September Update: Layout Samples
over 5 years ago – Fri, Sep 28, 2018 at 12:18:07 PM

Greetings, envoys! Well, I'd hoped my next update would include the words "your PDFs are about to be sent out" or "the book has gone to press," but sadly that's not the case. The book is still in layout; there are a number of artifacts and graphic elements that Thomas pretty much had to make from scratch, and although we're making progress, it still ain't soup yet, as they say (undead soup? ew). 

But, we're closing in! Below are some samples from the book. 

 At this point, the only thing I can say is thank you for being patient, and I apologize again for the delay. My best guess is that we'll go to press sometime in early to mid October, which should put the book in your hands before the end of the year. 

Stick with us, the zombies are coming!

New Free Case: In the Domain of the Mariner
over 5 years ago – Sat, Sep 01, 2018 at 04:46:34 PM

This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.

August Update: Good News, Everyone!
over 5 years ago – Wed, Aug 15, 2018 at 03:27:24 PM

First of all: Sorry for missing July, but there was basically nothing to report anyway. I was waiting to see if anything would progress, and then Gen Con prep started happening and it was periscope down for a while. 

But in any case: the comic is done!

 Now that everything is in for Undead - Art, text, comic, backers, and so on - we can get this put to bed. Thomas is busily working on laying everything out, and the plan is to have the PDF out by the end of the month and to go to press at the beginning of September. That should mean that we'll have the book shipping by November, assuming the usual 8-week turnaround for printing. 

BackerKit

You may notice I haven't charged your cards yet. I'm not going to do that until the book goes to press. When the book is accepted by KrakenPrint and it's actually being printed, I'll give everyone a 48-hour warning, and then a 24-hour warning, and then I'll close the BackerKit and charge your cards. If you need to get into your BackerKit and change anything (credit card, address, add-ons), you can do that by going to undead.backerkit.com. 

The Future

Growling Door has some exciting stuff lined up for 2019, but some of it is in process so I can't talk about it yet. We have another Chill book in the pipeline, but we're going to Kickstart it later in the year, partially because we need to get Undead out the door first, and partially because there are some new systems we need to playtest. If you'd like to help out with that last part, please email us at [email protected]!

Free Case

The next free case, In the Domain of the Mariner, should be up this month as well. The next one is kind of in flux, but you'll definitely get another one, and it'll be done before the end of 2018 in any case (that gives me a lot of wiggle room, but I like to hedge my bets). 

As always, thank you for your support and for your patience. I know we've slipped on the delivery date on this one, but it looks like we should only miss by a couple of months, which in the scheme of things isn't too bad. Soon you get zombies! Who's up for zombie hunting?

June Update: New Case, Gen Con Schedule, Livestream!
almost 6 years ago – Sat, Jun 30, 2018 at 07:15:13 PM

Greetings, envoys!

Well, I really wish my update this month was "Undead has gone to press and all is well," but as Jules says in Pulp Fiction, that shit ain't the truth. I'm still waiting on the comic art, and until that's done the book isn't going anywhere. I think at this point we're probably looking at delivery of the book in September or early October, but I'm just not sure yet. 

I apologize for this delay - my comic artist, Len O'Grady, sends his apologies as well. The rest of the book is done (rather, layout isn't quite done but I've told Thomas to take it easy because it's not like we can print the damn thing anyway), and I have every confidence the book is going to look awesome when it's finished. 

In the meanwhile...

BackerKit

I said before that I was going to close BackerKit on July 1st; since the book hasn't gone to press yet I'm going to wait another month. I'll be closing the BackerKit and charging your cards on August 1st. I'll send out reminders, don't worry.

New Case

The second of our four cases from the Kickstarter should be up within the next few days! It's called High Tide and it's written by yours truly. When it goes live (as soon as my webmistress gets a chance to set up the link), you can download it here. The third one should be up in July. 

Chill Livestream!

Chill co-author and all-around smart fella Rob Wieland is running a Chill livestream sponsored by Dungeon Master on Demand. The first episode airs live on July 29th at 6PM CDT. Check it out!

Gen Con 2018

Growling Door Games will be at Gen Con once again. You can pick up our products at booth 2545 (Indie Game Developer Network). If you come by the booth Sunday morning, 10AM-1PM, I'll be there doing demos of Chill and our other games, so feel free to stop by and ask me any Chill-related questions you have!

That's all for now. Hopefully the next update I have for you will involve the words "has gone to press" and "watch for your download links." Thanks for being patient and understanding through this process!

May Update: Burning Cats
almost 6 years ago – Tue, May 22, 2018 at 11:58:20 PM

Hey, folks! Here's your May update. 

TL;DR

I think it's likely that Undead will be a little late. By "a little late" I mean "probably delivered in September rather than August," which still puts it "early" by Kickstarter standards. Read on for more context. 

Progress

Right now everything is in except the comic. Len is busily working to get it colored and the inks look amazing, but it ain't done and that's holding things up. Thomas is laying out the book as we speak. Here are some screenshots!

 GenCon

I think it's unlikely at this point that we'll have copies of Undead for sale or pickup at GenCon. Growling Door products will be one sale at the Indie Game Developer Network booth, #2545. There are also multiple games of Chill going on (they're all full, but show up with tokens! You never know!), and I'm running a game of my new Powered by the Apocalypse RPG Timepeekers, which does still have slots, last I looked. 

New Game: We Used to be Friends

I mentioned in the last update that there's a new game in the works - and now it's available for sale! We Used to be Friends is a teenage drama mystery game, inspired by Veronica Mars and similar properties. You can pick up the PDF of the ashcan version (basically a preview version; the full game will be coming in 2019, but the ashcan is fully playable) here.

Cases

And speaking of things to download, a new free case, Manhunt, written by Steve Kenson, is available on our site! Michelle is presently editing another case, and I'm doing a development pass on a third. All of them should be up on the site within the next month or two. 

BackerKit

Finally, if you haven't filled out your BackerKit, please do so. You've got time - I'll be closing it down and charging people's cards on July 1st - but remember that I don't have your address and your shipping payment, you're not getting any zombies, and that would just be tragic.

As always, thank you for your support!