Radical 8 Games

Over the last few days I have dispatched almost all copied of Forks. A few copies have been held back for people who need to confirm there address, but otherwise over 250 copies are winging their way over the world, to the US, Australia, Europe and plenty more throughout the UK. It’s been a long journey (much more time spent wrapping boxes then I thought there would be!) but it’s almost done.

Obviously, nothing’s ever really done, and with the fulfillment of Forks finished it means new things can emerge! For one, there’s now a shop on this website (and eventually on Amazon), https://radical8games.com/store/, where people can buy Forks (plus the KS included mini-expansion). The postage is still subsidised, thought not to the level in the Kickstarter. So if you enjoy the game and want to get it as a present, or are interested but missed the KS, now you can order more copies. Whilst I’m relishing a break from the manufacturing process, we do have a limited number of additional copies from the print run, so if you really want a copy order when you can, as I don’t know when (if) more will be made.

Finally I’m going to write a ‘How to kickstart, manufacturer and fulfill a simple card game’ piece for this site and Boardgamegeek, as a lot of brilliant people have asked for advice, and the truth is it’s easier than you might think. That might take a while though, so don’t expect it immediately. Otherwise, keep an eye out for our next game, and if you like Forks please let us know, either through messaging or leave us a review/comment on Boardgamegeek!

Thanks, Mark

It’s been over a month since my last blog update, so here;s a quick update to say the reason for that is because I’m working on getting Forks made. Cards are printed, rules are being proofread (here: main instructions stretch goal instructions) and boxes are being made. Here’s a quick show of how the boxes are coming along:

First sheets of greyboard are cut into nets for boxes

Then these are taped into boxes

Then the laminated wrap is cut to shape

This is applied to the box, which strengthens the sides and protects it (as well as looks good)

Resulting in the final box!

Thanks to all backers, sharers, bloggers, podcasters, reviewers, play testers and supporters! We funded massively over our modest expectations. If you are interested, but missed the Kickstarter, or a retailer please send me an email at mark@radical8games.com and I’ll get in touch. Thanks

We have funded and hit all stretch goals. It’s been a fantastic journey, but the Kickstarter is now coming to a close. If you haven’t backed you have a got a limited time to do so and get the version which includes all stretch goals and Kickstarter exclusives.

Link is here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/radical8games/forks-a-card-game-about-embezzling-investing-and-c?ref=bpvvga

It was a playtest session earlier this year which persuaded me to finally include Abilities in the base copy of the game (or at least, the playtesters did). I’d originally come up with variable player powers (abilities) when I was thinking how I could extend this into a fully fledged Kickstarter, and whilst everyone had fun playing with them, I was concerned about them distracting from the simplicity of the game as it stood. It was a needless worry. The Ability cards introduced a rambunctious sense of excitement to proceedings. And in most cases completely eliminating issues with calculating from almost perfect information. A lot of these cards came from suggestions, or players misunderstanding rules, such as investing cards face down. Situations in which I thought, that’s not the right way to play but it would be interesting if you played like that.

The interesting nature of ability cards like these come in their asymmetry. They lead to different ways of playing, and help enable suprises from other players’ actions. To this end it’s important to keep them as straightforward as possible- you don’t want players to be attending to everyone else’s powers, but rather have them aware of them without it being a focus. The other option with different powers is how much of a game changer they are to be. I consider this difference in terms of Agricola and Feast for Odin.

In Agricola your occupations and minor improvements will massively change your strategy. Each occupation should elicit ‘ooohs’ from your opponents as they becom envious of your new power. Every single one has an impact on the game, or isn’t worth playing. They are big influential powers that only one player can use. The space for playing them is highly contested. In the first edition there were some crazy imbalances.

In Feast for Odin, occupations are small things which might alter one or two of your moves. Occasionally they’ll hint at a direction, but on the whole they’re small fry. Sometimes you’ll just play them for the few points they are worth. But they’re all so milquetoast they’re essentially balanced.

For me, if players have random asymmetric powers, I want them to be impactful. I want a game with them to feel different to the game without. To this end, powerful abilities are the way I went. Those abilities which weren’t having an impact have gone. But I also wanted to keep them streamlined- which means that they tend to be small rules tweaks. At first they might look straightforward and small- being able to discard a card instead of investing one seems like something minor. But through playing the game players see exactly how that small tweak can have a great impact.

Quick update, we have a date for Forks to go live on Kickstarter! The Kickstarter will launch on 14th May, and will cost just £10 for the first 48 hours. This includes shipping to the UK, and subsidised shipping to the rest of the world. Please check it out, and subscribe to hear more info to come!

The theme of Forks came about quite early on, during the Wibbell competition. Why would the cards with the lowest values in the middle be negative, well because they’re being audited for having all their investment mysteriously dissapear. Post-competition I needed to decide upon my companies, frst choice- comic or realistic? I went realistic, partly to step away from other games with businesses where they don’t look like businesses. I also didn’t want a central theme to them all, such as animals or foods. I wanted all the businesses to be as distinct as possible.

An early discussion with Tyler led to a number of names and ideas for businesses, as well as logos, being conjured up. After a quick internet search it turned out all of them already exist. It turned out thinking up fake companies is more difficult then it might first appear. Especially when it came to a company with a three letter initialism ending with ‘Finance’ or ‘Insurance’. Seriously, if you pick three letters at random and add ‘Finance’ to the end, then they already exist.

After much thinking and scouring, 6 companies were created, including logos. The colours are all pastel colours, again to differentiate them from companies and logos already in boardgames, and to avoid classic colour-confused colours such as red/green. Additionally, most of the names try to describe the company in some way, or at least have another meaning.

For those wondering, Apidae is a type of Bee, after it was discovered pharmecutical companies with ‘bee’ and ‘pollen’ in the name already exist. That enables us to keep the hexagon (beehive inspired) but everyone who I’ve played it with pronounces it “‘appy day” which is fine by me. DTV is an initialisation for ‘drain tempering valve’ and Oxime is already a type of chemical compound, so no company in those areas would use those names. Or if they did they are ungoogleable. The wild rock dove is an ancestor to the pigeon (I belive, I am ready to be corrected by bird enthusiasts on that front), hence the connection to communication.

Even though we came up with 6 companies, after much playtesting, Box Resolute (what I would call a freight company) was dropped to 5-player, which won’t be in the base game (sticking to 2-4 players). But here was the logo anyway

I had the strangest compliment on each of these when I was on the Unlucky Frog podcast, and Josh said they were realistically ordinary. Just what I wanted. You can hear that here (along with some other stuff we chat about, including colonialism in games) https://unluckyfrog.podbean.com/e/for-forks-sake-featuring-mark-stockton-pitt-of-radical-8-games. If you haven’t heard it give it a listen- it was great fun to be on and they’re a great podcast.

Since the Wibbell++ competition ended Forks has remained quite consistent. The number of companies has changed form 6 to 5 (and back to 6 for 5 player games), and one particularly memorable playtest session resulted in a key change to the 2 player game (it turned out not removing any cards and having hand sizes of 12 was as ridiculous as it sounds). But the main change came in the form of Merge/Swap.

Forks has always tried to be about choices. The hook, that you give your neighbour the choices, is what make the game special. But during playtesting the feeling of control early in the game was questioned- if your earlier choices are based on future information, how can they be made? Now all games feature this in someway or another, a game with perfect information is a puzzle to be solved. But when playtesters say something designers have a duty to listen. So we tried a new rule (with thanks to Alex and/or Tyler- one suggested merge and one suggested swap, but I can’t remember which).

Merge enables you to merge cards passed to you with your hand. You then invest using any card from your hand. Immediately this enabled a feeling of control, and a sense of strategy. Players become capable of strategising; you might go heavy into one company early with the intention of dumping cards into it late, or keep low value cards you can throw away to not change a favourable board state, amongst others.

That worked, and the game immediately felt better, more solid as a game. And then we tried another rule- Swap.

When players draw three cards Swap enables them to swap one with an invested card in the middle. This makes the game a lot more volaitle, but a lot funnier. Sinking companies, or drawing investments from them introduced a tactical play to every draw. In order to make sure a card you swapped stayed un-invested you needed to embezzle it, and the options you had to pass to you neighbour increased with every card invested. The game was a joy to play, but a lot more brutal and chaotic than with the merge variant.

Both variants were excellent, drawing on different aspects of the game and making them feel quite different, even though the core remained the same, so we tried them together.

Disaster.

The game has far too much going on for a simple card game, and turns were taking too long. Fine for a 4X, but not for this. So the question was, which one do we keep? The strategical capabilities bought about by Merge or the laugh-inducing tactical chaos from Swap?

The answer- both, but never together. Easy to implement with a double sided card. Now players can choose which variant to play, although never at the same time. We encourage people to start with Merge as that’s the most straightforward, and everyone is also relieved when they realise it means they can get rid of the junk from their hand. And that’s why the card’s double-sided (although you are free to play both if everyone’s prepared for it).

In current news- currently looking at boxes, box manufacturing and box printing. The glamourous part of the job. I want to try and upgrade from the boxes used for promo copies, which wear a little too much (although that may be because I didn’t get a protective lamination, but still). Lidded would be ideal, it’s just getting them for a non-exhorbant price. The search continues!