so please take a look around. I had the luxury of three new games in my pocket, and plenty of existing videos and articles.

I’m still trying to decide on format and content for a series of new design videos, but I think they will be 5-10 minute deep dives on very specific game mechanics and theory. Assuming I can come up with some of that. And maybe some travel vlogs, since I did just buy a new camera-friendly backpack.

While working on design video scripts last week, I poked through the rough draft of my design book. There’s a lot of rough draft in there, and I can’t believe it has been six years since I wrote it. This happened when I was teaching a design class at DigiPen, and needed a new chapter every week. It will be interesting to get back into that material and update it over the next few months.

I created new art for two Crab Fragment card games this month: the Island Deck and Pirate’s Bluff. This included drawing suit icons for the Island Deck, because there just wasn’t a good enough set of free tropical icons in all the clip art on the web. As of an hour ago, I have ordered proofs of both from DriveThruCards. Those will take a couple of weeks to print. Once I review them for errors, I can make them public, and that’s when I will post the closer-to-finished rules and print-and-play versions here.

OrcaCon happened in the middle of January, so I had a chance to play several games of After the Fog with eager new players. I also hosted some extra game nights of my own. The game is almost done, and I’m flying to St. Louis tomorrow to show it to the folks at Greater than Games. I have made some dramatic changes recently, but I think it’s very close to ready. And after more than a year on this project, I dearly want to work on something new!

I got some unexpected news mid-month, that my casino game Ricochet Poker was about to start a trial at the Stratosphere. So I decided to fly down and check it out. I’m not allowed to play, so I observed from a distance, grabbed a souvenir rules card, ate a hamburger, and flew back home. I saw some good crowds around the table, and one player made a point of telling me it was a really cool game, so that might have actually been worth the trip. They plan to keep it going for a month and a half, and we’ll see what happens next.

Inspired by the debut of Ricochet, I’ve been working on a new table game that I can’t tell you anything about. If I’m very lucky, it will stay a secret until it hits the market. If not, it’ll become one more game for the Lab.

I’ll head down to Vegas again next month, for Dice Tower West. I’ll bring the “final” version of After the Fog, for one last test before I send it to St. Louis and start the next big project. Mike Selinker will join me at that show for just a couple of days, to shoot some video for his next Kickstarter project. Hint: It has something to do with Vegas.

I have also started a new game design project with Paul Peterson. We’ve been talking about writing a game together for years, but we’re starting to get serious about putting it on the schedule. You’ll hear more details about that in the next few months.

There’s a lot of travel on my agenda this year, as usual. I keep a Google spreadsheet to track my destinations and to add up my frequent flier miles. I made MVP Gold status on Alaska Airlines last year, and the perks include occasional free upgrades to first class. So when you pass me on your way back to the sardine seats, remember that I’m only up front because I fly way too much.

I shall now eagerly await my card game proofs, and maybe write a video script on my flight tomorrow. Watch this space for more updates on my projects!