Thoughts from a first-time self-publisher Part 24: A chat with Wes.
Hey everyone! Welcome back! I’m again doing things a little differently (and a little earlier) this week and inviting a guest blogger.
Wes Woodbury is a game designer and publisher under the company: FunDaMental Games. I invited Wes for a couple of reasons: 1) He’s run a few Kickstarters of varying scopes, varying successes, and with varying strategies, and I think he can provide valuable insight into both what he has learned and what newer self-publishers can expect if they stick with this. 2) His current Kickstarter is both a re-launch after a failed campaign and is a smaller batch publishing affair being printed in the US. I think this model might be of interest to many of you. ]3) He’s a good guy!
I hope you enjoy this deviation from the norm (or maybe the new norm). First, a couple of things from my world:
Best Part of my week (so far): About 65% of my backers have completed their surveys for Super Snipers and I’ve raised an additional $3,886 from add-ons/ late pledges/ retailer orders. I’ve also been getting some great playtesting data in for the solo modes and progressing on schedule.
Most stressful part: I’m exploring additional fulfillment partner options to reduce my shipping costs in areas outside of the US and Canada. It is a lot of math. A LOT OF MATH. Not my favorite thing but worth it.
Okay, here is my interview with Wes:
Tell us a little bit about yourself and Fundamental Games:
Hi. I’m Wes Woodbury. I’ve been designing and publishing my own games for 4 years now. Titles include Duel of the Dragons, Legends of Novus, Deck-O-Dice, Die in the Dungeon, Questeros, and Dungeon Makers.
Dungeon Makers is currently crowdfunding on Kickstarter.
Our next game planned for later this year, titled Forge. It is a strategic worker placement game about developing a forge in medieval times. Includes tableau/engine building, set collection, and resource management.
Tell us about your most successful Kickstarter and your least successful. What are the key takeaways you learned from them?
Our most successful kickstarter has been Die in the Dungeon. I believe this was the most successful due to the broader appeal of the comical style fantasy artwork, combined with a greater investment on pre-marketing and video preview coverage.
The least successful kickstarter, based on time/cost investment compared to return on investment, was Questeros. A fantasy tarot deck that is also a trick taking card game and solo game. Some reasons I believe this title struggled include a difficult to read title (its an Ambigram), a questionable background (some religions and cultures frown upon Tarot decks), and minimal marketing investment.
Dungeon Makers is your current Kickstarter running until January 28th. You tried to fund this once before. Tell us about what adjustments you’ve made for this re-launch and why?
Dungeon Makers is crowdfunding on Kickstarter until January 28th. This project is a relaunch, previously tried with slightly different components in late 2022. We have adjusted the funding goal and profit margins to allow for a minimal print run to be manufactured in the USA (with the Gamecrafter). This will allow the game to still be made, but at a zero profit margin. This is offset by the add-ons and bundles offered for people seeking some of our previously published titles. The main component downgrades were going from tiles to square cardstock, removing a scoreboard, and changing from custom meeples to standard Gamecrafter meeple options.
I went with this method to still allow the game to come to life, just for a smaller audience. A lot of time and effort was invested by myself (all art/design done by me for this title) and I wanted to at least get a few copies out to those who have interest. This also allows me to print little to no extra copies, and if people are interested in the future it can be done as a print on demand option (right off the Gamecrafter site at a slightly higher price).
You have a number of games you’ve published, and it looks like they will be made available for purchase in the Pledge Manager. For newer or aspiring self-publishers, tell us a little about how having multiple games for sale in the pledge manager affects the total you bring in and what kind of considerations need to be made.
Having multiple games as add-ons or bundles can complicate fulfillment when the project is completed. If you do not have all of your titles stored in a single warehouse, shipping costs and planning can be complicated. You also have to make sure you are not offering them at too much more of a discount than original backers paid, as it can create some animosity towards the publisher.
Having these add-ons will cause your Pledges total to increase faster, but not for the title specifically being kickstarted. This can make it look like a project is performing better than it actually is, so the creator still needs to watch the pledge types to see if the title they are actually trying to create is getting enough pledges to support being produced.
Another factor for Kickstarter is deciding if shipping should be included within the kickstarter pledges, or added on later in a pledge manager. There are pros and cons to both, I have done both ways.
If folks want to learn more about Fundamental Games or Dungeon Makers, where should they go?
FunDaMental Games can be found on our Shopify site
https://fundamental-games.myshopify.com/
I am active on Facebook for social media ( Wes Woodbury ), and also run a page for Fundamental Games.
If you would like to email us, reach out to
I am always happy to provide insight to the crowdfunding and game design/publishing process, whether it is over text, messenger, email, phone, or video chats.
Thanks for reading and I hope this additional perspective and approach to crowdfunding has been helpful to hear about. As always, I (and Wes) would love to hear any questions you may have. Until next week!
Galen.
