A multi-module expansion for the Golden Geek Award nominated card game Villagers, from designer & illustrator Haakon Hoel Gaarder.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Progress Report #6: Pre-Production Samples
about 2 years ago
– Sat, Feb 26, 2022 at 07:01:43 PM
Hello villagers!
I hope you're all doing OK. I'm just here with a quick roundup of progress on the mass production of Villagers: Shifting Seasons, and things are looking good. We are expecting the factory to finish assembling everything ready for freight shipping by the middle of March. They had originally hoped to complete this step by the end of February, but had to add a couple of weeks on due to unforeseen delays with the wooden components which are sourced from a different supplier.
Pre-production Samples!
This week we received pre-production samples of everything except the Coin Chest, and I'm very happy to say everything looks good. The Coin Chest will arrive next week but since it's a reprint of an existing product, I don't anticipate any problems with it.
Here's what we got - and sorry about the inconsistent lighting in the photos!
Base game and expansion together.
Shifting Seasons box contents, including stretch goals.
Villagers playmat & tuckbox.
Promo card packs.
Card sleeves tuckbox.
Card sleeves. Lots of card sleeves!
Everything except the Coin Chest.
Every single card sleeved, plus cardboard coins, rules, and wooden development tokens, in the base game box. It's tight, but it fits! The 2018 Kickstarter expansion box is perfect for holding the money & tokens.
Final Production & Shipping Plan
Based on the samples above, I've given the factory the go-ahead to continue with the final assembly of everything we ordered. All the components have been manufactured and were just waiting on me to confirm everything was as it should be before it all got packed into boxes.
I'm one phone call away from confirming our freight shipping & final fulfilment plan, which has changed somewhat from the original but should run more smoothly as a result. I'll share those details in our next update.
Freight shipping is still expensive and messy as a result of COVID, so it's really hard to say what is going to arrive where, and when. It's certain that we will miss our March fulfilment start estimate for backers outside of Asia, I just don't know by how much at this point. I should know more in the next 2-4 weeks.
Take care, and play games,
Dave Clarke
www.sinisterfish.com
Progress Report #5: Trees and Waiting
over 2 years ago
– Fri, Jan 21, 2022 at 11:01:17 PM
Hello villagers!
Apologies for the radio silence, the reason for which is there has not been much to report.
If you only have 6 seconds to spare: everything is fine and moving forward according to plan. For details, please see below :D
Manufacturing
The factory tells me we're still on track to complete manufacturing around the end of February, at which point they'll send production samples & we can check for any issues before the games are shipped out. We'll share photos of the final products for you as soon as possible.
In the meantime, the factory sent a photo of the card sleeves... nice!
Villagers Custom Card Sleeves!
Trees
As part of our ongoing commitment to plant trees whenever we manufacture anything, Sinister Fish Games has today funded the planting of 9000 trees via the amazing tropical reforestation organisation TreeSisters.
Our very rough estimate is that the manufacture & freight shipping of Shifting Seasons will generate 9 metric tons of Co2. TreeSisters recommends planting 7.5 trees to sequester 1 ton of Co2 over 20 years, so our donation of 1000 trees per ton should cover us for any inaccuracy in our calculations, and hopefully see us quickly overcompensate for the environmental cost of this project.
Backers who would like to add trees to our growing forest can do so here. Since we started working with TreeSisters in 2020, our generous customers have planted over 400 extra trees in our name.
That's all!
We'll update again when the final production copies are in our hands - hopefully around the end of February.
Our redeveloped website is almost live, and when it launches we'll be announcing new games which we'll be demoing along with Streets and Villagers: Shifting Seasons at AireCon in March - hoprefully we'll see some of you there!
Progress Report #4: Manufacturing Order
over 2 years ago
– Sat, Nov 27, 2021 at 12:26:26 AM
Hey villagers!
I have a quick but significant update for you: we have placed the manufacturing order for Shifting Seasons, covering a total of 11 different products, and we're now waiting for physical samples of the new items.
The pledge manager is now closed, but you will still be able to change your shipping address until right before your pledge ships out. You can do that by logging in to BackerKit with the unique link you were sent. If you've mislaid that link, you can recover it here. If you require assistance with anything, please contact us via the website or email Carly on [email protected]
We'll soon be planting a veritable forest of trees, intended to overcompensate for the environmental impact of making & transporting everything from this campaign. You can read more about the approach we started with Streets, here. We'll be planting trees on your behalf using some of the profits from Shifting Seasons, but you're welcome to add to our contribution via Treesisters.
BEES!
The factory estimates that mass production will be complete by the end of February, just after Chinese New Year. There was quite a bit of tweaking to do to the print files, and many emails exchanged with our project manager on what has been by far the most complex publishing venture I've tackled. There has also been some disruption at the factory due to power cuts which have slowed down their entire operation. This has put us a couple of months behind the original estimate, so I've adjusted the timeline accordingly.
Although Carly & I are getting married in April, we're not doing any of the shipping ourselves, so the impact on our production schedule should be fairly minimal. On the other hand, we do have the option of drafting our wedding guests in to pack boxes for us after the ceremony ;)
Either way, I estimate that we'll start fulfilment in May next year. However, unless there are drastic improvements in the currently awful world of international freight shipping, there is still a high probability for considerable delays in some regions, particularly the USA. I'm currently hearing that the situation is simultaneously getting worse and better, depending on who's talking, so it feels kind of futile to try & predict what will happen four months from now.
I think it's fair to say that our humble games, although we love them, are not a matter of life & death, and that we can wait patiently for them to arrive. It's not a case of if we can get the games to you, just when.
Here's what our imaginary schedule looked like when I updated it 20 minutes ago...
Sinister Fish Game Night!
What do you do at 20:00GMT on Wednesdays? Probably loads of great stuff, but you now have the option of joining the Sinister Fish Games community on Discord and getting involved with Game Night! More details on our website.
Everything Else
I don't like to announce new projects until everything is completely locked in, but I can tell you that there's a lot of work happening behind the scenes on some great new (and not so new) games. We are aiming to run two Kickstarter campaigns in 2022, and also to release one (maybe two) non-Kickstarter games, which I'm assured are still a thing ;-)
Progress Report #3: Print Files & Pledge Manager
over 2 years ago
– Wed, Nov 03, 2021 at 08:09:02 PM
Hello villagers!
I hope you're doing OK. The important information in this update is that the pledge manager is closing this Thursday, November 4th. You will be billed for shipping and BackerKit add-ons at this time.
Right, let's dive in!
Print Files
The print files are complete and will be submitted to the factory this week, following a final round of in-house proofreading. We had a slight hiccup when we realised we'd formatted the rulebook to the wrong size, so it had to be completely remade. Oops!
The final rulebook can be seen here, and here are a few more finished files...
Tuckbox for the card sleeves.
Envelope for the stretch goal pack.
Shifting Seasons box bottom.
When the factory receives the files, they will prepare digital proofs for us to check before moving on to printed production quality samples.
Samples & Mass Production
Our project manager at the factory has sent us a complete blank sample of Shifting Seasons so we can confirm everything is to our satisfaction. We're expecting FedEx to deliver the sample here on November 8th.
Blank sample of the Shifting Seasons box bottom and insert.
Assuming all is well with the blank sample and the digital proofs, we will move to printed samples, and then give the go-ahead for mass production!
Pledge Manager
We are hitting the button to close the pledge manager today, which will give backers 48 hours to finalise pledges. Address changes will still be possible until shortly before shipping begins, but if you wanted to grab any additional items, now is the time!
On Thursday 4th November, you will be billed for shipping and any extra items added in the pledge manager.
We still have over 400 incomplete surveys, so if you can't remember giving us your details, you should do so as soon as possible. The survey collects vital information about your pledge, including your shipping address. You can retrieve your unique survey link here: https://villagers-shifting-seasons.backerkit.com/
How to change yourpledge level
Moving to a different pledge level is easy if a little non-obvious.
1. When you're logged in to BackerKit, click your existing pledge level at the top left of the screen.
Click on your current reward level.
2. A pop-up will appear. Click on "Switch Pledge Levels?" at the top right. From there you'll be able to change to a different pledge level, and you're done!
Just keep clicking...
Customer Support
We prefer to answer all support issues by email, to keep everything in the same place. You can email Carly on [email protected], or use the contact form on our website. We aim to answer all support requests within 48 office hours, but during busy times it can take longer.
Please note that we can't offer personalised support via Kickstarter comments.
If you suspect we're not receiving your emails, please contact us on Kickstarter.
Sinister Fish Game Night
Finally, we've started a regular online game night on Wednesdays at 8 pm GMT, and you're invited! We're largely playing on Board Game Arena, and organising via our Discord channel.
You can find more information on our website, here. Hope to see you there.
That's all for now - I hope next time we'll have some final samples to show you!
Production Schedule
We're a couple of weeks behind where I wanted to be, but perhaps we can get back on track if the proofing & sample phases go quickly. Mass production taking place in November-December is a complete guess at this point, and it depends on capacity at the factory. I'll have a more accurate picture of the timeline in the next update.
In other news, we're hard at work on three new games right now. More will be revealed in due course, I might even make one of those fancy project tracker graphics like proper publishers do!
Progress Report #2: Print Files
over 2 years ago
– Sat, Oct 02, 2021 at 02:26:03 AM
Hey villagers!
I hope you're all doing OK.
This is a very swift update just to let you know we're still here and working on Shifting Seasons for you!
It's been all hands on deck this last couple of weeks at Sinister HQ, preparing for and shipping copies of Streets to UK backers, but as of now the madness has ended and we're back in the office. Work continues on the print files for Shifting Seasons, and we now have a fully laid out rulebook, which you can see here. Let us know if you spot any typos - feel free to leave comments directly on the file.
We're close to being finished on print files for all the new cards, and next up is finalising the packaging. Hopefully, this will only take a week or two more, and then we'll submit everything to the factory and move on to digital proofs & physical samples. Exciting stuff!
I've extended the pledge manager by a month, because we're not yet at the point we need to lock orders. Here's where we're at...
In other news, Villagers is getting a Dutch version courtesy of White Goblin Games, and Haakon's next game is in an advanced state of development!
Told you this would be swift :) We'll talk again in a month or so.
