The Lucky 5 (Sept)

Dear Insane Children

Font Lord here with your favorite time again.
The time when Google’s RNG feature picks 5 people from our Patreon (and the YouTube comments from the last video to keep things above board and legal) to win some stuff.

Let’s see…
Ok, we’ll go Old Skool and this month’s prize can be an Omega Necklace   🙂

Ohhhhhh mighty Gods of RNG, bestow upon our Insane Children all thy luck, and ROLL IT !!!

The winners are

* Madison St. Martin
* Alexandra Zhao
* Heather Guill
* Amanda Phillips
* Jonathan A Ayala

Congratulations to all of you and look forwards to your Omega Necklace in the post in several weeks.  Woot!

You all know what comes next.
There can be no end to a Lucky 5 post without a LULU.

– Cheers

Awesome October Deal

Dear Insane Children

Font Lord here as promised by American in the previous post to just talk about the next super duper rabbit promotion we’re doing.

He pretty much said ‘all the things’ already actually, about those people at $75 getting a rabbit plush, and there’s also a FAQ about it too.

But here’s the general gist for those that don’t know or didn’t read the FAQ   🙂

1) You need to be at the $75 tier BEFORE October 1st.
Why not change tiers now? There’s no reason not to since you won’t get charged until October anyway, and it’ll also stop you from messaging me on Oct 2nd asking if it’s too late because you forgot to change tiers   😉

2) No, there will be no way to choose the angry or love rabbit.
It’s going to be the Angry Rabbit.

3) Same goes for mixing and matching different prints and/or multiple rabbits.
It’s going to be 1x Rabbit (and bag) and 1x The Watcher print.

4) Chaos Necklace perhaps?
If that is going to be your first ever month at the $75 level, then yes, you will get the Chaos necklace as well. You’ll get an email about this around Oct 7th if you qualify.

So, for the people that are at $75 next month, you don’t have to do anything special or extra. We’ll just send you your stuff, so please make sure your address on file on your Patreon account is up to date and accurate.

There we go.  I think that’s everything covered.
Any questions?
Pop ’em in the comments   😉

– Cheers

Something(s) Wicked

Dear Insane Children, 

LOTS of progress on lots of things… I don’t even know where to start!

So… high on my list of tasks is to build the Pitch Deck for the Chinese Publisher we recently met with – which we’ll use to convince them to give us the money required to start a new studio and start building games… which will eventually lead to the development of Alice: Asylum. 

As I mentioned on our last live stream (you can watch it on YouTube), the idea is that we establish the studio and get our pipeline up and running with a smaller project – ostensibly based on “Oz” – and then build the next “Alice” once that team is fully prepared. Makes sense. This is exactly the model we used with Spicy Horse when we started on “Grimm” and built everything we need to develop Madness Returns. 

We already have one narrative for Oz that we previously shared and Crowd Designed here on Patreon. But I want to take another stab… this time going in a different direction. The basic premise is “plane crashes, survivors find themselves in a strange land… eventually realize it’s Oz…” and we’ve been messing around with story notes as such: 

Love this image, @Omri and very happy to see stuff like this getting made. It really captures some of the feel and story that I think will be important to the final game. Going off the comments from @Alex Crowley, it’s true that we could (and should) stumble upon a scene like this (and many more scenes like this) to tell the story of just how many planes, balloons, helicopters, and other conveyances have been sucked into Oz and wrecked. It’s fantastic and really gives us a cool foundation for a world full of survivors. 

But as Alex said, for our story, at the place where it starts, this would be too much, too soon. Purple forests and deadly sands would definitely give away the fact that we’re “not in Kansas anymore.” And I think we want to save that reveal for a bit later in the story. 

Now… there are variations on the story where we could go straight into “the shit” and see our plane crash survivors stumbling into the sand, dying instantly, freaking out at the purple landscape, maybe getting eaten by some surreal Purple Monster … and I am OK with keeping that as a note on our sketches. Where exactly do we want to start everything? 

Do we all have solid thoughts on that? 

Because the alternative to this image is one that just looks like “standard plane crash into generic forest” and I don’t know how useful that is… visually and from a narrative perspective. 

It really depends on the type of story we’re crafting. 

Variation #1 is “plane crashes into seemingly generic forest and survivors deal with generic plane crash stuff until later in the story they realize they aren’t in Kansas anymore.” 

Variation #2 is “plane crashes and OH SHIT what the fuck that guy just turned into sand, why is the forest purple, what the fuck is that thing? aahhhh!” 

People (the survivors) won’t know it is OZ but they will know it’s an alien landscape. I mean, people will know it’s OZ because we’ve told them in the marketing, the title, etc… so it’s like you’re just waiting around for the crash survivors to figure out the thing the audience already knows? 

How long is that fun for? 

Food for thought. 

Maybe #2 is better? 

What do you think? Should our crash survivors immediately confront the brutal reality of their situation? Or should it be something that slowly dawns on them as more and more strange things keep happening? 

Alex’s done some logos – which I love. But… I shared my thoughts about the “lost” aspect it with the team… 

Now… the big problem is the word “LOST” – it screams to me that this is a continuation of the “LOST” TV series. I think they broke that word. There’s also a serious potential they would come after us for using the name in the title like that… especially given that there’s some similarity between the stories, settings, etc. 

What can we do? “The Lost” or a synonym? Adrift, vanished, gone? 

This conversation always sucks. 

Anyway, I can post to Patreon and we can get some feedback. 

What do you think? Does the “Lost” part just immediately kill it for you? Or do you think we can make it work? We’ve got to get this right because, as I learned previously, it’s all in the name! 

Angry Rabbits

Martin will write a full post about this later – but quickly: This month (September) is the month where, if you pledge $75 before October, you can get the Plushie Dreadful “Angry Rabbit,” an “Angry” tote bag, and this month’s art print “The Watcher” – all very grrrr, all delivered straight to your door. And if this is your first month at $75 you’ll also get a Chaos Necklace. Super Grrr!

Speaking of Plushie Dreadfuls… 

Meet Scruffy Bumps. He’s a cat. From nightmares. Or maybe not… depends on what you consider nightmarish I guess? I’m hoping he turns out like a cross between an octopus and a fluffy black cat… but we do have some Crowd Design questions: 

First, just give us your general feedback. Do you even want Scruffy Bumps? Or would you toss him in a fire? And what do you think about his expression? Should it be cute or sinister? How about the tail… straight (like the legs) or fluffy (as pictured)? Any other ideas or feedback?

I’d ask you for Crowd Design feedback on this Wolf wearing a Pig… but, I mean, he’s kinda perfect isn’t he? I like how he looks uncertain about what he’s done. What do you think? 

Your Move

Wonderland is also receiving attention these days. Omri sent along this sketch of Alice meeting with the King and Queen of the Chess Realm. Of this he says: 

SO! my first thought is this, queen and king sitting and Alice comes into the chambers or something and they talk.

i also thought Alice can actually speak to THEM as a crowd. like maybe the king and queen can be absent and she takes a place of importance. i’ll keep digging, but i kinda like this drafty story frames. please feedback me and give me a direction.

And Alex jumped in with some feedback along these lines: 

Would it be worth exploring renders that are angled or closer to Alice?

Or that show a hierarchy in story telling between the characters, just to mix it up a bit?

Meanwhile, I continue to work on the overall narrative with Alex. And had some interesting ideas over the weekend which we’ll work in this week. Trying to tighten up our presentation of the general THEME of the game. 

Expect lots more story updates and art soon. 

Alright… that’s it from rainy Shanghai this afternoon. Look forward to all of your feedback in the comments below!

From Shanghai with Love, 

-American

Asylum Story Timeline

Dear Insane Children, 

We hosted a fun livestream over on Twitch yesterday where we watched me continue to be terrible at my own game, talked about Oz, covered updates to Asylum, looked at some Plushie Dreadfuls, and (last but not least) chatted about the excellent meeting I had this week with a potential financier/publisher for Asylum (and our projects in general). Whew!

If you missed it, fret not. It’s up on My YouTube Channel now. Hit that link and enjoy!

Timeline of Insanity

As you know, I’ve been working with Alex on mapping out the Full Narrative for Alice: Asylum. And we’ve recently, with a lot of help from our Insane Children, reached a point where we have a pretty good grasp on the whole adventure from start-to-finish. In a recent call, I described the structure as “three trains running parallel which we (the audience) hop between as the story progresses.” Alex liked that analogy it seems – and so he created a visual representation of the overall narrative (main image, above). 

We’ll share this image again at the same time that we post the Narrative Overview document we’re currently working on. 

Bottom line is that we’re in a good place and I feel happy about the work we’re doing and the results we’re achieving. Good stuff! 

Look forward to sharing more awesome news and updates next week. 

From Shanghai with Love (Rabbit), 

-American 

Livestream Today + Winning!

Dear Insane Children, 

THANK YOU, everyone, for all of yesterday’s kind wishes. It worked! The meeting went really well and we were offered an path for pitching a new studio, securing funds, and ultimately improving the overall Alice situation by a huge amount. Thing is, much of what was discussed is within the zone of “strategic manoeuvres” and can’t be made public if the “opponent” is going to be taken by surprise. But… I will figure out a way to reveal as much as I am able in the coming days and weeks. 

For now, we have a studio pitch to build and deliver. If that gets a green light then we’ll be on our way towards a Really Good Place. 

There is a Live Stream on my Twitch Channel today at 10AM Hong Kong Time – that’s 7PM PDT.

Please join us at www.twitch.tv/americanmcgee

We’ll answer your Questions and Feedback, give away awesome prizes, and review all the latest art, design, and BD on Alice: Asylum. 

From Shanghai with Yay, 

-American 

On the Wings of Bat Yorkies

Dear Insane Children, 

In 30 minutes I’m driving to a meeting. A meeting that’s HUGELY important for Asylum.

It’s the sort of meeting that could lead to the funding and support we need to get Asylum developed and published. So… 

EVERYONE CROSS YOUR EVERYTHING. Pray to your deity, god, gods, spirits, luck, etc. Throw a coin in a wishing well. Don’t step on a crack. Sacrifice a goat to the Sky Dude. Sprinkle some Parmesan cheese to the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Wish upon a shooting star. Just DO THE THING. 

And let’s all hope that our dreams take flight like a little Bat Yorkie!

From Shanghai with Bat Yorkie High Hopes, 

-American