It’s Almost Time… Fulfillment Begins Very Soon!
over 1 year ago – Sat, Oct 01, 2022 at 12:51:30 AM

Steven Rhodes fans,

Games have arrived at most of the ports around the world and fulfillment should begin soon! That means you’ll be playing Cryptozoology for Beginners, Living Well Is the Best Revenge, and Let’s Call the Exorcist very soon! We were hoping to start fulfillment this week, but unplanned issues and that terrible hurricane in Florida slowed things down a bit.

Here’s a rundown of where games are in every region and fulfillment partners to contact in case of issues. If you need to contact us, please reach out via direct message on Kickstarter or via cryptozoic.kayako.com. We will post another update once fulfillment commences.

US, Canada, ROW (rest of world)

• Shipment has been ready for delivery since 9/28, but the hurricane in Florida has led to QML being closed most of this week. We expect them to receive the games early next week and start fulfillment soon after that.
   
•  Fulfillment by QML. Contact them via the QML Customer Service Contact Form.
   

EU

• Shipment cleared customs on 9/29. It will be delivered to Bigblue early next week so they can prepare to start fulfilling.
   
•  Fulfillment by Bigblue. Contact our partner Don’t Panic Games for all issues: [email protected]
   

UK/Switzerland/Norway

• Estimated arrival to port has been pushed to 10/1. Estimated delivery to ShipQuest is now 10/7, with fulfillment starting shortly after that.
   
•  Fulfillment by ShipQuest. Contact our partner Don’t Panic Games for all issues: [email protected]
   

Australia/New Zealand

• Shipment has arrived at port and warehouse. These games should start going out next week.
   
•  Fulfillment by QML. Contact them via the QML Customer Service Contact Form.
   

Asia

• Shipment has arrived at port and warehouse. Mainland China, Hong, and Taiwan games should start going out next week. The rest of the Asian orders will be shipped to various hubs and will take some time to fulfill,
   
•  Fulfillment by QML. Contact them via the QML Customer Service Contact Form.
   

Almost there!

Thanks for backing,

The Cryptozoic Team

On the Water and Fulfilling Soon!
over 1 year ago – Sun, Sep 11, 2022 at 07:34:48 PM

Steven Rhodes fans,

Amazing news: Games are on the water and are just a couple weeks from arriving at the different hubs (US, EU, UK, Australia, and Asia). In fact, we currently estimate that all games will be at ports by September 22. It typically takes a little bit of time to get rewards moved to the warehouse and start shipping, but we fully expect fulfillment to begin in late September and complete in October.

What does that mean for you? Start getting ready for three amazing new Steven Rhodes Games with Kickstarter exclusives: Cryptozoology for Beginners, Living Well Is the Best Revenge, and Let’s Call the Exorcist! We are super excited to get you your games… we know you’re going to have a lot of fun!

If you have any last minute address updates or other issues, please reach out to us ASAP via direct message on Kickstarter or via cryptozoic.kayako.com. In addition, if your games are being fulfilled by Quartermaster Logistics, you should receive an email soon giving you one last chance to update your address.

Thanks for backing!

The Cryptozoic Team

Loading Up! Time to Update Addresses
almost 2 years ago – Sat, Jul 30, 2022 at 03:29:04 AM

Steven Rhodes fans,

Work at the factory is totally done and games are being loaded onto ships that will head to hubs around the world! We estimate the different ships will leave around August 6. This means games should be at warehouses for fulfillment by late September. We fully expect backers to receive their rewards September/October. We’ll update you if anything changes!

Updating addresses: We will be locking backer addresses on AUGUST 14, so please log into your BackerKit survey and make any address changes ASAP. If you’ve lost your survey, request your survey link under "Lost your survey?" on our BackerKit project page: https://steven-rhodes-vol-2.backerkit.com/

Visit Us at Gen Con 2022!

We are heading to Gen Con, August 4-7 in Indianapolis, and we’ll be demoing early copies of Steven Rhodes Games Vol. 2! Check out our press release to see what we’ll have at Booth #403, including new games, previews, Promo Cards, playmats, and more. We hope you come visit us!

Thanks for backing,

The Cryptozoic Team

Finishing Up at the Factory and Card Previews
almost 2 years ago – Thu, Jun 23, 2022 at 10:08:18 PM

Steven Rhodes fans,

Excuse our recent silence. This is definitely a case of no news being good news! Manufacturing of all three Steven Rhodes Games Vol. 2 titles is almost complete. We expect games to be ready to be loaded onto ships before the middle of July. This means we are right on track for games to be at ports by early September and in your hands later that month!

We’ll let you know when your games are on the ships and on their way!

Sneak Peek at Game Cards

Here’s a look at one specific card from each game and some insight on how each card plays.

CRYPTOZOOLOGY FOR BEGINNERS

When Nightcrawler is in your opening draft, you gotta consider the powerful turn you could be setting yourself up for! Imagine reactivating your Nessies to draw more cards, Sasquatches to gain more Award tokens, or any of the seven Creepy Cryptids. It's like taking another turn with just one card! The balance is that by itself, it doesn't do much, and because it’s colorless, it is harder to use it with an Assignment. Will you take the risk Nightcrawler asks of you, or will you play it safe?

LET'S CALL THE EXORCIST

A game within a game! When you reveal Answered Prayer, it’s "hidden" again and must be found again, and if you do, you gain 2 points. That's enough to get you ahead, but it also puts the attention on you! You may have had your prayers answered, but you'll need to convince everyone else that you're working with them for the big payout. If you have this in your hand, you'll need to be quite subtle to dissuade the Seeker from your cards, and if you are discovered, can you deceive the other player to keep it hidden?

LIVING WELL IS THE BEST REVENGE

Unlocking your ninth tarot sized card–flipping it from “Twerps” to “Perps”–gives you a big advantage on avoiding an early game elimination. Rolling low or high is up to the whims of Lady Luck, but you can control your fate by removing an offending die. This always available ability helps you not only stay in the game but guides your choices on which 1-6 abilities to unlock first.

We hope you enjoyed another preview of your games as they prepare for their journey into their slipcases and into your anxious hands.

Thanks for backing,

The Cryptozoic Team

Behind the Scenes of All Three Games… Plus Our DC Deck-Building Game 10th Anniversary Kickstarter!
about 2 years ago – Sun, Apr 24, 2022 at 01:59:07 AM

Cryptozoic’s lead game designer Mataio Wilson gives you a peek behind the scenes of creating the three titles for Steven Rhodes Games Vol. 2.

Hey gang,

We've sent out the final files to the factory to start printing cards, tiles, rulebooks, and boxes, so we wanted to give you some insight into how we got here.

Cryptozoology for Beginners

Last-minute edits: Calamity of Chupacabra

Throughout the game's development cycle, we experimented with ways to interact with the other players. The original Calamity of Chupacabra gave you a choice when you played it: Steal a card or give a card away. The giveaway element was fun for getting a Professor Robert Zoic’s Book of Cryptozoology (At the end of the round, if you have only 1 "Book," gain 1 Reward Token) out of your area and into the hand of someone who already has one.

This created fun moments, but ultimately, it slowed down the game as you looked for an opportunity to play it, even if there was only one instance in which it was useful. Earlier versions of the game had Assignments that wanted you to avoid colors or types, but the disappointment of losing a goal you spent precious drafts building toward to a single card was too much of a bummer to justify keeping it around. Plus, it takes up a lot of card space and it was difficult explaining its purpose to new players.

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Bonus Insight!

When the project first started its graphic design journey, we whipped up a quick icon for the Creepy Cryptids to get the ball rolling. Once we had time, I asked our design team to come up with a replacement. I think they nailed it.

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Let's Call the Exorcist

Art process: Descriptions lead to illustrations

The process of aligning game effects to the art was super rad. Some of the inspiration came from the movie The Exorcist and was self-explanatory. We needed the Pazuzu statue represented in a "hit the viewer over the head" example of what we were trying to tie together.

Now I'm also a fan of puns, wordplay, and overall dad humor, so I snuck in some iconic parody items, too. My ridiculous description provided to the artist: "A demon-faced book bound with flesh, ala Army of Darkness. Use ‘The Gross Book of Demons’ from Let's Summon Demons as reference (plus any Easter eggs from The Princess Bride if possible)." That led to this delightful treat:

A favorite band inspired this next description, "3 rusty, bloody-nail spikes in a backwards ‘N’>‘И’ arrangement."

Sometimes an image appears in my head fully formed, and the artist fulfills it in ways that blow my mind: "A backlit judgmental kid is pointing downward at a guilty looking child who is hiding communion crackers behind their back and illuminated by a holy spotlight. A demon is sneaking a cracker out of the bowl."

Just when I think, how is the artist going to portray the humor of this act? "A demon has stuck its leg out to trip a kid down the stairs, who is tumbling and laughing." The kid's face sells it.

Living Well Is the Best Revenge

Upgraded point tracking: Player Boards replace point tokens

Early drafts of the game used lots of point tokens to track player's gains and losses through the 3 rounds. But, a major card change that improved the gameplay also made point-tracking an issue. Knowing an opponent's point total was key to using the ability, but asking players to count their points up was a pain. Although our graphics team had created excellent tokens to quickly grab the right amount of points, they had to be replaced.

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I mocked up a double-sided player board and accompanying player tokens in MS Word (tell me you're old without telling me you're old) for testing, and it worked perfectly. Our design team matched up colors and arranged it for a more polished representation.

became

Thanks for your time reading about our design and development processes as we work to deliver to you the best quality games our team can muster. Surround yourself with the best and you'll find yourself reaching farther than you could imagine.

–Mataio Wilson

DC Deck-Building Game 10th Anniversary Kickstarter

In case you missed the announcement, we launched a Kickstarter campaign for the DC Deck-Building Game 10th Anniversary last week! Rewards include two new games–Injustice and Rivals – The Flash vs. Reverse-Flash–plus Multiverse Boxes, playmats, reprints of old Promo Cards, and much more!

It has been an amazing campaign so far: We’ve unlocked more than 25 stretch goals. If you’re new to the DC Deck-Building Game series or a long-time fan, we hope you pledge!

Thanks,

The Cryptozoic Team