Merge Games Ltd.’s Post

https://bit.ly/3Q0NDni #kickstarter #games #kickstartergames #fantasygames #fantasyworld #GameNight Champions of the Elements - game story book. Building light from darkness together! "Champions of the Elements" beckons you to join the Elemental Five, a league of legendary heroes from realms imbued with elemental might. As the chosen one, your destiny intertwines with theirs as you embark on an epic quest to restore harmony and defeat the encroaching darkness. Immerse yourself in a world brimming with breathtaking landscapes, ancient ruins, and hidden secrets waiting to be uncovered. Traverse through diverse elemental realms, each with its unique challenges and mysteries to unravel. From the scorching deserts of fire to the tranquil depths of water, every step brings you closer to the heart of the elemental conflict. Learn more, get involved, and support on Kickstarter at:

I've often challenged people with the idea of a game where it would be more fun to lose. [que VERY raised eyebrows]. Co-op board games like Pandemic are so much fun to play that despite losing together as a team, you want to play again, but what about actively deciding to lose because it was way more interesting? I've been pushing this in recent solo/co-op miniatures game designs like Cohors Cthulhu Tactics https://lnkd.in/eTRCXiTK (and others to come). Jon, our head of Studio, often jokes about my 'frog in the well'. The concept that the frog in the well is so much more fun to focus on than holding the bridge, ambushing the enemy, or taking out their leader. Now, don't get me wrong, there's always going to be fighting. One of the reasons we paint up these little armies on the table is to roll dice, fight fun battles and see our little heroes pull off daring feats. There's been a theme around 'narrative' in wargames that reminds me of 'multimedia' in the 90's. It was a word bandied around by a lot of people who clearly didn't know what it meant, much like 'transmedia' now. The concept of narrative wargames is often misunderstood as the story behind the battle, that you are fighting because of X or Y, that if you lose this battle you fight a different battle than if you won. But it often stops there - it's really just another battle. What I'm looking for is a reason to ignore my orders. If I can search for and find my father's sword I'll learn about my heritage, that will lead to more discoveries (that may have mechanical effects). If I spend those hard-won points on unlocking my story, not buying more troops I might discover the secret about my past and that opens different interesting options than just more soldiers. Just like the Magratheans in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, who had to build a computer to figure out the great question, I don't imagine I've got the answer for one moment. It's why I seek out awesome and innovative solo/co-op miniature games that DO narrative in interesting and different ways, like Five Parsecs From Home, Rangers of Shadow Deep, Five Leagues From The Borderlands, Country Road Z and Battlespace and in my own way contribute through things like Cohors Cthulhu Tactics (and others to come). The gravitational effect of so many great ideas may help point the way to the narrative game to end all narrative games, I just hope the frog hasn't escaped the well by then! ;-)

Sixty Mile Sky: The Two Body Problem - A rules expansion and lore compendium for the world of Sixty Mile Sky. Also releasing a complete revamp of the original core rule book. Check out the campaign and support on Kickstarter at: https://bit.ly/4c29ljB This is a sci-fi TTRPG. It uses a "Powered by the Apocalypse" framework. This means actions have a "success, mixed success, and failure" condition, so the story moves forward with every player action. Sixty Mile Sky uses a ten-sided die to get results on player's actions. Classes have unique moves that are harder to pull off than the basic moves available to everyone, but have bigger rewards. These unique moves give each class a specialty that gives them something powerful that they can contribute to their team. #Kickstarter #kickstartercampaign #rpggame #rpggaming #games #dicegames #scifigames #ttrpg

Summer means warm weather, days at the beach and a solid week of 24/7 gaming speed runs known as Games Done Quick. What started as a streamed event in someone's basement has grown to a 7 day event that sells out convention space. I can think of no better example of a niche interest that has raised over $50 million for charity over the past 10 years. Summer Games Done Quick was the most watched channel on Twitch June 30th - July 6th. From Metroid Dread to Powerwash Simulator to Mega Man, there is a game for anyone. SpikeVegeta, Keizaron, KungFuFruitCup and JHobz do a wonderful job to emcee this event and make it accessible to new and returning viewers. Over $2.5 million was raised for Doctors without Borders last week. This article summarizes the viewership trends and how individual donations have increased to compensate for declining viewership: https://lnkd.in/gAZMqdmU What niche industry or interest do you follow? This year's pre-show to give you a sample of the humor, love and production value that goes into this event: https://lnkd.in/guVjQMXB #videogames #gdq2024

🎮 New Release: FireFly ✨ 𝑮𝒂𝒎𝒆 8/10 𝑵𝒐𝒘 𝑳𝒊𝒗𝒆! Dive into the dark with the 8th game of the 10-game development challenge – Firefly! Take control of a lone firefly and illuminate your way to survival in an increasingly challenging world. ✨Including: - Engage in fast-paced rounds with escalating difficulty - Survive endless waves and outshine rival fireflies - Collect coins to unlock upgrades - Enjoy a dynamic soundtrack with 10 unique songs - PC and Mobile Optimized - Play on your desired device Stay tuned for the final two upcoming releases in the series! #FireflyGame #Indie #GameDevelopment #NewRelease

I meant to be posting much more often to continue my trip down memory lane and all the great people I worked with at Virtual World, FASA Interactive, Microsoft, Wizkids, 42 Entertainment, Smith & Tinker, Edoc Laundry, Harebrained Schemes, etc - but chasing my wife around the world and preparing for the Sea of Legends Kickstarter has waylaid those posts until a future date. Which brings me to today's news!  I am excited to announce that today we launched our Kickstarter campaign for Sea of Legends, an Open World, Deck Building Pirate CRPG based upon the highly successful board game series that my son Zach and his friend Ryan Schapals created. Zach is also working with us on the video game :) Much like the board game, the video game offers an open-world experience where you can maraud across the fantasy imbued Caribbean, seek treasure, forge alliances, and even find love—whether it's true love, fleeting love, or maybe multiple loves! After all, you’re a pirate, and there are no rules! Combat centers around intense crew-on-crew battles, combining the tactical depth seen in my previous games (Shadowrun Returns, Battletech, etc) with innovative deck-building mechanics. This is the first big game from our new start-up Endless Adventures Incorporated. For the last two years we have been working on a no-code video game authoring and distribution platform which we will now use to create Sea of Legends. In addition to making the development of the game faster and less expensive, it will also mean that Sea of Legends will likely be the first 100% no-code moddable game. I would really appreciate it if you checked out the Kickstarter, and even more so if you would do me the favor of using your social channels to let people know about the game and the Kickstarter campaign. https://lnkd.in/gF2RDtpc Thanks for your support All the best,  Jordan

Real quick PSA: During GamesCom, Humble Bundle is doing a bundle for 1) a TON of Unreal and Unity assets, worth over $2400 collectively, for just $30, and 2) a series of genre-specific courses over on GameDev.tv for $19, including stuff on Unreal 5's Enhanced Input system, also worth over $1000. I snagged both myself, and if you've got the extra money and time to make the use of them, I highly recommend it. I've linked both down below. Happy gaming! GameDev.tv Bundle: https://lnkd.in/gTQ4dzCN Unreal/Unity Asset Bundle: https://lnkd.in/gCegVvDn #gamedev #unreal #unity #gamescom

I’ve been lucky to have great crewmates on 40 years of “pirate” voyages! All your good wishes from my previous post really meant a lot to me and made me think about all the great people I’ve had the pleasure and privilege to work with.  I can’t name them all, let me try to name some of them, starting with the FASA years: Ross Babcock, who had been at the US Merchant Marine Academy with me, pitched in some money to print the deck starship deck plans I drew for our Traveller game, and that’s how a 20+ year partnership began. Marc Miller of GDW was the Blue Fairy that changed FASA from a couple of guys printing “fan” materials into a real company by giving us a license to publish Traveller products. My father Morton Weisman joined us to run the FASA ship so I could focus on product and community. Without his steady hand on the tiller (and a vast number of magic spells he cast to keep us afloat), we would have floundered many times over the 30ish years we worked together.. After BattleTech changed FASA, and in some respects our little industry, Sam Lewis joined us to oversee the game’s development, and eventually the whole company. BattleTech wouldn’t be what it is today without the creative contributions of more than a thousand people over its 40 years, but there is no question that the three most important are of course Michael Stackpole, Randall Bills, and Loren Coleman. All three have invested decades to make it a game and universe that is more vibrant today than ever before. Mike Pondsmith designed and published Cyberpunk, brilliant as all his games are, which forced my to make my cyberpunk game into something else, namely #Shadowrun. Scott Berfield led the first BattleTech video game and became a long term crewmate. He was the one I called at 2am in the morning to tell the origin story for Shadowrun which I had just figured out. Tom Dowd, Bob Charrette, and Paul Hume figured out how to roll buckets of dice to bring Shadowrun to life. Mike Mulvihill who oversaw and grew the Shadowrun universe for decades before passing the torch to the Catalyst team. There are hundreds of other creative, hardworking people that helped bring the FASA games to life and I will name drop just a few more; Dana Knutson, Jeff Laubenstein and many other art directors and artists. Sharon Turner Mulvihill and the other editors and writers. Karen Stange, Jill Lucas, and the others of the publishing team. Any post about accomplishments must include my wife and creative partner of 38 years, Dawne Weisman. She was always the wind in my sails. Speaking of sales, we have now launched our preview page for the Sea of Legends: open world computer RPG! I’d really appreciate it if you could click on the “Notify me on launch” button. 🔗Kickstarter Link: https://lnkd.in/gR-jJmYh Thanks again for all your support and kind words, Jordan #FASA #BattleTech #Shadowrun #WizKids #Pirate #OpenWorld #CRPG

Attention LinkedIn!!! Do you like to play board games with friends and family? Today is your lucky day! My good friend Isaac Meyer launched his second big game on Kickstarter today - Effortless: Prepping for Adventure. He founded Barn Made Games in Snohomish, WA and has spent a ton of time and energy (and money!) to get this game to market. I have played it myself and it's AWESOME. This will replace Catan as your new go-to for game night. If you're at all interested - please follow the link below and consider supporting the Kickstarter campaign. At the very least watch the video on the landing page - I dare you not to be intrigued! https://lnkd.in/gZrkHZDH

Rebels Give is Here! Rebels Give is UNLV’s largest crowdfunding campaign, where students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends from all over the world come together to celebrate what they love most about UNLV. And the thing I love most about UNLV is UNLV International Gaming Institute! IGI is a self-funded organization. We're able to stay at the forefront of gambling, gaming, and risk in large part through private donations that help us build and sustain the most relevant, interesting research, education, and innovation environment. Your gift, no matter what the size, will help build excellence that cannot be reached solely by state support and federal grants alone. And if your (tax-deductible!) gift is $75 or more - UNLV has some baller socks coming your way. Support IGI's efforts to research, educate and innovate in the study of gambling, gaming, and risk here: https://lnkd.in/gyAzwrWW