#188; In which a Lost Elephant is easily found

Comic Transcripts

[[Two men are talking over beers.]]
Man: I have designed a shirt for ironists! Ironists wear shirts that they would normally hate, because they are being ironic. It is what passes for cleverness with young people!

Man: My shirt is in Russian, which is ironic because the ideal consumer of this shirt does not speak Russian. He or she is also probably too young to remember the Soviet Union, thus neo-Soviet design is “retro.” In addition, the shirt is ironic because it asks “Where is my elephant?” although the elephant is clearly right there in the center.

Man 2: Do you really think people would buy your stupid shirt?
Man: Ironists love to spend money on things with no value! That is their defining characteristic.

{{header: cash in at WONDERMARK.COM}}
{{alt-text: also, you see, it is ironic because i am making fun of the concept but the shirts are actually for sale}}

#188; In which a Lost Elephant is easily found transcribed by in

Man 2: Do you really think people would buy your stupid shirt?
Man: Ironists love to spend money on things with no value! That is their defining characteristic.

{{header: cash in at WONDERMARK.COM}}
{{alt-text: also, you see, it is ironic because i am making fun of the concept but the shirts are actually for sale}}

#188; In which a Lost Elephant is easily found 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!