blog: stuff I made

Bolted Production Update & Playtests

From a recent playtest!

Some quick updates on my Wondermark card game Bolted!

I’m working on getting this game finished and off to print, but there are still a few things to iron out.

Specifically: One big change that I’ve introduced is an extra mechanic that allows for additional strategic choice in the game.  If you don’t want to play a card onto your creature, you can instead “scrap” that card for a variety of different effects.

This opens up a new dimension of strategy and also allows for the creation of combos that can be really fun to pull off! I think it’s a great new wrinkle for the game.

It’s all pretty straightforward.

Join Virtual Playtesting With Me

I’m now doing more playtesting to confirm:

  • That the secondary effect options are interesting without being too overwhelming.
  • That the effects I’ve designed are fun, and affect the game flow positively.
  • That what you can do is clearly explained to players.

To get in more reps with the updated rules, I’m hosting more virtual playtesting this week:

Feel free to grab a slot at: picktime.com/wondermark

If you’ve played before, I’d love to have you back! If you’ve never played, I’d love to have you too!

Unsupervised Playtesting

Pretty soon, I’m going to be sending out the rulebook to folks to confirm it’s clear and understandable. Please feel free to sign up here if you want to be on that specific review list!

(If you’ve signed up for this earlier, I’ve still got your info and will be in touch soon enough.) 

Other Updates

  • I THOUGHT I was basically done with the art for this game, but then I unfortunately stumbled across thousands of additional vintage images. (As documented here.) This might necessitate some new additions.
  • I’m going into much more detail on the finer points of game updates and design over on my Discord. Feel free to pop in there to ask any questions or get into the nitty-gritty with me!
  • If you happen to be in Seattle, I’m also doing in-person playtesting most Wednesdays at the Playtest Northwest meetups. Drop me a line on Discord if you want to connect in-person at one of those.
  • I’m pretty excited about this game, friends!!
The end-game state of the creature first shown at the top of this update

[Comment on this post on Discord]

Bolted Game – Design Diary & Playtests

My new card game, Bolted — which has less than a week left in its crowdfunding campaign — is a fun way for anyone to make Wondermark-style characters of their own.

The basic premise of the game, which is that each player is racing to build a composite character out of parts, shares certain qualities with the comics themselves.

One of the most enjoyable parts of making Wondermark comics for me is locating and assembling just the right characters and props. It’s a process that’s mostly invisible (though you can also watch it happen), but I hope some of that creative energy comes through when looking at the finished comics.

Not every comic is a hugely elaborate collage made of parts; sometimes it’s pretty straightforward. But even fairly simple comics can be made of a surprising number of individual pieces:

The original idea for Bolted was just “It’s fun to build weird guys.” The very first prototype that I used for initial playtesting had no Wondermark art at all; I just wanted to see how well the puzzle mechanic worked:

The first application of Wondermark art was also very simple — “what basic images do I have on hand right away?” I wanted to ensure it all worked as a game before spending a ton of extra time on the design of each individual card.

One of the most fun parts of this process since that initial version has been refining the artwork.

Besides the enjoyment of playing the game, I want each piece to be fun and interesting to look at by itself. So especially with some of the “robot-style” connector parts, it’s been a very rewarding process for me to apply ever-more layers of “make it weirder”:

There are 166 individual cards in the game and each day I keep noodling on them, swapping out a hand card for a more expressive one, or adding details to a foot card, or finding better-looking epaulets for a body card. It’s really fun!

And there’s still another art pass to come — all the final cards will be in full color, similar to this:

I’m just waiting to finalize the designs before heading them down the conveyor belt into coloring.

It’s very hard to decide which has been more fun, working on all the art, or the game mechanics themselves!

Because my “north star” with the gameplay itself has been, “what makes building these characters the most fun and interesting?”

Which is exactly the same thing I’ve been doing on my own, while working on on the art.

Get your copy of the game here!

Want to help playtest?

I’ve opened up more remote playtesting times for the coming week, which are hosted by me personally:

It’s been REALLY fun playing the game with randos like you (term of endearment!) and I think the game gets better after each round of feedback.

Sign up to play here!

I am ALSO ready to start opening up UNSUPERVISED playtesting, which means, you read the rules and play the game by yourself. The goal of that is to provide feedback on how clearly the rules are written.

If you’d like to play with your own group — we use a web browser, so you can either play remotely via video chat, or you can play IRL if everyone has a laptop — you can sign up for that here and I’ll follow up with detailed instructions!

Here’s a character created in the online version:

Playtest BOLTED with me!

The pre-order campaign for the new Wondermark game Bolted is going strong on Backerkit! You can pledge to reserve your copy now, if you haven’t already!

Would you like to play the game with me personally? Above are the time slots for VIRTUAL PLAYTESTING SESSIONS in the coming week,

You can sign up for a slot here: picktime.com/wondermark

I’ve had a lot of fun playtesting the game with folks over the past few weeks! Each session is a tiny bit different, as I tweak various rules and cards.

It’s also a lot of fun to meet people and chat! And uniformly, players have had fun — or so they’ve claimed. And why would they lie???

Hope to see you there!

[ Claim your copy of BOLTED on Backerkit ]

Now crowdfunding: My new game! 🔩 BOLTED 🔩

Today is the launch of my new weird card game, Bolted, on Backerkit!

Bolted is a puzzle game in which you build Wondermark-style characters out of individual parts cards. It’s a game of “making friends”! See what I did there!!

It’s quick, strategic, and always ends up with a very strange result:

I’m not certain it’s the best idea to give every “friend” you make in this game terrible existential agony, but it’s what I’m going with for now.

Backers who pledge to Bolted in the first 48 hours — so, by 9:59am Pacific on Saturday March 15 — will also get a Gax bonus card for free!

NOTE: GAX DOES NOT LIKE THIS, BUT I AM HIS BOSS

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Repeat backers (from any of my previous crowdfunding projects) will also get a very powerful Piranhamoose Antlers card:

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All the final game cards will be in color like these; the black & white example above is just for playtesting purposes.

[ Here’s the link to check out Bolted! ]

Final few days for #Pintopia!

I’m excited to remind folks that we are in the LAST FEW DAYS of the Pintopia campaign!

Most of the pledge tiers are for various numbers of pins, as you might expect.

But I’ve ALSO just added a new tier called PLEDGE MANAGER ONLY:

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The best deals on groups of pins can be found in the regular pledge tiers (where every additional pin is cheaper than the last, as volume pricing does its magic).

But, if you’d prefer to peruse everything later and/or make à la carte selections, you can now opt in to the Pledge Manager tier for just $2.

This will give you access to the pledge manager after the campaign (with $2 credit already on board, natch), where you can then build your own reward of individual items, including:

  • Pins – of course!
  • Stickers – individually OR in sets
  • Wondermark greeting cards

But also, a few extra things will show up in the pledge manager as well:

  • Wondermark books and prints
  • Stickers of each of the NEW pin designs
  • T-shirts! I’ll be using this post-campaign order period to determine the long-term interest in making shirts of the new designs… So an initial, limited number will be made available.

If you haven’t joined the campaign yet, you have until APRIL 18, 1PM to pledge at any level, and gain access to these items! Here is a colorful button to click:

[ Pintopia! Through APRIL 18 ]