Things I backed on Kickstarter
Hello, friends of the Internet! I had a home emergency last week that took up a lot of time to get repaired. Board-gaming, blogging and a couple other things just fell by the wayside. My home AC broke. Ugh. In most other places in the U.S., this would not be a major issue. But in Arizona, where temps hovered around 110 degrees last week, this was a BIG. FREAKING. DEAL. So now I’m sitting in my condo, basking in the coolness of central air blasting out of my new energy-efficient unit. Woot woot! Anywhooo …
I recently backed two projects on Kickstarter. Kickstarter is a global crowdfunding platform, where creators introduce projects they need funding for, and people of the Internet pledge to give money for said project. I personally haven’t encountered any negative experiences on this (*knock on wood*), but I have only backed projects from established companies that I’ve purchased items from before either in person or online. I’ve heard horror stories of items missing deadlines by years and other shady transactions.
The most recent project I backed is the Scoville: Labs Expansion. I love playing Scoville! I love the pepper meeples and overall great quality of the components. This expansion introduces labs where players can breed their own peppers away from interference on the main game board. The peppers you’re breeding in your lab also count toward the pepper’s value when selling them back. The expansion also comes with more peppers, recipe cards, market cards and tokens. The campaign ends in eight days, and it’s supposed to ship out in April. Can’t wait!
The other project I also recently backed on kickstarter is T-shirts from Cardboard Clothing – Apparel for the Modern Gamer, which ended on July 29. I immediately fell in love with these geeky T-shirts that put a modern spin on some of my favorite board games. I’m already planning to wear this for BGG Con this year. When you’re sitting for hours on end playing board games, it’s nice to be comfortable. And what better way than with geeky T-shirts?!
I pledged $50 for the project, which should give me three shirts. I ended up choosing the shirts for Twilight Struggle and Le Havre, and the “Uwe is my homeboy” shirt. These are of course some of my favorite games, and I’ve waxed poetic about the genius that is Uwe Rosenberg. If I ever ran into Uwe, I hope that I would be wearing that T-shirt. That would be freakin’ awesome. These shirts are expected to be delivered this month. Yay!
In other gaming news, I’m going to Maricopa Con for the first time this year. A friend of mine offered her extra ticket. The event will be two days of board games, card games, tabletop games and RPGs. I’m happy that such an event is local, and I get to see what the scene is like. Looking through the photos, I already see some familiar faces in the crowds from last year.
According to the website, MaricopaCon 2013 & 2014 successfully used Kickstarter to build and rally hundreds of people to re-ignite gaming in the Valley. Another score for Kickstarter to exposing people to new things! It’ll be great to see people I don’t game with on a weekly basis, because they’re from other gaming groups or that their meetups coincide with other events I’m already signed up for. There’s only so much time during the week!
Any local folks out there ever been to Maricopa Con? Share your experience!