The Mother of All Updates (A Mothers Day Update)
almost 3 years ago – Mon, May 09, 2022 at 11:53:58 AM

Alright, so I admit the title is clickbait. This isn’t particularly a content-heavy update like posts in the past. It’s actually on the lighter side in that regard. But it’s still a pretty big update. Why? I’ll tell you!

But first…a little context.

We’ve been getting quite a few messages from backers noting the lack of updates. We hear you. In all honesty, it’s just really difficult to write an update on things that haven’t changed.

“Hey everyone! Update time! Water is still wet and the sky is still above us!”

Why have things been so quiet? Why hasn’t there been anything to update? Well, this whole COVID thing has done a number on the city where our factory is. Because of Government mandates, they were forced into a vicious cycle of repeated closures. I’d be speaking to them one week and then radio silence the next and then they would pop back up “hey, sorry, they shut us down again,” and then a week later *poof!*

This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone and I’m just thankful they’re not located in the heart of Shanghai.

Logistically, this had the biggest hit on our timetable for the production of the molds for the miniatures. Everything else was pretty easy to prototype out. We’ve actually had a video of the samples for the expansion game tiles for a while now, but I was holding off to put them in an update with the miniatures. I did, however, post the video in our Facebook Group a while back. But since we’re here….

Look at those beeyutes!

I know a lot of you guys don’t do social medias, and I don’t blame you, but that group is where a lot of updates actually drip out in micro-doses. So if you’re really itching for some noise in all the silence, that’s definitely something I’d consider for you all to join.

“Wait…you said you were waiting to show this until you had pictures of the minis…does…does that mean…?”

So glad you asked, myself! Behold!

These were obviously taken with my factory contact’s phone. I’ll be getting these in the mail hopefully soon to take better ones and then I can’t wait to throw paint on them! Still waiting on the Bandero Blonde 1 and 2 minis and Father Franklin, who had to be re-waxed (the process before creating the mold). Once those are done, they’ll send them all to me along with the game tiles for inspection and approval.

So does this mean we’ll be getting our expansions soon?!

Eh….not quite. I mean, maybe. But I’m definitely not ready to say so. And here’s why:

We’ve also been getting some feedback from folks concerning the timeline of delivery. Some have mentioned how they already received Kickstarter games that launched before ours and they’ve used that as kind of a barometer of when they should expect to receive other games.

Look, I totally understand where those of you in that mindset are coming from. I can see how it might make sense to gauge expectations on what has been done already. But let me put another perspective spin on things.

• I have no idea what projects these are, what kind of games they are or what went into producing them. Furthermore, I have no idea what stage of production they were in when they launched. When we launched, we had the 5,000 starter sets on the last stage of production. The only thing that stalled those was the shipping crisis. So I can’t speak to these other projects and as much as it might look good on paper to compare them to other projects, it’ll probably only end in more disappointment on future projects in the long run. 
• While I don’t know about the campaigns that have been fulfilled, I can tell you about two pretty huge campaigns I backed, one that launched before High Noon, and also haven’t been fulfilled. Scarface 1920 and Zombicide: Undead or Alive are both still in development phase. That’s not a call-out on either campaign, mind you. Scarface seems to be on target for their 13-month delivery and I can’t wait to get my hands on it and of course Zombicide looks amazing. I don’t regret backing either game. But these campaigns raised between $1,000,000 to $3,300,000 respectively and we are keeping nearly in line with them with a fraction of those budgets. We also took a massive hit to our finances with the quadruple increase in shipping costs to get the starter sets to everyone by Christmas and we didn’t pass any of that cost down to any of you, which is something I’m hearing we won’t be seeing with Zombicide, so please pray for my wallet. Haha!😅
• In short, it’s best to treat every campaign as its own thing. Treat every creator as their own thing. Assume that every creator and every campaign is facing their own unique set of incredible challenges to overcome, because that’s the reality of it. We’re all going to get our stuff to you and we can’t wait to do so. 

On the positive side, this time has given us some great opportunities to capitalize on. It’s allowed us to make improvements to the game with the incredible new artwork of the game tiles. It’s allowed us to come up with new and better solutions to the rules and some of the expansions, including the fire-cone tool for Father Franklin, a completely new additional asset to that expansion that we didn’t increase the price to our backers for. It’s also allowed the current shipping crisis to somewhat level out, though it still has a long way to go.

Not gonna lie. After seeing this interview from the Dice Tower, I’m still nervous as to what this will ultimately cost us to get to all of you. But that’s a burden for us to worry about and a bridge to cross when we get there.

That said, selling through our current stock of Starter Sets will certainly go a great distance to help cover that cost, so please consider petitioning your local retailers to reach out to us to order games for their stock. It helps to raise the funds and also clears our inventory we pay monthly storage to keep around in our fulfillment centers.

We’re also on Amazon through our incredible Amazon distribution partners, so shooting off a link to our game, telling your friends and family how to get a copy there and just spreading the word goes a long way to support our cause.

That’s it for now, guys.

Happy Mothers Day!

We Have A Lot to Talk About (And a Lot to Look At!)
about 3 years ago – Tue, Mar 08, 2022 at 09:44:12 AM

It’s been a year since the incredible success of our Kickstarter launch and a lot has transpired. We’ve overcome everything from the global shipping crisis to an absolute disaster with fulfillment vendors and almost everyone has gotten their starter sets, save for a few that slipped through the cracks that we are actively sorting out.

Overall, the response from you guys has been tremendous and that is a humbling thing. We are so grateful to all of you for your continued support and we love seeing you all loving the game, especially the pictures of the painted miniatures that flood our Facebook group!

(new) Rules of the Game

One of the biggest global complaints/criticisms/critiques to come out of all of this – even as far back as feedback from our initial reviewers from our first, cancelled Kickstarter, has been the rulebook. And I’m not going to lie, all of it was warranted as that rulebook is red hot flaming garbage. It’s so bad that it’s inspired a multi-series Western Epic narrative drama about just how garbage it is (and you gotta see it!) by the talented and thorough Board Game Hackers. But hey, it’s my first rulebook, what’s a guy to do?

After a lot of feedback gathering and answering tons of rules questions, putting my nose to the grindstone again, I’ve finally come out with a revised 2nd edition of the High Noon Rulebook that is now available for download on the High Noon Website! From now on, the rules will be hosted on the site for easy access and any changes or updates will be updated there so you're never without the latest version of the High Noon rules. This will also be the rulebook going into print with future productions of the game. So, if anything else, that terrible book you currently have in your possession is now a collectors’ item!

Expansions Update

A lot of folks have been asking about the expansions, and I’ve been giving updates on them as I can. We ran into some issues with the miniatures that I hadn’t anticipated. Some of the files were wrong, resulting in some of our wax samples coming out too big. We had to get several miniatures remodeled to prepare for the mold process. The molding process is officially underway and we'll hopefully soon have sexy pictures of those minis!

Several of the expansion posses also underwent some redesigns to alter their balance and playability issues we discovered through our intensive playtesting in house and with you guys in our Discord server. One of those posses was Father Franklin, whom we modified his base to show the 4 squares his deployed miniature covers. We also added a nifty tool to mark his firing cone.

Right now, the prototype from The Game Crafter is acrylic, but we’ll probably have it made in something thinner and more durable. This has been a major development for High Noon because it’s the first time we’re adding a tool to help with the Line of Sight of a character. This was always the plan for future expansions, but the change with Father Franklin forced our hand to push the development sooner with his posse. And that’s good because it gets our feet wet for expansions to come.

About the Packaging

Speaking of Father Franklin, I’m pleased to show you what his packaging will look like on the retail shelves. I’m showing you this not just to wet your appetite but to also show how we will be introducing expansions in the future. 

See that little QR code? That scannable code will take customers to the page exclusively for that expansion, which – just like the posses currently on the website – will give players the character backgrounds and stories of who they are, as well as videos on how to play them, etc.

A Whole New Look

Along the way of all this development, something has been itching me and I had to make a decision on where High Noon was going and – more to the point – what it would ultimately look like, literally.

At its core, High Noon has always been a Game System. I’m very big on games needing to be more than miniatures and art and gimmicks. They need to be a game first and foremost. High Noon is my first official game and I just wanted to focus on mechanics over everything else to see if I even had the chops for this industry. Everything else was second to that. And that’s pretty much been the stance of my inner circle of friends and family who playtest the game ad nauseum with me. The folks in the Discord also seem to have the same perspective. Nobody’s really complained about the look and feel of High Noon. And while, deep down, I never felt the game’s looks were where they needed to be by any stretch of the imagination, if it wasn’t broken, there were bigger fish to fry.

But ultimately, if the game was going to look any different than it does now, that look needed to come with the expansions, not after. It just wouldn’t be right to have everyone invested in all these expansions, only to then make everyone buy new artwork just to keep up with the future of the game (except for the Ride or Die posse, of course).

Don’t get me wrong. Our initial artist did an incredible job making the art we have, and we wouldn’t be here with out him and I hope he doesn’t go anywhere any time soon because we still have a LOT to do yet. But I’ve focused him in another area of the game now and he is excelling at it. Meanwhile, I took a 2nd pair of eyes to the board tiles of the game to really bring everything to life.

Before, it was all about the mechanics. Now that those mechanics are fleshed out, we can turn our attention to the details that really immerse the player experience. After months of hard work by our resident artist Mikel Canizares, I can finally share with you what High Noon is going to look like moving forward. Below are Before and After illustrations of the expansion tiles. What you were going to get and what you are going to get.

What I love and what you’ll see in these new tiles is the attention to little details and nuances from the universe of High Noon. Abernathy’s blacksmith, you’ll see his armor prototypes and scraps he’s been working on. In the General Store, you’ll find shelves of Jethro Jenkins’ popular Firewater Moonshine casks. On the boardwalk of the Gunsmith is a poster of Madme Cleo’s Cirque de Cabaret, a massive line upcoming line of expansions you won’t want to miss. The tiles burst to life in the new artwork, each piece drawn by the talented hand of Mikel who has already done so much to breathe life into the characters of High Noon.

You might have noticed the balcony is now missing from the Bandero Blonde’s bordello tile. That’s because it’s now a separate tile altogether. This allows for more exploration in the bordello itself, providing valuable additional loot crates for the girls to equip themselves for the battles ahead of them. The balcony itself will now sit on acrylic risers above the tile, giving the miniatures the actual elevation they enjoy. This will also introduce how some elevated tiles will work in the future.

Now you might be asking yourself how these tiles will work with the tiles from the Starter Set. The short answer is they won’t. Functionally, they work just fine. But putting the two artworks side by side, they’ll stick out like a sore thumb and completely break the immersion.

Which is why I had the Starter Tiles re-envisioned as well.

I’ve been playtesting on these tiles and I gotta tell you the experience has been night and day. While there was no way for us to have had this done by the Kickstarter, this is where High Noon needed to go and now it’s going to get there.

So you’re probably asking yourself how this applies to you. You’ve already got the game and the tiles. How is this going to work?

This is where I’ve been doing a lot of thinking and this is where I’m at with it. If you are someone out there who is happy with just the core game, there’s no reason to have the new tiles. Everything you need, you already have. Heck, I’ve been playing that version of High Noon for 4 years now, and I’ve never had a complaint about it. It’s perfect as it is.

However, if you’re someone who wants expansions, these would work no differently. They’re essentially “expansion tiles,” which we plan to release a bunch of in the future anyway. So these tiles will be available for purchase separately for those wishing to broaden their experience of the game.

As for you all who backed the Kickstarter, anyone who backed at any level above the base game or added an expansion posse of any kind to your order, I’ll be including a pack of these upgraded tiles with your expansions, absolutely free.

I’ll even take it a step further. If you’ve been holding out on pre-ordering an expansion posse and you’d like to receive a free set of the upgraded tiles, simply send me a private message requesting your order be unlocked and you can add a posse to your pre-order. From there, I’ll add the tiles in fulfillment.

So there you have it. New instructions. New minis. New artwork. New Tiles. New mechanics. New everything. And we’ve only just begun. Thanks for coming this far and I look forward to sharing with you more exciting developments as they happen!

EUROPE UPDATE!!!
about 3 years ago – Sat, Jan 08, 2022 at 12:01:08 AM

Great news!

We've just received notice from our fulfilment center in Germany that they are expecting delivery of the High Noon Starter Sets in two weeks! We're almost there, posse! Yeeeeeehaw!

I've gone through the list of backers to confirm everything is all set for delivery, but I noticed a few snags. We need to get those sorted asap so we can ensure everyone gets what they're expecting.

So here's what you need to do:

If you haven't completed your survey... I've resent you the link to your pledge manager. Please go in and complete your pledge asap. Some of you either haven't paid or haven't entered a valid delivery address. We can't ship the game if we don't know where it's going.

If you've changed addresses since the campaign... Send me a message (not a comment) and I can unlock your address so you can update it. I can't ship anything until addresses have been locked. 

If you want to add anything to your pledge... Send me a message (not a comment) and I can unlock your order so you can add whatever you want.

Because it takes a few days for the system to lock everything down, I'll be initiating the lock on Monday, January 10th. Once I lock it, that's it!

Sending 2021 Out with a BANG! BANG! BANG!
about 3 years ago – Sat, Jan 01, 2022 at 02:11:55 AM

Well, posse-folk, the time has come again. High Noon’s

2021 Year-In-Review

2021 has been a crazy ride for all of us. Some good, some bad, some heartbreak, some beautiful moments of joy. Here are just a few key points worth noting about where we started, how far we’ve come and where we stand today...

The obvious first start was our amazing Kickstarter campaign, which wouldn’t have been remotely noteworthy without you all. For a first-time Kickstarter, to reach the level we did, was simply astounding and we owe it all to you, our backers. You guys stepped up, supported with your wallets, your voice and your encouragement. Many of you invested further in your time to play the game with me, to test its strengths and weaknesses and help to polish it into the little gem it is today. We closed out the late pledges with nearly $160,000 and a dozen unlocked unique High Noon products going into production.

Of course, our first challenge came with everyone else, in the infamous container shortage, followed by the shipping congestion. Again, your unwavering support saw us through the storm and – even though it took longer than we had hoped or planned, and cost us an arm and a leg – we managed to get our container across the ocean and onto U.S. soil in near-record time.

After a few more run-ins with Murphy and his dag gum Law (I think I just brain-spat a new posse, hot dog!) we had our games shipped out to our backers here in the Americas and the Asia Pacific, with a container of games en route to our European Backers. That container ship is currently docked in France as of this writing (you can track the ship here) and should be in Hamburg, where the fulfilment center is, very soon.

Somewhere along the way, High Noon was graced with possibly the most epic Video Critique and Breakdown series by the legendary Board Game Hackers. If you haven’t watched their videos on High Noon (or anything else, for that matter), I strongly encourage you to check out their channel. But here’s their latest piece on High Noon:

One way that 2021 was a bit unkind was with the sudden and devastating Super Typhoon Rai that swept across the hometown of our resident artist, destroying his home and leaving him stranded on the streets, awaiting evacuation for weeks. 

I set up a GoFundMe and given what I can to raise a recovery fund to get him back on his feet once he is settled in with his family. While I don't expect us to reach the goal or anywhere close to it, if you are feeling charitable, you can donate here. Or even just spread the word as every little bit helps. Mikel is the man who has brought all of the iconic High Noon characters to life. I’m hoping we can help bring him back just the same.

Finally, going into the new year, I have launched the official High Noon website! This will be a place where anyone can go to find more information not just about the game but also about the universe, the characters, the lore, and even gather around the campfire with other players in the message boards. This will also be the staging area for the Ride or Die posse members as we start to roll out all of the additional expansions and products for High Noon. I plan to develop the website even further from its current form. I want it to be a robust platform, supporting all kinds of interactions, a sort of social media space we can all call our own. I invite you all to come on over and introduce yourselves and get the conversations going.

Moving forward, I will be posting my updates on that website, so you’ll want to bookmark it. And don’t worry. You can easily subscribe on the site so you’ll never miss an update.

Of course, as always, you can reach me here if you wish.

2021 is getting a bad wrap by a lot of folks. But the way I see it, it’s left a lot for me to be grateful for. I’m grateful for what we’ve learned, what we’ve achieved, the relationships we’ve made along the way. I’m grateful for all of you.

Thank you all for an amazing 2021. Here’s to a new and exciting adventure awaiting us just around the bend of 2022. I look forward to seeing you all there.

A little Christmas Gift and a Production Update!
about 3 years ago – Sun, Dec 26, 2021 at 02:00:37 AM

Howdy pardners!

It’s that time of year, again, where families around the world gather together and celebrate the gift of giving. Today, I wanted to gift you all a small update on the expansions, as well as a little something for our Canadian backers.

We just received the initial pictures from our factory of the wax sculpts for the upcoming molds for the miniatures and hoo-dee they sure do look pretty!

I did have to send over some corrections, and they are working on those. It also looks like the chips and gold might be just a smidge too big, so that’ll have to get fixed. But progress is moving steadily.

I’ve also made a small update to the miniature for Father Franklin’s deployed version. This way, it will be much easier to position him on the map.

Soon, we’ll be moving into the packaging, and that’s when things really get exciting. But for now, I hope you enjoyed this little peak into the journey of High Noon production.

On to the Canada Update!

So, over the past several weeks, we’ve been getting notifications in our messages here and on our Official Facebook Group that several backers in Canada were served with some rather surprising charges by FedEx. I requested everyone who was receiving these invoices to send them to me so I could investigate.

Here’s what happened:

Our fulfillment center in the US chose FedEx for the international shipping. During the set-up phase of our account with them, when they asked who would be responsible for import duties and fees, I said it would be you, the backers. I was under the impression this was in reference to the Customs fees. I had no idea that private delivery firms like FedEx and UPS charge additional fees just because they can. I’ve always used the postal service, which has never charged anything like that. Of course, moving forward, we will not be using FedEx, UPS or DHL for our international backers unless absolutely necessary.

Aaaaaand Here’s what I’m going to do:

As far as the damage done, I’m going to make that right to each and every one of you. While I can’t cover the customs fees, I will be issuing you each “refunds” for the surprise fees associated with your deliveries. This will be coming directly out of my pocket, so we’ll need to go through PayPal or something like that. If you haven’t done so already, please reach out to me in the messages with your contact information and I’ll connect with you on your invoices and get working on your refunds.

All I ask is that you be a little bit patient with me, since this will be coming out of my personal funds. It shouldn’t take too long to get everyone covered, but it’ll be as I can afford it. That’s my Christmas gift to you 😊

I plan to push out one last update as we close out the year, so stay tuned!

Merry Christmas everyone!