BackerKit survey tests early next week - full access later next week!
over 3 years ago – Thu, Nov 19, 2020 at 11:30:19 PM

Hello High Rise backer! Thanks so much for your patience.

In this update, I'm going to go into detail about BackerKit. If you're new to crowdfunding, I'll take a moment to explain what BackerKit is and why it's important.

BackerKit is a pledge manager; it lets you, the backer, do things like change your shipping address, change your pledge, order additional add-ons, or allow people who missed the campaign to pre-order the game. Other pledge managers include CrowdOx (which, interestingly, just announced a merger with BackerKit this week), and the creatively-named Pledge Manager.

In theory, I don't need to use a pledge manager; however, Kickstarter's built-in surveys don't allow backers to change their addresses, and don't allow the modification of pledges. They also let people who whose cards got declined during the campaign re-pledge at a later date.

Note that many campaigns charge shipping fees in the pledge manager these days. This campaign did not. If you do not add anything in BackerKit (like buy add-ons or upgrade your pledge), you will not have to pay any extra money. 

So, where are we with the BackerKit campaign right now? It's currently in review. In a couple of days, I'll test it out with a small percentage of backers. That means that around Monday or so, a few of you will get your BackerKit surveys. After I get feedback from those backers and make necessary tweaks, most of you will get your survey by next Friday. 

If you get your survey and see anything weird, like a shipping cost that's too high or too low, please let me know! 

I ask that you fill out your survey with your address as soon as you can. If you're planning on moving soon, you'll be able to update your address later.

I will likely close pre-orders around August 2021, and lock addresses around September 2021.

One more note: some of you will be getting credits in BackerKit from buying certain combinations of add-ons during the campaign. You're not going to see those credits for a few weeks, but I promise, they are coming soon. I'll probably have them ready by mid-December.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask!

All done! Thank you so much!
over 3 years ago – Sun, Nov 01, 2020 at 01:12:36 PM

I want to thank all 1,476 of you for helping bring High Rise back into print, with amazing plastic buildings.

In the next couple of days, I will update you on what to expect, especially in terms of the BackerKit post-campaign pledge manager.

I may be slow to reply to messages and comments tomorrow, because I need to catch up on some much-needed rest. But I'm so thankful to you for helping me continue to bring games onto your table!

Welcome to the final day!
over 3 years ago – Sun, Nov 01, 2020 at 12:58:50 PM

Hi! Just a quick update that we're on our final day, and we've already broken $100k! I'm so happy to have hit this milestone with you. 

Of course, this means that we've unlocked the $100k stretch goal! Here it is again:

I've gotten a bunch of amazing ideas for the tokens; I really like the idea of replacing the plane with a sports car, so all of these modes of transport are somewhat realistic to a ridiculously wealthy person getting around a large city.

One more stretch goal? Why not!

At $110k, we will reprint the Fancy Bits expansion from the original Kickstarter campaign! That means I will have an unlimited amount to sell when the BackerKit campaign opens in two weeks.

By the time I write this update, we will likely be sold out of Fancy Bits from the original print run. I was originally not going to print more, but it looks like there's enough demand for us to do so!

Extra Tenants 2020 still available - for now

They were sold out briefly, but I've made some more copies of Extra Tenants 2020 available. I don't think I can offer too many more than this, though, as I'm pulling from a limited stock. I'm unlikely to be reprinting this module, and it's likely they will sell out before the campaign is over. 

Here's to a big final 16 hours!

Thank you so much for backing this game! I'm very happy it's gotten such an excellent response.

$85k goal unlocked, $100k goal announced, and Extra Tenant Reveal #4 - Vaguely-Named Charity
over 3 years ago – Tue, Oct 27, 2020 at 08:33:30 PM

You know, there was a period of time where this campaign was estimated to only hit $75k. Yet here we are at $85k, and we're not even in the final 72-hour mark yet! 

It's very possible for us to hit $100k before this thing is through, and I've set up one final stretch goal to hopefully pull us over the edge.

But first things first!

We have unlocked the revised rulebook for all copies of the game, and all Fix Kits will come with it! We're also going to see if we can update wording on some of the Tenant Tiles. I hope this makes the game more accessible to all!

There's also another thing the Fix Kits will include, but I'll save that for later in the update. For now, let's look at the $100k stretch goal!

At $100k, we're going to give you new wooden Mogul markers! Instead of being plain wooden discs, they're going to be ostentatious representations of wealth. I've mocked up a few of them above, but if you folks have suggestions of what a mogul would travel around a city in, I'm all ears!

If we hit this stretch goal, it will be available for all backers who pledged at any level or added any add-on, as a thank-you for reaching $100k!

OK, that brings us to our next Tenant reveal:

As always, I'm sharing prototype graphics with you; these are the graphics that I'm actually playtesting with, but you're going to get something that looks far better.. Also, the exact powers may change between now and the time you receive your game.

The Vaguely-Named Charity is a Harbourside tenant that lets you effectively snag a Floor that any other player has turned in for their building. You can only use it once per round, but it might come in handy!

Finally, I wanted to show you one other thing that I've been playtesting...

I wasn't expecting to make any changes to the base game for this campaign. But if you know me as a designer, you know that I can't resist any opportunity to tweak my games and make them better.

There are two small changes to the board that I've been dying to try, and it turns out they work really well. So well, that I'm going to include them in the next printing, and in the Fix Kit.

The two changes (visible above) are:

• Construction Zones now let you build for no Corruption in the neighborhood ahead of you, instead of behind you. Pictured above is the first Construction Zone, that normally lets you build for no Corruption in East Gardens. This makes it far more likely for someone to land on a newly-constructed building.
• The last action space in a Construction Zone now only forces a player to gain 1 Corruption instead of 2. This makes it far easier to use.

If you have a Fix Kit coming your way, you'll be getting stickers that you can apply to your board that will update these to the new rules. They won't be a black bar with white text; that was just a way that I could easily test this and show you my proof-of-concept.

I'm also going to look into the possibility of printing extra boards and offering them as an add-on. I can't include them as part of the Fix Kit for cost reasons, but if you don't like stickers, this could be a decent workaround. What do you think?

Let's close this update with a lovely preview video that Shut Up & Sit Down did for AwSHUX last week!

1000+ backers, and $75k stretch goal unlocked! Extra Tenant Reveal #3 - Mutual Fund Firm
over 3 years ago – Wed, Oct 21, 2020 at 11:12:07 PM

Big night tonight! We are now over 1,000 backers strong, and we have smashed the $75k stretch goal!

 This means that the Extra Tenants 2021 module is now going to consist of 10 Tenants! While the image above shows 10 tiles (yes, it's 2 sets of 5 in the image, but it will actually be 10 unique tenants in the final version), it's going to be 10 tiles and roughly 12-16 cards, once we settle on which of the Tenants that I'm testing will be included in the final set.
 Speaking of, here's another preview! This one is a newer Tenant, so I don't have much art on it, and its final effect may change between now and the time you get the game. But I really like how it's testing so far, and I think it gives a great example of how Extra Tenants 2021 really affects the game!
  The Mutual Fund Firm has a pretty big effect when you land or build on it. You gain a new Construction Yard, fully stocked with 5 Floors! The catch is... you have to take Corruption at the current round's rate (3 in 2010, 2 in 2020, 1 in 2030), and you immediately lose 3 VP (and you can go negative).
 You also get a Mutual Fund Firm card, which gives you an interesting power - at the end of the game, for each Mutual Fund Firm card you have, you may discard up to 5 Floors from your Construction Yards, gaining 1 VP for each Floor you discard. You do not gain Corruption if you play multiple Mutual Fund Firm cards at the end of the game.
 What does this mean?
 

• So far, this is the only way you can gain a new Construction Yard without overflowing.
• While you lose VP and Corruption when you use the Tenant, it's technically possible to make a VP "profit."
• It's usually better to put Floors into a newly-constructed Building in your final Construction. But if you have extras, 1 per Floor is a better rate than 1 per 3 Floors (rounded up). If you have multiple Mutual Fund Firms, you may actually try a "hoarding" strategy, although this could trigger the base game's anti-hoarding rules if you're not careful.

 So far, this Tenant has tested really well. It's exciting to take that risk and get a rush of floors... and Corruption, and to take that VP hit, wondering if it'll be worth it by the end of the game. 

 
Daniel Newman has a new project on Kickstarter

Daniel Newman, who is designing the plastic buildings for this project, has a new project of his own on Kickstarter. He's working with Tony Miller, whom some of you know as one of my former co-hosts on the excellent Breaking Into Board Games podcast (and a designer with his own game, Kabuto Sumo, on Kickstarter right now).

Daniel and Tony are combining to become New Mill Industries, and they launched a campaign for The Science and Séance Society. What they're doing is really cool; they're intentionally publishing for a small print run, only for Kickstarter backers. It's a really punk/DIY aesthetic they're going for, and I really enjoy seeing that approach in board games.

Daniel in particular has been critical to my success - he's helped me in incalculable ways, and I'm really excited to see what he does here. And of course, the designs he's made for our plastic buildings have been excellent.

I'll be back in a few days with another Tenant reveal!