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Kickstarters we loved, hated and laughed at
77 Plays1 year ago
The pod took on a sicilian flair as Joeph Casabella took the lead on this episode. No one better to have on when discussing kickstarters though!
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Transcript
Introduction and Icebreaker
00:00:00
Speaker
I'll ask how we... Your headphones are ginormous, Helen. I haven't looked at videos before. They are... It's... You could drive a wagon on those things. They're Liam's. Oh my god. They have my own. They've got lats on the sides. What the hell is going on? They do have lats on the sides. Yeah, they light up. Oh, cool. And the light changes colour. Wow.
Meet the Hosts and Guests
00:00:40
Speaker
Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Board Game Chinwag for another episode. I think this is lucky number 13, if I'm not mistaken. 13 plus one. 13-ish that you'll hear. So for this evening, we've got our friend G Money, G Unit, Grant Schulz. Hello. Hello. We've also got Steve coming all the way from downtown Emerald.
00:01:05
Speaker
And the lovely Helen of the OC board game phone and many other unmentionals. Hello. And our special guest host this evening is Joe Cashebella, Mr Southeast Queensland regional Kickstarter group. Hello, Joe. How are you? Bonjourno, bono sera. Como estรก e bien?
00:01:25
Speaker
And also lots of languages. And that's how it should be. So thanks for joining us, Joe. So as usual, we're going to kick it off with a get to know Joe, a few sort of introductory questions.
Joe and the Twilight Imperium Experience
00:01:46
Speaker
So Joe, how do you know us?
00:01:49
Speaker
Oh gee, apart from jail time, where we spent 13 years together. You might have to say who that actually was. It was a Thai prison.
00:02:01
Speaker
Well, it was close. It was like a Thai prison at times. But no, I've known Dave and G-Money, I think, the longest, just purely because I worked with Dave. I think I was at one stage or maybe two or three times his boss. So, you know, the way that he's turned out to be is completely my fault. So, yes, I'll take the blame and fall on my sword for that one.
00:02:30
Speaker
And then as they tried to indoctrinate me into the world of board games, that's then when I was literally exposed to Dr. Shilts. Not a real doctor. Not yet.
00:02:49
Speaker
And many others, some of whom are actual doctors. Yes, Mr. Troy. So, no, it was, yeah, 13 years has kind of just evaporated really quickly, but I think at one stage we all had hair that we could be proud of. We had nice golden locks. We were courting. We may not have been married at that time. We were childless.
00:03:12
Speaker
It was all the best things in the world at that time. We were going on holidays. Yeah, there's lots of holidays and trips around. There were lions and tigers involved at stages. And I think you got to go to a wonderful zoo in Bali, I think, Dave. Do you remember when we were members of Virginia Golf Club? We were.
00:03:34
Speaker
I was their membership for three years, in fact, yeah, with members of Virginia. So yes, we shared a common interest, NFL, fantasy football, unfortunately not the New York Giants, but you know. So indeed, anything sports, but I must say out of all of them is certainly
00:03:58
Speaker
the opening my eyes to the board game industry so that's been very very good for me. When you talk about games that open your eyes, anyone particular come to mind?
00:04:12
Speaker
Well, you know, you never forget your first one, right? So, um, and so that's why, you know, it's still my number one. It was. How did you know? No, it was not Charlie, but it was, it was a Twilight Imperium, um, fourth edition. Hey, hey, Joe, we've, you know, we've got this big, you know, there'll be everybody there. There'll be pizza and drink and, and G money will be there. And, um, you know,
00:04:40
Speaker
You know, have a look at this thing and pick your faction and... You're a strategic guy, right, Joe? Yeah, you've got a free day. And how long does it go for? Just a couple of hours, you'll be right. And just turn up and I think it went for something like maybe seven hours and best time. And I think if I remember Rob and his plants annihilated everyone and I think
00:05:04
Speaker
By about round two, Troy, who was on my left hand side, had his war son and was checkmate, so I was puppet the rest of the time. But there was plenty of laughs. He hid his hand all the way up your rectum. Well, pretty much right to my throat and was just puppeteering me.
00:05:27
Speaker
But yeah, so I left that and and then the good thing about it was that we kind of continued the friendly banter and there was a narrative that was actually written I think Dave you put in a couple of pages worth of and now and then I actually do find that email and and rip it out and have a bit of a read because it's it's actually quite funny and and some of the
00:05:48
Speaker
the narrative not only reflects the personality of the players, but it was just so much fun. So it didn't matter where you came in, whether you lost or you were within three VPs or whichever, it was just
00:06:03
Speaker
What completely blew my mind is when we got to the agenda phase and here we are squabbling over laws and voting and bluffing in misdirection and it was just, it was good. So for your first one, you know, lots of mechanics to learn and do it. But I think I got a good handle of it and by about the 10th round I kind of go, oh, this is how you play the game and only had one victory point. But that was good enough for me.
00:06:31
Speaker
I still remember the moment in that game when Troy said to you, now Joe, I'm just going to take this system off you, but only for a moment, right? Just so I can score a point and then you can have it back.
Favorite Board Games Discussion
00:06:40
Speaker
That's right. And then use that to win the game. Something Putin would say. It was very reminiscent and I just put my tail between my legs and I said, yes, God. That's awesome. So Twilight, your first game, what's your favorite game you've ever played?
00:07:00
Speaker
Oh gee, that's my favourite game, gaming moment or game game. So this is pretty hard that I've got now over 200 in my collection, which my wife says is what's arrived today, another box of junk. So I've gone all out real deep in stuff, but I would say
00:07:23
Speaker
Look, one of and it might sound family one is wingspan because that's that's the family game. And so my wife absolutely loves that. So whenever there's, you know, an opportunity to get out wingspan and get spanked, that's that's the game that we play. And I like the reward for playing wingspan is that later on you get spanked and not related.
00:07:45
Speaker
Yeah, so Wingspan is probably the family favourite and it kind of just brings everybody together at the table and you kind of go yeah we had a crappy week or whatever it was and we'll play a game and I had some relatives out that
00:08:07
Speaker
kind of later in life, they're in their 60s and never really played a board game other than Monopoly and so we got wingspan out and they were pretty much hooked on board gaming and gym building so it was probably their gateway and their entry.
00:08:25
Speaker
So that one would be that one but I will I can't really, you know, pass up saying T.I. I know it's a bit of a cliche but it's my first one it's my most favorite one so whenever there's an opportunity to kind of either teach it or
00:08:41
Speaker
you know have a round which isn't you know frequent enough like you get a couple good games a year but certainly there's a few Lacerda ones that I like as well and Age of Steam would probably be up there for me in the top five for me in that space but I played Architects today and did a bit of a teach on that one and that was so fun because we hadn't touched it for a while and there were a couple of new people
00:09:10
Speaker
and yeah they certainly enjoyed it and one had completely written it off saying I've played this before absolutely hate it you know and by the end of it was saying you know what the group makes the game and that was really really good to kind of see and I'd probably is my third one that I'll throw up is I'll say an Old and Goldie but it's a city of the big shoulders really hard to get but it's a
00:09:38
Speaker
A good one nonetheless, so yes. You're very much showing why you and Dave are such good friends. Well, it's just he's indoctrinated me, really. I just hassled you every single day relentlessly until you played my games.
00:09:55
Speaker
Lots of great ones. I'm just looking at my shelf now and right, staring right in front of me is Le Havre. First time I played Le Havre was with Steve. That's a great note too. And that's right. And we made a running joke for a long time. It's going, hey, Steve, you got any wood? You know, would you like to buy some wood? I definitely would like that wood, but I don't think I want it right now. No, that's right. And Halletow was another one, you know, in there.
00:10:21
Speaker
Yeah, so lots of memorable moments, but there's just, you know, my interests are just playing, trying to play as much and as often as you can and enjoy the groups that you've got and get out and just play. Yeah. Well, it's a good point you raise that joke because it's one of my favorite things to do with Shane. I know he plays a lot of games and a lot of them he's actually quick to decide on. So he will come out and say like, I hated Big Shoulders and then I played it with you guys and now I love Big Shoulders.
00:10:50
Speaker
Yeah. And I think we're nearly double digits of games that he's disliked playing and wanted to get rid of or has actually sold and then came and played it with a different group of people. And I really liked that. I want to buy it again. Well, good luck getting to see the big shoulders. If you left that one there. He did. He sold his coffee. I'm still, I'm still dirty about him for that. It's like a week after he put it in his top 10. It was a real roller coaster for me that week.
00:11:19
Speaker
I mean, he did a pretty big cut this week. Yeah. Oh yeah. Which I did buy too, though. I bought one. I bought Aftonova. He was selling Aftonova. Outrageous. I know. There's no way you've given that enough of a go to have made a choice yet.
00:11:40
Speaker
Yep. Well, he's lost someone else's win.
Quirky Kickstarter Projects
00:11:42
Speaker
That's how it works. But I just look at it as sharing, right? So sometimes you got to create some space and often it's within the group. Like if you have a look at who's buying, who's buying the games, like I think I've funded probably Steve's move up to that emerald. This is one time he put it on there and I'm just looking up, yeah, heroes of air, sea and land. Oh, yeah. You know.
00:12:07
Speaker
There's either fields in there, throw that in there, throw Howletow in there. It feels to even get out of the box. 800 bucks worth of, you know, don't tell my wife that. But yeah, there's many times. Hey, I bought over $3,000 worth of games to support Dave, so I get it.
00:12:26
Speaker
I will come to Shane's defense a little bit too, because he's reasoning for selling big shoulders. I've sold games for that same reason. And that is that the only people I'll ever play this game with already own this game, which I get, I get that argument. But the reason obviously otherwise is that I sold a lot of games that I will never play again without finding a new game group. So I guess that's probably a similar thing too. Like doesn't matter how much I want, my wife's not going to play Nemesis with me. It's just not going to happen.
00:12:55
Speaker
Whereas we go the other way often, we're going, oh, we really like TI. Every single person gets a copy of TI, which works if you then expand that out and then introduce another five or six players each. But no, we saw we usually play together. And that's such a huge game, right? It makes more sense if it's a little game that you can play with other things, like when we played Subterra 2 the other week.
00:13:17
Speaker
like three other people in our game group ordered. So we now have four copies in our game group, but I'll go play that with my mum or they'll go play that with other people because it's a smaller game. So I know you were talking to me about that the other week. So it was Subterra 2, you actually got copies of it?
00:13:32
Speaker
Yeah. So I've got Subterra, and Subterra 2's arrived. So they got, basically what happened is, because it's gone bust, they've gone into liquidation now. But the people who made the game, like the actual company who made it, produced it, have sold retail copies to try and get some of their money back. So they were selling it, so we got copies from Canada.
00:13:55
Speaker
Yeah, so we got we've got four copies in them. So I've got a copy of some territory. It's beautiful. Like because we played a version like we played one of the copies that came earlier. And it's just it's a really well made game. It's such a shame for all those people who invested so much money. Yeah, but we yeah, it was $95 a game. Wasn't cheap.
00:14:18
Speaker
They're recouping some costs out of that, that's for sure. So, Mr. Casabella, you've mentioned a couple of plays already, but if you were to like single out like your most hilarious board gaming moment, can you do that? Oh, most hilarious board gaming moment. What a story.
00:14:42
Speaker
Oh, gee. Look, I think I've had a couple of crackers with Western Legends, so we've played it.
00:14:53
Speaker
Because it's so sandbox-y and there's twice I've played it now, once with my family and then once with my work colleagues. And, you know, Western theme is fantastic, but you can go and do everything. So there's this time when, particularly my niece, I'll give you that example, and she absolutely loves it because she often takes the path of evil. And so Charlotte Clark, if you're listening, evil never pays, but in Western Legends it does.
00:15:21
Speaker
But very competitive, so we're just trying to figure out what's the fastest way to make as much money as we can. So I'll do the honest thing and I'll go and hit the gold mines up.
00:15:36
Speaker
So then I make my way up to the bank and she makes the way at the bank and then she kills the bank guard and then she robs me of my goal and then banks it in the same move. And that's family for you, you know, pretty good. But as that kind of game kind of manifested itself, it kind of like out of the four of us between my sister and my brother-in-law, it became, you know, a split of good versus evil and then it became, you know, 2v2 type thing.
00:16:04
Speaker
and you know four and a half hours later it was just kind of like you're sleeping on the lounge tonight and you're grounded for the next three weeks and and it just became so immersive that we kind of you know forgot about
00:16:20
Speaker
You know, just the little things in life really, you know, midnight on a, it was actually Christmas Eve, midnight that we played it last and suddenly you go, oh, where's the time gone? So we'll chalk that up as a,
00:16:35
Speaker
as a great family one. But I've had little ones like that. Then I've had some really brutal ones that end up being fun anyway, like in Age of Steam. And I'm going to throw Adnan under this one because I always remind him of it this one time at Bandcamp moment. But I had this route, it was premium
00:16:59
Speaker
He kind of figured me out really quickly and he could have done something that that had earned him more money But chose to do something that earned him less money and he absolutely cock blocked me And but he does this whole oh, you know, I feel really bad. I won't do it Yeah, okay. I will do it. Sorry to cock block you and it just killed me like That was it. That was the end of the game. He was like on 80 and and everybody else was on 50 and
00:17:25
Speaker
But every time I see the mongrel, I'll sell him, you know, on that one. But it always has, like, you go to a board game event, and we'll see him there, and it's always good to just catch up with a beer and just go, you know, this one time at Bancam. But the first was really that created a bit of a narrative that flowed through the story, was Nemesis.
Unusual and Unsuccessful Kickstarters
00:17:53
Speaker
So, it's my first time playing Nemesis, we had somebody teach it, and I don't know, Steve, if you were at that one, but I think you might have missed it. We had Shannon Tilley, another guy that Dave and I work with, and he was a convict in Nemesis, and I was kind of the medic, and there's a couple of others, and the ship's captain decided to release the convict, and he said, why? Why did you release him? Like, clearly he's up to no good.
00:18:21
Speaker
But as the game kind of manifested itself, he set the whole ship on fire, double-crossed a whole bunch of people, and then eventually got eaten by the alien whilst the scientist in the wheelchair and the medic escaped without anything. But often that'll be a reference point whenever I'm playing with Shannon. It's kind of like, I'll never forget that time in Nemesis. You know, Sicilians have long memories. Very, very long memories.
00:18:48
Speaker
But yeah, any type of moment that kind of creates that narrative that you can kind of always hinge on, because it does create a little bit of rivalry, but when you do catch up, it is a bit of fun, you have a bit of laugh, and you kind of go, we haven't touched that, let's play that again sometime soon. So he's desperate for me to go play John Company, but I worry, I fear for my life in that one.
00:19:11
Speaker
Um, I wasn't at that nemesis game, but it don't, it doesn't matter anymore because everyone else in that group was, and I've heard so many stories from that game. I might as well have been there. Like, yeah.
00:19:25
Speaker
Thanks, Joe. So now that we know you a little bit, we might hand over the reins to you and you can take us away from here with tonight's topic and see how it goes. What is tonight's topic? Is it gateway games? Kickstarter's? Kickstarter's? Oh, that's right.
00:19:42
Speaker
Okay, so I know that you guys invest a lot in Kickstarter because obviously they funnel them through me, kind of like a middleman. Except for Helen, I don't think Helen's bought anything from the SEQ. No, I have not. She hasn't bought anything yet. That's very true, very true. G-Money is also known as the king maker, the king pledge maker, because as soon as architects come out,
00:20:08
Speaker
I was lucky though, because I hadn't bought anything before that, so I got the whole kit. No, you got everything. That was hilarious. There was a bargain, you know, just slap it down. I think it cost like six dollars. It was great. Oh, postage. No, it was less than that. It was like two bucks. Two bucks. They actually paid me in the end. Like $444 New Zealand for the whole suite. The funniest thing about that, because I got on that pledge as well. I haven't gotten many on the SEQs because obviously I don't live in Brizzy anymore.
00:20:36
Speaker
But I just remember the conversation about the coins. That was really bad. Everyone had already decided on everything they were going to buy. And someone just said, what about the metal coins? And I just get on and say, oh yeah, you got to get the metal coins. They're so awesome. They're great metal coins. And then all these people start messaging Joe going, oh yeah. We'll grab a set of metal coins. We'll grab a set of metal coins. And I'm like, yeah.
00:21:01
Speaker
Fair. But are you really going to get the metal coins out of your architects box and put them in your paladins box and then get them out of that? So then it was like, yeah, good call. Three sets of metal coins. I think we ended up collecting like 20 sets of metal coins. They were a bargain at $14 each. You know, in retail you pay 40 bucks. But still people chase them for me. They think like I've got coins everywhere. Sleeves and coins are what people go. You got any whiskey? It's like...
00:21:28
Speaker
Come over here, what's, you know, have you got any sleeves? Can you hook me up with sleeves? You know, type things. So yeah, so we're going to be talking about Kickstarters. Whether it be game Kickstarters or any type of Kickstarter that you've kind of thought is quirky or you did back, and in Shameless, and not Charti Party, I think we've referred to Charti Party quite a bit now, but
00:21:55
Speaker
maybe something different. I've kind of been tempted from time to time to kind of diversify my investment portfolio in Kickstarter.
00:22:07
Speaker
Do you mean into actual shares or equity? Well, you never know with these things. I did see, you know, not many people realise that I am a bit of a beekeeper, so I'm a bit of a nerd all rounder. But when the Flow Hives hit the market, they were going in for some tooling.
00:22:26
Speaker
set up their Brisbane shop here and I think they were after about 10 grand just to buy some laser cutting equipment and ended up having something like $14 million worth of investment. So the company went from very micro in size to having to get a CEO overnight and chief financial officer and setting everything up and thinking about the logistics chain.
00:22:53
Speaker
They've been quite successful since and have moved into social media and a whole bunch of other things for wonderful elements in beekeeping, irrespective of where you sit, whether you're traditionalist or purist or you like the innovation that goes with it.
00:23:15
Speaker
you know kind of investment in other portfolios whether it be kind of gaming like PC gaming there's a lot of you know software and game stuff that people kind of dabble in or there's you might see you know belts shoes I think I've seen backpacks I've seen an ostrich pillow that kind of goes out and I'll talk to you about the ostrich pillow a little bit later because that'll pop up on one of mine
00:23:41
Speaker
The weirdest one I've seen is Hot Potato. So it appeared as a bit of a board game. So Hot Potato, just like any concept, you throw a potato at somebody and throw it off. Except it was electrically charged. So it was literally, you catch it and you get massive shock. And I think there was a few lawsuits as a result of that one.
00:24:09
Speaker
I wouldn't be surprised. So look it up. There was a Kickstarter called Hot Potato. I'm pretty sure. If not, I would have seen it and I've tagged it on my Amazon wish list to kind of give to my seven year old to take the school for show and tell. There used to be a game like that. And when I said game, it was more of a toy. And it was just a disc and it had four handles. And you just have to sit around and hold the handles and one of you would get shocked.
00:24:34
Speaker
That was the entire game. It's like a drinking game and it was like in 20s. I just remember this thing. We used it like three times and then someone spilled a drink on it. It doesn't work anymore. Yeah. And then somebody got electrocuted and died. Yep. Oh no, it's the tiniest little shot. The, um, the, the fun that we had when I was a teenager growing up in a small country town was you'd, you'd create an electric fence chain.
00:24:57
Speaker
So someone would hold on the electric fence, then hold on to the next person and so on and so on and so on and so on. And the shock would go through everyone. The last person to get a bigger shock, it was amazing. It was science. 10 amp, 240 volts, Steve. That's how your country boys did it. It was a cow fence.
00:25:16
Speaker
Oh, I wasn't a farmer. I don't know that stats. I was just one of the many young alcoholics there that was in part of the chain. But you didn't whiz on it though, did you? No, I didn't try that one. Yeah.
00:25:33
Speaker
What about you Dave? I've talked a little bit in the past about some that have never arrived so I did back that laser cut rubber band minigun which
00:25:47
Speaker
which, weirdly enough, in January, there was an update from Ukraine. They said, we're still making them. They're like, OK, buddy. Most have gone to the front line. They just had to make real guns for a while. Yeah, I think so. I don't know what the logistics of the shipping trains are like from Ukraine at the moment. Barely ordinary, I'd imagine.
00:26:10
Speaker
They obviously, they didn't die. So that's, that's a positive sign. That is positive. So there may eventually happen. Um, and I pulled, I pulled out at the last minute of a 3d printer, which was also good because that didn't end up fulfilling at all. Um, but yeah, there was just some interesting ones. So I was sort of flicking through some of the ones that I'd seen in the past. Um, back in the early days, I remember the new story about the clothes folding machine.
00:26:37
Speaker
So the clothes folding machine was So they saw a gap in the market for a machine that folded your clothes that you could have in a house So the only machines I have that exist to do that now like industrial and factories and things so they're like, okay We can miniaturize this we can make it everybody can have you know, you washing machine you dry your folding machine So we'll do a kickstarter and we get it funded entry price 5,000 us. Oh, that's pretty good. So barking. Yeah
00:27:06
Speaker
So you need just to get one of the first of these machines. So you can have a look up if you want. It's called the FoldyMate 5000. Foldy with an I.
00:27:23
Speaker
I'd love to look it up, but my keyboard's too loud. Yeah, that is true. I can send you the link later. So the Folding Mate, it was unsuccessful in getting funded. I'm sure you're not surprised. Of the $5,000 pledges to get one of the machines, there was zero backers.
00:27:41
Speaker
Okay The there was a whole bunch of tiers that you could do like supports I get stickers and t-shirts and stuff like that and one of them was there was an inner circle where you'd get Early access to the factory to go and see how the machines have been made it Created they had one backer for that and that was their highest backer So I didn't actually get anybody that wanted one of these things And you can see why some of the photos on the actual pledge. It looks like
00:28:11
Speaker
I'd say a small car, except it's got like outside chains and wheels and levers and things that just sort of move you close through. But there's a video on there and you put a t-shirt on there, it'll be folded into a nice neat little package.
Kickstarter Disappointments and TV Show Endings
00:28:26
Speaker
But how loud is it? Like at what?
00:28:29
Speaker
Oh, sure. It sounds like a bike. It runs on, runs on. And it only takes 17 minutes to do it. That's right. You'd be cheaper just to hire, you know, a laundry person. Yeah. It says, you know, arms. Yeah. It says it takes a third of the time with washing your clothes.
00:28:51
Speaker
So you just, yeah, you just take it out of the washing machine, put it in the folding machine and Bob's your uncle, you got to set a folder closer. That was a cracker. But, so one I actually did look at and I might end up getting at some stage, if I've got a big chunk of disposable cash was the invisibility shield. Did any of you guys see those? It was invisible. I think I might've seen one, but I'm not sure. It may have been invisible.
00:29:17
Speaker
Yeah. I gave that too big of a laugh. So the invisible shield did actually get funded, but it's a, it's kind of like a combo mirror sort of light refracting thing. Um, and it's fairly functional, like it blows things. Yeah. Yeah. So you put it on a black background and it's only about a meter high, but you look invisible behind it. So they, they funded that. Um, they're actually delivering, I think now.
00:29:47
Speaker
Well, maybe from December 22 onwards, according to their site. Um, again, it's not cheap, so 500 bucks, but it's literally a non-powered, so you don't need battery or power cable or anything like that. It's just a light shield that refracts the light and you can't see what's behind it. So, so are you predator? Like if you have one? Maybe. Because that's awesome. Yeah, you never know.
00:30:14
Speaker
And the final one I was actually quite keen to do, and I still might also, this one hasn't fulfilled yet. It's levitating dice, so it's kind of, I guess, poor game of Jason. But it's a tiny little electromagnet, and you get these special dice that come with the pledge, and the metallic, and they actually spin and hover. So you just put them on this little block, and they hover, and you can spin them around, and then it's sort of levitate, and then you just grab them off there and roll them.
00:30:39
Speaker
look fantastic. Just be cool to sit next to the desk and just go. A little levitating dice. Yeah, that's my concern. You'd have some for sure. I don't have any... I'm sorry, I've just looked at the invisibility shield. I need to not do that while I'm talking. It's pretty good. Yeah. It's relatively legit. It surprised me how good it was.
00:31:05
Speaker
So I backed, I may have even told this story already, 14 episodes in and I'm repeating myself. So stop me if that is the case. But I got jammed by a mate of mine. Yes, you did tell the book. The book.
00:31:22
Speaker
Well, maybe I won't share that story again then, but anyway. Yeah, I should close the book on that one. Yeah. Moral of the story is, when he's at 40% and you feel bad for him, so you back it, so he jumps up to 45, just remember that he could also spend the money to make the other 55% happen and then you lose out on your money.
00:31:41
Speaker
But hey, the book got made, so happy days. All right. But I found a few other odd ones. I actually went a different tack to what we... Because a lot of the stuff is either the charity party or that book and everything else is fairly explainable. But
00:32:01
Speaker
There's this Kickstarter at the moment called Rocketball007. And it says, Rocketball007, I know who it is. That's what it is, right? So it's this old guy who's like a producer of music and he's raising money to get a digital copy of this music.
00:32:24
Speaker
also offering like um um like the stuff on vinyl um like remixes of other stuff it's and also he's he's like also happy to you know take your music and and produce it if you're paying for that but that's not that's not one of the backing things but if you just listen to the first like
00:32:47
Speaker
Ten seconds of the video it's bloody hilarious because it's this really heavy sort of techno music Followed by this old guy dropping in and going. Oh, hey, I I'd make this music like very not the person you would think that's behind the music It's just a bit of fun. It's making
00:33:06
Speaker
a dollar from one backer. So it's not doing particularly well. But yeah, it's the, if you want to get a copy of I Know Who It Is digitally, it's $25 US for a digital copy of an album. If you want the Bandcamp catalog version, it's $200 US. And if you want the Spy Hunt 45, then you're looking at $500 US.
00:33:36
Speaker
Um, so, um, yeah, that's, uh, that, that, that one I found and I just thought that's a bit of fun and it's, you can back it right now. 40 days left. Rocketball, 007. I know who it is. I don't know who it is.
00:33:57
Speaker
But yeah, I guess for me, I've successfully avoided a lot of dodgy ones. Probably the dodgiest thing that I've ever gone in for, I think I've also mentioned on here, which was the 3D printer that's
00:34:13
Speaker
had a lot of problems and its help desk was just a Facebook group. And it still is. So that was, that was painful though. It wasn't funny. It was like, I wanted to find the people who did that and throw the 3D printer at them. At one point I ended up buying a new 3D printer and I went onto the forum and like, I finally fixed my problem. I threw this one in the bin and I bought a better machine. That was my response.
00:34:40
Speaker
Yeah, but as far as funny things go, yeah, I don't really have many, many unfortunately, so. Yeah. All right. I think, um, just Helen, I think, um, you look a bit innocent there. So, uh, tell us about, uh, tell us about the stuff that's might've enticed you and, um, you know, potentially if you wanted to jump in. Yeah. So I'm going to stick to my lameness.
00:35:08
Speaker
I have only ever backed one thing on Kickstarter my whole life, and that was the Veronica Mars movie. Yeah. I knew you'd say that. Yeah. I was a massive fan and I was so excited. So I put back the movie and I paid extra to get like a signed poster and a digital copy of the script. And I got the DVDs, um, some stickers, I think at the time, a t-shirt was good. But, um, but yeah, I was really happy until they made season four.
00:35:38
Speaker
And then they can go to hell now. Sorry, you need to explain that. So, Geronic Mars Season 1, 2, 3, cult, classic, good show starring Kristen Bell, obviously, for anybody who doesn't know. She's a detective, works for her dad's detective agency as she's going to school after her best friend was murdered. She's trying to solve the mystery.
00:36:04
Speaker
So that's season one and then it goes through and there's constant murders and mysteries to solve. Then the movie was 10 years later, everybody came back for it. It was all lovely. They got the two couple together in the end. Then they made season four on Stan, I think it was. And they just made her unlikable. She was fighting with her partner and then they ended up getting them together at the end. It was great, they got married.
00:36:34
Speaker
last three minutes of the show, they blew him up. What? Yeah. So because they wanted her, the writer wanted her to go on and be more of a noir detective on her own, leaving and solving cases and leave behind the high school of it all. But it was just like, everybody was just like, what the hell just happened? You just killed off like, one of the favorite characters, which is hilarious because
00:37:02
Speaker
episode one, he's the most unlikable character. But you just fall in love with this guy called Logan played by Jason Doring and then yeah, they kill him at the end.
00:37:10
Speaker
It was mortifying. Was it to set up season five? Like were they actually going to keep going? Yeah, he wanted to, but he did it knowing that fans wouldn't be happy, but he didn't care. He did it anyway. And I'm like, dude, you wouldn't even have a season four had it not been for the fans. Cause at the time it was the fastest growing Kickstarter. It really changed the scope of what Kickstarter was. Like they made like, they wanted, I think 6 million. I think they made like 13 or something.
00:37:36
Speaker
13 or 15 million dollars. They were able to do a better movie than they originally planned. But yeah, he just basically went, screw you all, you know, I don't want to hate on Rob Thomas too much, who's the director of a different Rob Thomas to Matchbox 20. But he also directed Party Down, which has just come back for a new season, which is a show about some catering, a catering company. But it has a lot of the same. It's a lot of the same actors.
00:38:05
Speaker
are in both. So Ryan Hanson, Ken Marino, they're both in both. So yeah, it's great. So Veronica Mars, maybe they wanted 2 million, they got 5.7 million. Right. That's a big effort. But it was quick too, they got it quick. Yeah, we were so excited because when the show ended back in the day, when season three got cancelled, like
00:38:30
Speaker
It was before all like the internet and stuff. People, the fans were literally sending Mars bars to the people trying to get this show back on the set. They got like thousands, like tens of thousands of Mars bars sent to their office trying to save the show. Wow.
00:38:46
Speaker
Um, so when it came back from Kickstarter, it was just, yeah, it was heavily backed and it was great. It was so exciting. And we were so excited for it. And season four, so excited for it and thought this is so great. And then they, yes, and they didn't need to kill him off. He was in like, I'm going to say the Navy, but that's probably wrong. He was in the armed forces and they could have just sent him off on a mission. They could have done anything to get him out of the picture. They didn't have to murder him.
Board Game Kickstarters: Favorites and Regrets
00:39:11
Speaker
So yeah, it was, it's a big thing. I actually have some, um,
00:39:17
Speaker
some sites I follow on Facebook and they still are like, I'm still not over it. It's been like three years. They're like, I'm still not over it. I still can't watch it. All right. Or they watch the whole of season four up until the last five minutes and just pretend that didn't happen. They stop at the wedding. Oh, like at the end of Serenity when you just pretend wash doesn't die. I'm going to pretend I know what Serenity is.
00:39:40
Speaker
I watched this show once that wasn't very good, but my wife and I just loved it. And again, stop me if I've told you this story because I feel I have a terrible memory. But the show was Las Vegas and it went for about, I think, four or five seasons. It was decent cast that had like that Josh Duhamel before he was anybody.
00:39:59
Speaker
and had James Kahn, you know, a few other big names. But it was all about this casino that they ran in Vegas. And the James Kahn's daughter and Josh Duenel were getting married in the last episode. And Old Lovey was pregnant. And then she went into labor while she was walking down the aisle. And that was the end of the season. And then it got cut. So similar to your Mars bar story, apparently all these people started sending in booties for the baby to the
00:40:29
Speaker
whatever. But nothing ever came of it, but it was this huge big thing. Facebook must have been around because you know how Facebook knows what you're looking at. There was all these posts of, you should join this group and send in booties for the baby and let's get this show back on. Let's find out what happens next.
00:40:52
Speaker
So yeah, it's good to know that there's stories like yours where that actually eventuates into something actually happening. That's kind of cool. Yeah. Well, they do a Kickstarter and they get multiple millions of dollars. Yeah. Yeah. That's where you can find a bit of TV. Because I think Fireflow is like the ultimate one where it may have been before the really inventive.
00:41:10
Speaker
Facebook and the internet sort of activism stuff and just never came back. So, Helen, did you say you haven't seen Firefly? I haven't seen Firefly. Neither have I. If Kickstarter was around, that show would still be going. 100%. No, I've heard very much Firefly is that show. It's that.
00:41:26
Speaker
The show that should never have been canceled. It's 20 years ago now and people still go, fucking, how dare they not do another season of Firefly. And Serenity was a movie related to it, wasn't it? Did the movie come first or after? No, it was the follow up that was probably the script for the second season that they tried to cram into a movie to just finish the story a bit. But yeah, sort of went off on a bit of a tangent.
00:41:47
Speaker
And I think they knew at the end of it, they weren't ever coming back. So they killed a few characters. I feel like we could do an entire episode just of shows that they shittily ended. Yeah, exactly. Ally McBeal. And I go back a bit, but shocking. I wasted so much. I literally got to the end. I watched the last episode and I went,
00:42:11
Speaker
I literally just wasted the time watching any of that because of that ending. I was fucking shit. I'm like, never again. And I will never watch it again. See, there's a whole other tangent there though, where I would say there's a whole bunch of TV shows that they shittily didn't end. Like, come on. Because they didn't know they were canceling. Put a bow on The Walking Dead after two seasons, please. And then it's a great show. Now I'm like, I don't, I don't care anymore. There was some good bits in season three and four about
00:42:37
Speaker
I don't remember when I stopped watching it. I just remember going, okay. Like we already know the Triffids. Let's move on.
Exploring Odd Kickstarter Products
00:42:45
Speaker
Like in the summer sexual stuff, like lost one of my favorite shows, but lost got completely, you know, off the tracks in the middle of the year and the run because of the brighter strike that happened then. And so they went from like a full season with a plan to like 13 episodes where they actually
00:43:01
Speaker
there was no idea what was going on and it wrecked the whole rest of the story it was just completely random and then eight seasons yeah it was just kind of yeah they just yeah you could say they lost the plot oh yeah i was trying to avoid that one gmail
00:43:17
Speaker
But it definitely feels like that is a whole other episode of TV shows that should have ended or didn't. And maybe there's the rear gym out there that ended perfectly. Ted Lasso's coming. I don't want it to end, but maybe it will be perfect.
00:43:33
Speaker
Look, if you haven't seen Mr. Inbetween, definitely. That's got to be one of my, my most favorite times. It's my favorite show from last year. I think that the whole bit with the police was like, I don't answer questions. Right. It still gets me. Right. There's a show called You're the Worst. It was probably one of the best endings I've ever seen on a TV show. What was that? You're the worst. Is that because it ended? Just the way they ended it was absolutely perfect.
00:44:04
Speaker
Anywho, I digress. Well, we might be talking about that in an episode in the near future. So that's all I have from my back in my Kickstarter history. I did have a quick look today and there were some gems on there. There's a movie that they're trying to get made called Happy Meat, which is about when a lab grown meat develops teeth, the company owner faces an escalating set of dilemmas as the situation spirals out of control. Basically, the teeth meat, the meat person goes and tries to kill the board and seems like a bit of a horrid, very bizarre.
00:44:35
Speaker
So there's already a movie that sounds a bit like that called Rubber. It looked a bit like that. It's literally that when you go onto the Kickstarter page, it's literally a steak with eyes and eyes and a mouth. That's a mistake. Yeah. Yeah. And then there's another one called Eating the Indies, the wrestling cookbook.
00:44:58
Speaker
Oh, I found that one too. A group of independent wrestlers together to make a cookbook. So some of the cookbook recipes are buffalo chicken egg rolls and white chilli. The best thing about that buffalo chicken egg rolls though, is that the picture they've got on it is of this female wrestler who has just been absolutely hammered and she's covered in blood all over her head. It's like chicken buffalo egg rolls. Look at the marketing down.
00:45:29
Speaker
And I love that it says, what does it say? All profits from this Kickstarter will be going to the talent. So this is like a way for the independent wrestling racket to get some money. But what you get for your pledges is literally, you know, one person got to put their recipe in the book with their picture and everything. One person got to have a sponsor page dedicated to them. And, um, yeah, otherwise it was, yeah. That's great. Interesting what people are selling.
00:46:03
Speaker
I bought a few games on Kickstarter. Only a couple? Not much. The one thing I regret is that I never got into Critical Role when it was doing its Kickstarter thing. I don't really have much interest outside of board games and stuff. To be honest, I've never really looked at Kickstarter for other stuff. But a big community project like that would have been amazing to have been a part of to help
00:46:30
Speaker
make it work and succeed. And back to board games. Best one you've ever backed, hands down. Go Frosthaven.
00:46:48
Speaker
Other than Frost Haven or Gloomhaven, it's got to be the Kingmaker pledge. It has to be a value for money. That's a distant third. So has Gloomhaven and Frost Haven always been kickstarters?
00:47:04
Speaker
Uh, you can get, you can get Gloomhaven retail and I think you can also still now get Frosthaven retail, but both started on Kickstarter. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Well, even the retail ones at Frosthaven are Kickstarter. The retailers keep starting back. Yeah, true.
00:47:23
Speaker
I definitely have a clear winner for best Kickstarter ever backed. And it's Smartphone Inc. It's a cracking game. It was one of the first Kickstarters ever backed, like probably around about charity party time. And it had this, I've talked about this a bit, but it had this weird existential moment when I opened the box.
00:47:43
Speaker
Um, because I've opened the box and there's this handwritten letter from Ivan Lashan saying, thank you for backing my game. I'm like, that's cool as, and then I'd move that off the top of the box. And the first component I see says Steve, and it's in like cardboard. It's a piece of the game. I'm like, holy shit. This is like a custom.
00:48:04
Speaker
version of this game for me. And then I realized that Steve is the AI for the solo game. And it looks a lot like Steve Jobs' silhouette. But for a good 30 seconds, I was like, this is unbelievable. This guy has done 5,000 versions of this game and made a personal one for everyone who's backed it. Holy crap.
00:48:28
Speaker
But no. But yeah, I mean, obviously, it's a gift it still gives today. Had all the expansion stuff in that you could buy in the retail version later, the 1.1 expansion was all included. Had a really good community, too. They created these scenarios that you could go to the community and download and play, and they're still adding to that. So it's been out for a while now.
00:48:49
Speaker
Um, and then he went on to make furnace, which was another cracking game, but yeah, it's for smartphone. Yeah. It's a top 10 game for me. And it's, it's yeah. One of the first ones are back. So yeah, mate, mate, probably wish I didn't back it because then I just thought that all Kickstarter games were going to be awesome. And that's not the case.
00:49:10
Speaker
Indeed. So going back to some of these weird kickstarters that you might have seen or you might be shopping in Amazon and you get a little hey recommended and you kind of go how the hell did that get you know recommended that blow-up doll shouldn't have been up there. I swear that that was on G Moneys like he borrowed my phone. I'm still waiting for that too. Yeah oh damn sorry I've used it I'll have to return it to you.
00:49:38
Speaker
but uh ostrich pillows right um so so i don't forget right so it it's um you know how ostrich is well yeah oh you have one get out of town that is it all right and and how did you get that one and if it wasn't clearly on kickstarter must have been on one of the amazon or other retailers we bought it from maya
00:50:04
Speaker
It's Liam's. So basically, I'm actually going to take my headphones off for a second because you have to see it to believe it. So just give me a sec.
00:50:15
Speaker
And this was not a s***, guys. For everyone listening, this is completely random. There you go. How the hell is that? It's so you can sleep at your desk. So you can put your hands through these holes on the side. And like, rest like this while you're sleeping. But it's, you use it so you can sleep at night, so you get rid of the thing. So you kind of do it like this. So that you can have like, some, you know, instead of putting a pillow on your head while you sleep.
00:50:45
Speaker
But yeah, Liam uses it whenever he gets migraines. Yeah. So that's what I was searching for.
00:50:56
Speaker
I don't have one, but I'm absolutely still chasing one. But so they sold something like, I don't know, plus whatever, 140,000 pounds later. But it's still in the place today. So it's kind of it's got to be working like people wear them on airplanes and and, you know, for sleeping migraines. They're really good if you want to never have sex again.
00:51:26
Speaker
What are you talking about, Liam? I'm just saying, when you see your partner wearing one of those.
Future Podcast Plans and Community Support
00:51:32
Speaker
It ruins everything. It ruins everything. Not surprised. Why are they called ostrich pillows? Because I think they look like an ostrich. I think they're the shape of an ostrich. Like it's, you know, like it's got a long neck. Clearly it's an ostrich. You know the Rick and Morty episode where he has the sun and his arms grow out of his head? That's what it looks like to me.
00:51:57
Speaker
I'm going to look it up. It was launched on Kickstarter, so go check that one out. But if ostrich pillows are listening and they want to send a freebie our way, I'm sure Helen could do with the second one for sure. OK, the name is inspired by the way, ostriches bury their heads in the sand because you bury your head in a pillow.
00:52:21
Speaker
Okay. Straight into the marketing department. It was very successful. If you look up weird things on Kickstarter, it's like weird things on Kickstarter that were super successful and the ostrich pillow is one of them. There you go. The other one was, you know how you get those toasters that leave the imprint, so you might have a Star Wars one. So did a cheese toasty.
00:52:51
Speaker
So the problem is you just cut out. You know how you get, it was so good. It was like, it was a, like, you know, when they do those things, but they cut away as a joke. You were like, yeah, those toasters, they can do the imprints. Well, cheese, toasty.
00:53:11
Speaker
It was called the Cheezus and it had Jesus's face on it. That's why it was called the Cheezus. There's a shop in the my center I go to for lunch and they have a Holy Cheezus and it's just a toasted cheese sandwich with four different types of cheese. It is my go to $10 toasty lunch. It's glorious. It should not cost you $10 for a cheese toasty. It shouldn't but it does and I pay it gladly.
00:53:36
Speaker
Well, you know how much cheese chicken parmigiana is nowadays. So 27 bucks. That's a rort there. I feel like there's a whole nother episode here of overpriced lunches. All right. Well, that's next week. Next week is the agenda. Look, I picked a fairly inspirational one about, you know, mentors and coaches and what's been, you know, the best advice that you could ever pass on and who the most three influential people in the world has been. But we'll go with that one, Dave.
00:54:05
Speaker
food item menus that are significantly overpriced and you know mind you last Friday I think you know that that pizza that we had Dave was kind of very small and very expensive. It seemed like a kid's pizza and I'm pretty sure it wasn't a kid's process. No certainly not.
00:54:27
Speaker
but look we can do two topics right like so we've got a bit of time we can research up some food and talk about your other thing which sounded way better as a topic well see because well I thought I like from me
00:54:40
Speaker
in the board game community and we volunteer a lot of our time and so you know, coaching and mentoring and what's been the best advice that you've received or what have you experienced as a coach that you can pass on.
00:54:58
Speaker
And whether it's in gaming, at the last board game event, I had a person, it was smartphone, because I did teach a smartphone, so Steve, you introduced me to that one, and I really didn't get the puzzle-y thing to begin with, but the person was first game around, and just didn't want to play anything strategy, and so when you kind of walk through
00:55:22
Speaker
absolutely love strategy games and that's all they played for the rest of the day and it was because in their mind they had a different concept of what strategy was and then I was talking to her at the end of it I said oh what are you doing she goes oh I work for a telco and I sell mobile phones so it was perfect it was the perfect kind of ending and it was but it was really good but yeah just a little bit of advice so whether you apply it to
00:55:51
Speaker
or whether you're hob that you can do. But I think we've always got a soft spot for some type of mentoring and coaching along the lines. And I think that that's a more recent one that I've had. But yeah, my topic for next week. It sounds like a great topic. And I think we'll happily do that. It has been an absolute pleasure having you on
00:56:16
Speaker
This evening, Joe, thank you so much for your energy and your passion. Go Niners. And your random Kickstarter stuff. And just give it a quick plug, talk about the group as well. See if we can get you. The SEQ Kickstarter group. So that is, well, one thing I'll mention is that everybody's really supportive. So we've, you know, in probably two years that we've been running it, there hasn't been any incidents. So that's good that we can all look after each other.
00:56:45
Speaker
people have the opportunity to not only post and say people think about this game and it does entice a bit of conversation and we gain some momentum from it. So it's been ultra supportive and the community is helping each other out so it's not just me running the kickstarters and people are with distribution and like any good drug
00:57:10
Speaker
Like any good drug system, you know, narcotics movements, you always rely on volunteers to move stuff around for your HEG money. But in reality, we've grown...
00:57:23
Speaker
people now in the group. And last year we amassed a massive amounts of savings and they just keep coming in. So whether it be big popular ones that people want to get in on, you know, anything from a lacerda or that, you know, particularly chasing. It cut out. So you said anything like a to a lacerda. Yeah, that's right. I will say anything like a sham.
00:57:55
Speaker
Zencast is automatically bleeping any words anytime anyone says shem. Yeah, massive amounts like our biggest one I thought was voidful. So that was some close to 400
00:58:16
Speaker
shipping and just over six grand worth of purchases and then you know Ra has continued with that and so yeah you just sometimes you just can't pick which ones are going to do well and you kind of think oh that's you know going to gain a lot but and I think with with shipping costs and you know
00:58:40
Speaker
delivery and and that people kind of are happy to save the 20 bucks but then there's times when you know there's no savings but people just want to jump in to be able to kind of make it a group thing and because you know we have the chats offline and and people talking about you know the mechanics that they're most looking forward to and and that and
00:59:00
Speaker
Yeah, so it's been fantastic. If you haven't had a look at it, jump on. You know, we support each other in there and it's, you know, really inclusive and it's a good thing to support. So, you know, it's not just about me posting games that I like or others. It's really, you know, for people to kind of have a look and learn as much as we can from each other. And I know Shane Tonkin's not here, but he is one of our, I think, top members that posts.
00:59:30
Speaker
What? Yeah, no. He talked to us the other week about how he's dodging his goal for the year by- Except in post-ban. Yeah, yeah. I'm not backing anything on Kickstarter. I was like, and I called him out because he told me he backed something. He's like, no, no, I didn't back that.
00:59:47
Speaker
I told Joe to back that and then... It's kind of the same thing. He bought vindication off me because I'd backed it and so that was fine. But he didn't back it and paper it. Yeah, that'd be right. That'd be right. And then there's some really niche stuff that's coming in. I've been surprised that we've only had three or four.
01:00:11
Speaker
So yeah, hopefully it continues and the numbers just keep going crazy. But jump on, have a look and be part of the conversation. And I really appreciate the updates that you put out of
01:00:27
Speaker
where everything's at and where all the shipping's coming in. And if there's any spares, because occasionally there is a spare one left over or someone needs to pull out for some reason. So it's not just for getting on and backing group pledges. There's a whole lot of info that Joe puts out that keeps everybody updated as well.
01:00:44
Speaker
sometimes we just kick in extra copies so you know the group will buy the extra 10% and when they arrive we just pop them up there so if you think you've missed out on a Kickstarter you know wait for those monthly updates to come out and you kind of go oh yeah we'll grab one of those so you know we don't make a profit that's not what we're here for we're here to support the community and board gaming is a big passion of mine as it is ours so get behind it
01:01:12
Speaker
Awesome. All right. Well, we'll, we'll end this one here. Thank you very much for this evening, Joe. My pleasure. Thank you very much for attending and pitching in everybody else. Wonderful week. Signing off. We did it.