Into the Godsgrave

Onward and Upward
2 days ago – Fri, Jan 17, 2025 at 08:53:04 AM

Happy New Year!

Hello to all of you wonderful people 🙂 I hope the winter break was full of games. Those are the only things we need, right?!

It likely won’t come as a surprise to you that January will be a lighter month for updates with all of the personal leave and holidays. Never fear, though. I’m here to bring you the latest crowdfunding news and to offer that soothing balm of a data dump and progress report. Something to tide you over until the next step in the campaign.

2025 Timeline

In September of last year, we shared the following graphic for the revised timeline.

In the last four months, the game’s development has adhered to expectations, and we’re in the final stages of design for the base game scenarios. The team has designed 9 of the base game scenarios and is working on the tenth as we speak. That means over half of the 16 scenarios between the base game and expansions have been designed! Concurrent work is being done on the expansions, and that will carry us through Q1 of this year.

As we get closer to manufacturing later in the year, we’ll start to provide estimates for the shipping and delivery windows.

Scenario Development

Playtesting among the development team has continued to go well. Strengthening the mechanical and thematic layers has been the primary focus, so that the narrative overlay pairs nicely for a memorable gameplay experience.

The development cycle for the expansions waxes while the base game wanes, and the team is excited by what will be presented in the extra content for Into the Godsgrave 🙂

I can’t wait for the full story to unfold on your tables!

Art

It’s nice to see the world take shape as more and more art is finished. Here’s the latest from the art team.

Farewell

Everyone, I wanted to be the one to tell you that this will be the last round of updates I’m writing as the Crowdfunding Specialist at Lucky Duck Games.

I wanted to be proactive and address my departure rather than have you wonder where I went all of a sudden. This is my decision to focus on other creative and professional opportunities :)

I will be leaving you in the capable hands of Guillaume Poueys and Scott Morris, who will be handling crowdfunding communications until a suitable replacement has been found. Guillaume (my manager) has been involved with the Game on Tabletop projects in France for Lucky Duck for 4 years. He’s done great work there with those projects, bringing amazing games to the French market with the team. Scott, who’s been a manager and mentor for me these last two years, has over a decade of experience in the industry. You may know them or you may not, but I wanted to make sure you knew who you'd be hearing from in future updates and comments until a new community specialist is brought in.

Treating all of you with honesty and respect has always been my goal, and I know that Guillaume and Scott share that sentiment.

I wish you all the best, and I hope that your tables are filled with good games and great memories 🙂

Best,

Devon @ Lucky Duck Games

Development Deep Dive
about 1 month ago – Thu, Dec 19, 2024 at 11:05:01 AM

Hey, everyone!

The winter holidays are fast approaching, and I wanted to share a sizable update for Into the Godsgrave before gamers around the world settle down by the fire and enjoy some festive respite in the cold days ahead. Maybe even play a game or two :)

You all have been wonderfully patient in the face of delays for Into the Godsgrave, yet you’re also curious–justifiably so–as to what’s going on with the game and where it’s progressed since the initial campaign.

Let’s chat, starting with the regular progress report before shifting to a macro look at the project to-date. I will do my best to facilitate transparent and honest communication between backers and Lucky Duck Games.

Development progress

The workshop elves have been busy tinkering away at the components. The team has been hard at work:

• Redesigning the dice, cards, and player boards to improve readability and player experience
  • The team has received the backer feedback about the new dice design and are evaluating solutions to appease all backers.
• Overhauling map tiles with new graphic design and added terrain types for more player card interactions
  • Design of all 60 tiles for the base game is almost finished.
• Developing new components
  • Border tokens provide more flexibility when rearranging tiles during gameplay.
• Compiling the full list of cards in the game and finishing the final run of art for cards
  • The DTP process will soon start in earnest.
• Finalizing new miniature designs
  • We’re excited to show those to you soon.

And the mechanics of the game have been attended to with care. The dev team has been poring over the design, tweaking and improving the:

• Player characters
  • All classes have different themes incorporated into their decks. During the campaign, the Infiltrator and Relictor were introduced, and they’ve been polished and buffed while other classes were built from the ground up.
• Scouting system
  • Both unsuccessful and successful scouting efforts are revealed to the players, providing more robust information during gameplay.
• Traits system
  • This will allow players to pull off more combos when playing cards, and it introduce unique encounters with points of interest on the map
• Narrative development
  • The team is focused on building intuitive bridges between scenarios so that the story is cohesive through the base game (and later on in the expansion).
• Scenario-exclusive mechanics
  • We want each scenario to feel special, so the gameplay will evolve in small ways as the game progresses.
• Branching storyline
  • Player choice is important to us, and we want the story to respond to the decisions players make along the way.
• Rule adjustments
  • Based on playtesting, the team has eliminated some earlier rulesets that were inhibiting gameplay. The aim is to make for a smooth, immersive experience.
• Solo mode
  • Fairly self explanatory, but the solo community has grown significantly over the past few years, and we want to cater to that demographic.
• Player count
  • The gameplay needs to scale to different player counts, so the team is mindful about balancing everything appropriately no matter how many adventurers are around the table.

Development history

What follows is an effort to explain the growth and evolution of Into the Godsgrave from the campaign (and even before), when backers would have first been introduced to the game, to present day.

It makes sense to start with the changing landscape of tabletop games and crowdfunding. Originally, Kickstarter campaigns were approached with a nascent game design in mind and hopes for realizing each project with financial support from backers. In recent years, due to overdue campaigns, shipping woes, and other contributing factors, the standard has shifted. There is an expectation for games to be much further along in the development cycle. Less “realizing something that doesn’t exist” and more “joining a project already underway”.

And, frankly, we had not adjusted to this new status quo when Into the Godsgrave launched. The core design was still fresh and new when the Kickstarter campaign launched. We even asked reviewers to emphasize the fact that it was a very early prototype. That’s 1 scenario out of the 16 that were planned (10 in the base game, 5 in the expansion, and 1 replayable scenario). There were 70 cards developed out of ~700 (400 in the base game and almost 300 combined in the expansions) as this product was created with the intent to emulate deck-crafting card games. Graphic design and card structure that was “in progress” had to be finalized. Mechanics were not set in stone. The early test version of the app shared with reviewers was inspired by Destinies, but the full version of the game needed elements that the prototype app and its inspiration didn’t possess, requiring further implementation. In a climate where backers were expecting projects to be 50% or more complete at launch, Into the Godsgrave was not there.

With any project that is unfinished, the development cycle can be inscrutable. The ambition of Into the Godsgrave outweighed initial expectations, and the development team has grown at each milestone as the full scope of the project comes into view. We’re not sharing this with the intent to excuse the delay. We do want to be transparent, however, as you all are rightfully wondering why there has been such an inordinate hindrance to the fulfillment calendar. We launched an early prototype into a crowdfunding environment that was trending toward late-stage products and tighter fulfillment windows.

That being said, the team has made a lot of progress. All cards for the base game have been designed and developed. Eight scenarios have been developed, and the entire base game campaign is close to being cohesively tied together. Narrative writing is underway. There are seven total classes, as promised. Components and miniatures have been crafted. Almost all graphics for the base game have been completed. New team members have been added to share the workload. Solo mode and player count scaling are being integrated into the gameplay experience. And throughout all of this, a high volume of internal stress testing has occurred to evaluate the game throughout this process.

In the coming months, the plan is to show the extensive work that has been done of late. Besides the illustrations, the goal is to show cards, miniatures, map tiles, and so much more of the game as it preps for manufacturing. We also want to share the rulebook with backers as soon as possible, so that you can start to familiarize yourself with the world of Into the Godsgrave.

In summary, this project needed A LOT of work after the campaign was finished. We recognize that’s not what backers expect anymore, and we’re learning to adjust our internal processes for this project and future ones. However, we believe that the final product will be worth the wait.

A picture paints a thousand words

We’re eager to showcase other visuals from the game, but the illustrations for cards is a crucial step in finalizing art production for DTP.

Once cards have been finalized, map tiles artwork completed, and miniatures reworked, then there will be plenty of game assets to share with all of you. I recognize that you’re all keen to see those representations of the game state, so I’ll plan to share those with you as soon as possible.

Here are some new pieces that have been completed since the last update!

Questions and concerns

As always, please reach out in the comments and after updates with any questions or concerns you have.

We believe in responding to feedback and being an active part of the community.

Best,

Devon @ Lucky Duck Games

Scenario Webslinging
about 2 months ago – Fri, Nov 22, 2024 at 07:37:56 AM

Hey, everyone!

Our team is on pace with the revised timeline, layering the mechanics and scenario gameplay onto the larger puzzle. And new assets continue to roll in from the artists, so onward we march to the next milestones.

Let’s get into it :)

Scenario development

Our developers hosted a workshop to discuss the cross-scenario dependencies in our base game campaign. They finalized the larger scenario web connecting all of the disparate pieces to connect the whole game together. 

Scenarios 1 & 2 are nearing completion mechanically while Scenarios 3-6 are progressing through testing and iteration. Once those are finished, the final two scenarios of the base game will be tackled by the development team.

It’s exciting to know that particular scenarios, points of interest, and other story elements in the base game will all be tied together. The Forgotten Song prequel will then expand on the stories from the base game campaign.

As previously projected, we’re wrapping up the base game campaign this year before moving on to final development tweaks and the expansion scenarios. 

We’ve also onboarded another writer to start on the expansion narrative. The progress is consistent, and we’re adding more resources to ensure the project speeds up.

Sampling the new dice design

A few months back, we shared a redesign of the dice used in the game.

We’ve received dice samples of the new design! We’re focusing seriously on the gameplay experience during the development and pre-production window 🙂

A picture paints a thousand words

Here is some of the new art that has been finalized since the last update!

Questions and concerns

As always, please reach out in the comments and after updates with any questions or concerns you have.

We believe in responding to feedback and being an active part of the community.

Best,

Devon @ Lucky Duck Games

Development Continues
3 months ago – Fri, Oct 18, 2024 at 07:30:30 AM

Hey, everyone. I’m back from Essen Spiel. It was a great show, but I’m happy to be home.

Last update we talked about the revised timeline and shared the calendar for base game development, expansion development, app implementation, and manufacturing (as well as all of the other pieces of the puzzle to be worked on along the way).

Our design and development team continues to make progress on the base game, in line with the schedule we’ve shared previously. And other Lucky Duck team members are hard at work with art, logistics, and other essential details.

Scenario development

From a design perspective, the team is working on the story for the second of three arcs. The mechanical design of core game scenarios should be finished around the end of 2024 before the team progresses to the expansion.

All class and lineage cards for base game and small expansion classes are already designed; currently they are evaluated and balanced. We are tweaking the traits, polishing texts, balancing the cost ratio, et cetera.

The story and points of interest are currently being written as the mechanical design finishes for each scenario.

And now the rulebook is undergoing testing from outside the development team in order to streamline and improve the learning process for new players.

Art development

Here are some of the art pieces that have been created since the new director has joined the team :)

Thank you

It’s never an enjoyable thing to share disappointing news, so I wanted to personally thank all of you for the kind and supportive reception that you gave after the last update. Your empathy and understanding was really welcoming, and it’s been a great part of this new position for me to interact with all of you.

I appreciate it!

Questions and concerns

As always, please reach out in the comments and after updates with any questions or concerns you have.

We believe in responding to feedback and being an active part of the community.

Best,

Devon @ Lucky Duck Games

Where We Stand
4 months ago – Thu, Sep 26, 2024 at 09:09:09 AM

Hey, everyone. Thanks so much for being here. I cannot express enough how appreciative I am of your patience as I talk with the development team and evaluate the project to see where we’re at with Into the Godsgrave.

You’ve all been waiting for the revised timeline of the project, and so I’d like to jump right in.

Production timeline

*Art development, STL work, DTP design, molding, and sampling corrections are all a part of the process as well, but have been removed to streamline the graphic

Since the last update, our focus has been determining when development will be done and when we’re going to production. Our current deadline is to be completed and ready for manufacturing in July 2025.

Our aim is to deliver the game to you as fast as possible without sacrificing any of the innovative experience that we promised backers during the campaign. The teams have been working diligently to improve the timeline, identifying every gap that can be optimized. While the schedule revision may frustrate you, we are confident that we’ll be able to deliver the best version of Into the Godsgrave we can. The current schedule has been prepared with great attention to detail and includes realistic deadlines.

Scenario development

Part of the development adjustments involves reducing the complexity of what we planned for the base game. There are 10 base game scenarios, and players experience 8 of those scenarios in one larger story arc during a single playthrough. The planned content remains the same, but we’re aiming to streamline app development and testing.

Since the last update, we’ve made significant strides with the base game. A new Art Director has joined the project. Development of Scenarios 4 and 5 are undergoing playtesting for iterative improvement. The team has started to work on stretch goals tied to the base game. Final card layout design for DTP is underway. And new card artwork has been created. There are examples of those below.

Development, production, and other milestones

As with all of our campaigns, the timelines shared with backers are estimates. A project of this complexity brings its own set of challenges, and we are always working to quicken the process when and where possible

I say this to reassure you all that for Into the Godsgrave we will be looking into every avenue that would move up our development, production, shipping, and delivery timelines. However we can speed up the process and get the game to you sooner than expected, we will consider.

Reassuring backers

While Lucky Duck Games has always delivered their projects, it’s understandable if this revised timeline frustrates or upsets any of you. We are more than excited to realize this game’s potential and deliver it to backers, but we’ve experienced a considerable delay with Into the Godsgrave.

I’d like to stress that as part of the delayed fulfillment of this campaign, backers will not be charged anything more! We are accepting the responsibilities of additional costs. We believe you, our backers, should not be financially impacted for our delays or challenges.

If, after learning about the game’s delay, there is anyone seeking a refund, please reach out to [email protected]. While we will be sorry to lose your support, we will be happy to help you.

Community interactions

A delay like this can bring about mixed emotions; we appreciate your patience and understanding. We truly value your feedback, be it positive or critical. As mentioned recently, a main focus for us is to keep the conversations respectful and constructive, as we work together to move forward. We want this space to remain supportive and focused on the project.

Again, I know that this is upsetting news and that there will be a longer waiting period before you’re able to play the game, however please engage in discourse responsibly.

Thank you

As always, I want to share my gratitude for all of our backers, on this project and others. We believe that everyone is a gamer, and our team makes games so that people can make memories together.

Best,

Devon @ Lucky Duck Games