#1089; In which a Warning is not heeded

Comic Transcripts

[[A large, well-dressed man looks at a bowl of salted fryballs with a mixture of doubt and curiosity in his expression.]]
Jacques: Maybe just one more salted fryball…

[[A woman in a porkpie hat intervenes.]]
Porkpie: Will you regret it?
Porkpie: Imagine yourself after eating that fryball. Imagine how you’ll feel.

[[Jacques imagines his future self. A ghostly Jacques appears besides him.]]
Ghost Jacques: Whoof. That additional fryball was a mistake.
Ghost Jacques: My stomach is letting me know in very clear terms what it thinks of my poor choice.

[[Ghost Jacques’ eyes roll up in pain.]]
Ghost Jacques: Past me made a bad move. Past me should NOT have eaten that fryball.
Ghost Jacques: NOT a good move.

[[Ghost Jacques turns his gaze towards Current Jacques in disgust. Current Jacques sweats.]]
Ghost Jacques: And the WORST part, past me? You even IMAGINED how terrible it would feel and you STILL did it
Ghost Jacques: WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU

{{header: have another WONDERMARK.COM}}
{{alt-text: sounds like your mouth is writing checks your stomach can’t cash}}

#1089; In which a Warning is not heeded transcribed by in

The past few weeks have been a frenzy of assembling the very laborious, very bespoke first print run of NOODLE BATTLE, the puzzle game I am releasing this weekend at PAX West in Seattle!

PAX has an event called the PNW Tabletop Game Market (Saturday night ONLY), which is a curated selection of short-run games from local designers. As I’ve mentioned in this space before, I applied for a space in this fall’s event mainly as a way to force myself to finish a new game. And here it is!

The drawings are all by Jason Poland, good pal and cartoonist of My Dad Is Dracula. Jason played an early version of this game at Alaska Robotics Comics Camp this spring, and really liked it!

So I said, “Do you want to help me make it?” And so he has! It was his idea to make all the characters fun little animals, and I think it adds a ton of charm.

Because this edition is limited-run, it has been incredibly labor-intensive to make! The boxes and cards were made by a game factory in the usual fashion, but separately. The blank tiles were made by a woodworker dude out of Connecticut. For each game, we have had to:

Cut a piece of plastic and install the box window
Paint all the tiles, hundreds at a time
Apply a sticker to both sides of every tile
Apply stickers to the box (we couldn’t get the box back printed in time, so the whole back side of the box is a sticker too)
Apply the “Nutrition Facts” sticker, which was a late suggestion by my kid that I just had to run with
Fold up the rule sheet (they come from the printer as big strips of paper)
Put all the components into the box and seal it all up

I knew it would be a lot of work and would require some inefficient, expensive compromises AND I WAS RIGHT. But the final product is turning out great, which is the important thing!!

I will have 50 copies with me (if all goes well) at PAX, and then between now and the holidays we will be putting together additional copies to round out this first edition.

I will announce additional copies on Patreon first, once they are available online!! And here too, naturally, before long.

You can also sign up here if you’d like me to email you once the game is available online!