[Music] [Music] thank you welcome to board game binge the place where we bring you bite-sized bingeable board game content from across the industry I'm your host James Staley and in this episode we're chatting with Jesse Conger owner of good days games the publisher behind Escape Death Race 2182 micro upcoming on Kickstarter Jesse will be launching the full-size board game version of escape death Rays alongside a comic book Jesse welcome to the binge how you doing James I'm great thank you so much for having me it's awesome to be here with you oh it's awesome to have you on the podcast uh we don't really know each other we just chatted very quickly for about 30 seconds uh we had a cancellation this week and you were gracious enough to jump in so thank you so much uh man I love uh micro games minting games things like that I've had some of my own and uh we're gonna get into those in a second but what I want to start off with is kind of backing up a little bit here and going back to where did you get into this hobby how did this all start for you man it was it's one of my favorite questions to answer because it was just really uh organic for me it came from my love of video games of all places and I ordered one game that I loved so much that I ultimately wanted to create a board game inspired off of it not exactly the same actually a lot different but it was a racing game it wasn't it was a free to play mod called uh is 82 or Interstate 1982 based off of the original Battlefield 1942 uh PC game that came out in the early 2000s so I was a big uh a big player and advocate for Battlefield 1942 and when that game came out mod it was a it was downloaded it came out with the content where it was mod friendly people were just creating mods left and right there's a Star Wars mod there's Pirates there's racing uh different world war one and all sorts of different desert combat so one of the ones I discovered was called Isaac 2 or Interstate 1982 and that was actually a like a tribute mod to an old Activision game called I-76 or Interstate 76 and they made a sequel called interstate 82. so uh but that was essentially they used the battlefield 42 engine to make a game which it was really just in name was it a uh as an honor or a head nod to it sure but ultimately the game ran on the engine of Battlefield where you're getting in a race car and you're driving through obstacle courses it's not it wasn't all based off like Twisted Metal where it's vehicular combat it was more so the cars were going through these these cars can do Insane obstacles and they can go through stunts Loops in the road uh jump over Broken Bridges and gaps on the road and drive up vicious terrain and the objective was to get as far as you can try to beat the level and uh before essentially giving up because it's so hard Senator levels very from actual uh infantry combat to this uh to vehicle combat but the most of them uh the original 12 Maps uh had a variety of of those three but then the fans took it to another level and they just kept making content making content to where when I joined there was already about 50 60 maps in that were created and I went ahead and made probably another 30 and then uh ultimately became the owner of the domain that ran that server and ran that Community uh it's called is82.com and so I just uh took on the Helm of running the community and and then after about maybe eight years I I was just sitting at my girlfriend now wife's uh old kitchen uh and I just had the idea I was actually playing the game on my laptop and I was thinking this would make this could make a cool board game so I actually took uh one of the original levels I uh contacted the guy who made it and just hey you mind if I try to make a board game out of this and he said sure go for it and I what did I do I just I just kept going I just opened up a notepad started typing rules I started prototyping and then the whole process led me to watching uh how to make board game videos previews uh all the different content uh that a lot of reviews and previews for board games that's when I found like the tabletop show and uh learned about Dice Tower and all their top 10 videos sure a lot a lot of those things started to come into uh into my radar so I'd be sitting there making notes and doing prototypes with watching these learning about new games that are coming out and older ones and it it wasn't it took a little while before I finally it finally caught my attention like let me play some of these other games that had have come out I ain't one of the first ones I finally bit the bullet and bought was uh Stone Age okay for forbidden island and Forbidden Desert went and got those pretty quick and uh from now I mean I have about 100 games behind me yeah so it it turned into a bit of a crazy passion at the same time where I was doing board game nights uh regularly I do have a shelf of opportunity of unplayed games unfortunately I got to get into I've never heard it called that shelf of opportunity versus shelf of Shame yeah it's the nice way to look at it shelf of opportunity I have to remember that one yeah card games are hot right now uh clearly you've got heat you've got uh what's the Vendetta game is the other one um anything to do with racing and uh the kind of this whole uh Mad Max approach to uh you know yeah you know car racing in in the board game industry seems to be doing well um and clearly you seem to be really passionate about this specific IEP um what were you doing before this like is this the one thing the Catalyst got you into the board game industry were you boardgaming before that or I grew up the youngest of four and uh my brother being he was six years older than me two sisters in between any games we played at home I was sure to to lose so the whole I grew up with the the classics uh nothing modern uh you know from the monopolies to the uh from the clues those types of games and my brother loved access and allies and and magic and he and of course comics and he shared all those with me and there's a point where I didn't really get that interested playing with him learning from him because I just maybe it was a a preset mentality that you know he was gonna win and maybe I just wasn't as uh thrilled to play so sure for the most part he had friends we both had friends who come over he'd introduce them to her they'd sit there for hours playing access and allies and I just I wanted nothing to do with it he even tried to teach me magic once and I said you know what I'm good I'm gonna go sit there and play this interstate game I'm very happy and content so yeah this was the Catalyst that actually got me into the into the industry before this it was just work work and play uh you know I go to work I was doing construction a lot of the time and and that that has all uh progressed as well but then it was just working games video games for the most part and reading and then yeah now board games are you still working like is this still like obviously it's I'm sure it's just a hobby like do you still have a day job or what do you do oh yeah yeah I in the day I'm a area sales manager I sell uh I sell storage buildings and garages oh wow and I've been I've been with the company now for 20 years so they're they're a great company and we're uh Nationwide in America so we're uh all over the place so I've I've been able to uh yeah enjoy a a great career and then as a passion project maintain and pursue uh the good days games and just trying to get uh get my ideas to bring it across the Finish Line yeah and how often when you're driving in the car you're thinking about iterations of your game it's it's uh it's scary how often I am it's because by the time I get home I'm so my thoughts are so spent I'm thinking about it yeah and I of course I have other things to take care of we have a six month old now at home it's our first child and so by the time you get home I usually don't have a whole lot of time to actually start making those things happen uh it was in those first golden years it's all called of making the game that I actually started on a macro version of this micro game and I um are you familiar with the game crafter of course the website the game crafter so that that was where my game's humble beginnings actually became a published reality uh after working years on a prototype for the bigger version and I was using their website to uh to print things out and then I realized well they came up with a contest back in 2019 called The Mint 10 Challenge and ultimately I saw that and it inspired me to streamline everything I had into a smaller digest you know micro version did you enter that challenge I entered it there was about a hundred 60 participants I got right there at about 82 my my lucky number oh nice and so I got right there in the middle I didn't do a great job at promoting it so uh that's what it boiled down to sending it out to all your friends and social medias and emails and just getting it out there to the people say hey get on here vote for it because there's a voting system and I of course players participants could vote for others as well and so uh organically I got about Midway through but I didn't place but it's still the game is published on their website oh that's cool and yeah so it's still there actually and then what I did uh for the uh for a campaign the one in 2020 I ran I actually uh ended up just uh because when they when they print the game they send it in a sheet of paper and you have to pre-pluck everything out and then it put everything in the tin put the stickers on it so I actually acquired multiple copies and then I pre-packaged them to where it would be an easier uh thing for a customer to purchase where it's already sealed sure so yeah that game crafter was my uh humble beginnings and they're a great set of people over there how hard was it for you to uh shrink your game from a board game size down to Minton surprisingly easy uh do you once I realized the just the the way the cars move mechanic and it hit me like a it just hit me like a bucket of water once I realized what it needed to be done uh there is movement there's roll based movement and there's card based movement in the game uh this game I actually created a D4 uh I want to put a dice in here but I couldn't fit it so I created a D4 draw deck of four cards and simply just you Shuffle these cards and and whatever you reveal uh that's the game comes with 20 Road tiles those Road tiles are uh they're interchangeable so the road's different every time uh if I if I have on your intro I think you had a picture of the game laid out yeah the uh once I realized so okay you you have a start tile and you have all the characters on it you draw a card that's how many Road tiles you draw and you create a new road that enter that's changeable every time and you move your character up to that many spaces and so just creating the new road was different because the original was a linear track which I've still been doing some prototyping uh I've and that one I'm looking to have that one come out in uh next year wow and then you've been uh doing like conventions and stuff as well or I think I was reading somewhere that you are actually like you go and you you sell this right at different events and so forth as well yeah exactly so the micro game which is already out that one they're both titles the new one coming out the the to this next Kickstarter it's the micro LS Edition so the new the original one uh did not have the ls Edition off the off the back it was just micro so this one yes I've been going to strategicon they have the gamex uh out there in at the Los Angeles airport at the Hilton they do that three times a year and I I've gotten uh relationships with those who run it over there uh shout out to Victor and so I uh three times a year we try to make it to each one of those events and there's President's Day Labor Day Memorial Day weekends they're doing those so they run for a whole weekend and then I did Dice Tower 2020 it was right before uh actually 2022 I went as a just as a attendee in 2020 before covet uh literally like days before it lockdown happened yeah was uh was that last convention I went to as an attendee and then 2022 I was I did it as an exhibitor and I got a demo the game there with thousands of people it was really fun and just playing the game over and over getting to see people's reactions and learning that the game is unique every time it's it's been a thrill yeah there's nothing like it uh anytime somebody I'm talking to about you know this industry and you know they they want me to describe it I mean no one's driving Lambos uh making board games uh but the reward you have of seeing someone else actually enjoying something you've made uh there is no feeling like it it is is just amazing and uh the the first time you see somebody pull out one of your games without you asking them so somebody who owns your game and also you kind of catch you know at a corner of your eye and then pulling the game out and playing with some other people man that feeling is just uh it's just incredible so and I think that's what fuels the addiction right and gets people to kind of keep staying in this Hobby and want to create even more and and and you know create more iterations and kind of get on to the next game someone at the dice tower west 22 uh he purchased the game in maybe about an hour later he came back and he actually had had my game in one hand and a Sharpie in the other and said hey can you sign this for me and that's that's the closest I can relate to that and I was I was elated I just felt just so grateful that you know abundant that he did that and it really just it gave more reason as to what I'm doing it's it's not just a selfish passion there you know there are people that enjoy the game and they're having a great experience and they get to share those with others I talked to my colleagues and and they all say the same thing that if it still kind of feels weird when someone asks you to sign a game yeah I mean because you have almost like this imposter syndrome right like who am I to sign this copy like you know I'm just honored that you even bought it what you want me to sign it now to sure I guess I'll sign it it's it's kind of an odd feeling but uh it does it's um you know very humbling but uh complimentary at the same time now you've been working on this larger version of this game can you talk a little bit about what that's going to look like and how you plan to expand it out and and how you're going to go the opposite direction of now making it bigger yes uh I have a lot of prototypes actually right behind my computer I'm going to I'll show one thing I've added is a is a currency system so the characters uh every round they're they're they're accumulating uh income for various reasons for being the first to defeat a boss for driving over a defeated boss uh for killing another player uh just for dying you get money so there's a lot of ways you get money in the game because there's a lot of special abilities uh here's a prototype sheet it's called a disco dollar investment log I use little uh Battleship uh uh little tax that you put in your ship and essentially you can pick different categories of things to invest in you you can increase in your your base Health uh the amount of weapons you can carry the amount of weapons you can use the amount of Power Cards you can carry the amount of Power Cards you can use if you land on like an event you can trigger an event at the end of every turn instead of having to just land on an event different things like that you can invest in your own special ability making it better maybe if you were already stronger you become even stronger if you're even faster and you become faster uh if you if you deal more damage to someone now you deal even more and also you can invest in other people's special abilities to some degree so the whole it gives you a lot more decision making during the game and instead of it being a linear board which I was working on for so long I've converted it into more of a a modular board system so you take one uh one location your start and then you have you know maybe play your final top your final board you have all these different boards uh locations that you're moving to and you can choose how long you want the game to be if you're playing with you know if you want a half hour game you might only want to do two boards if you want to play a three hour game because it can go that long you play with all six Sports as well can you like flip them over and reorient them as well yeah they're not yet but they are you can so no they are not at this time uh hasn't been considered but uh it definitely will be I've included uh figurines for each character what it is a car based game but what I've done is on the uh let me show you so players have like language for those who are listening so we'll use descriptive language for those who are listening not watching yeah exactly because I have I have it so characters have a character card and your health track is on the top but uh this character shooter for example Shooter McGavin not from Happy Gilmore but just coincidentally so I have this character not a race car but the actual figuring guy himself and he has a slot behind it to where the card can rest in it uh there's also a little miniature figurine race cars that are on the board represent your character unlike the current micro game where they're they're little cubes to represent your car yeah the ls Edition is coming to Kickstarter this year and uh of course the macro version are going to feature the the actual uh pre-painted Miniatures so you're gonna have Minis and they're gonna be pre-painted uh the Miniatures might not be able to make it a pledge for the macro game uh and it just depends on how that goes but the cars the vehicles will definitely be pre-painted they're pretty simple yeah yeah and did you find like do people like like to paint these themselves or uh like is there actual car like so you have cubes in the in the micro Edition uh so there's no cars so the cubes represent your car I guess in the in the original mint 10 version correct and there's six playable characters uh it's a one to four player game you can play solo but the uh instead of a cube like here's a little race car and it's got Flames coming out the back it's got a little Gatling gun on top of it this is the purple character so I have one for each of the the colors that represent the game nice but as far as pre-painted I I have been uh selling just a case of these cars uh unpainted and people have painted them themselves yeah so uh I think it's I think most people would prefer to have them already painted but the enthusiasts would love to just get their hands on some raw ones and go at it you'd be surprised uh we we put minis in our most recent game and um we announced hey we're gonna ink wash these right for those people who don't want to want to paint them and the number of people that came back saying oh I want to paint it myself this is gonna make painting more difficult uh it was a lot uh there is a huge industry or I guess subsection of this of this hobby of people just like to paint minis right and and really geek out over that and um uh you know obviously if there's treatments and so forth so even if they are pre-painted uh they can do a pre-treatment and then they can change the colors to what they want um but I guess that's part of the fun of it too right is that customization and people feeling like it's kind of their car right and they can put their own numbers and stuff on it yeah no I do like that and the cars will need to be a little bit bigger for that to get uh more more paint brushes in there yeah because the current ones are super small they're a half inch by maybe an inch and a quarter they're super small but yeah no that it is an idea and I I would like I like the idea of just giving options so if possible to say you can go paint them yourself or let us just have give them pre-painted yeah now we were saying just before we went on air too that you you're a one-man show as many of us are in this industry um how have you approached um you know a the the your initial campaign that you did on on the micro version and then what were some of the learnings you're carrying forward now to this next campaign uh when you when you launch your next campaign for uh for your game the the first one is comes to mind is is who not how I think I spent a lot of time thinking about how am I going to get this done and I got it into a bit of a brain fog just in that mentality versus who can I find to help me get these done so I reach out to Freelancers a lot and I I'm always vetting them to some degree or another and I'm always grateful for just what they do to for the industry I can't imagine I'm the only one who's ever reached out to a freelancer for graphics design or uh even those 3D Miniatures I've set you up I had to have it designed and then you know I paid someone to make the character uh initially just a 2d character and then someone else to convert that to a 3D and then someone else to make it 3D printable and then someone to 3D print it and then I even had some pre-painted ones that I just for my own personal collection and I sent those away for someone to hand paint and then send back to you so things like that is finding people that you can trust that they're reliable that they do good work and that they understand what your vision is but they're not afraid to say well I you know have you you know try this or yeah I like what you're doing but you know here's a couple extra things you should consider yeah even when on our pre-conversation you know you're giving me some good Insight on Pitch routers and I'm very grateful for all that it's it's leaps and bads it's a testament to the industry yeah to me that people want to help each other they want to see each other succeed that's the the first one is uh it's not about doing it all by yourself even though often you feel like you're by yourself but you need to be creative with how you get assistance and uh just that's the biggest thing don't give up and keep keep pushing on it if it if it means something to you follow it through and if you followed it through and there's still more that you felt like you could have done then try you know find the PATH that's going to get you to doing it yeah yeah certainly uh the the approach I took um over the past five years is just ask as many people uh for their advice as I could and try to learn from other people's mistakes and and try not to repeat them although sometimes you have to do the mistakes yourself right to learn them firsthand and to sometimes believe the advice you almost have to you almost have to live it right um but you know it's not saying right the rising Tides uh you know raise all boats and I I certainly see this industry that way where um there's so many people wanting to pay it forward and wanting to see other people be successful and I know Chandler copenhaver at um backer kit calls it coopetition right so everyone's technically competitors because they're in the same industry but everybody's trying to help everyone else succeed because they want to see this hobby uh Thrive right and they want it and and there's so many different iterations of games that um you know what you're creating is probably not going to cross over with what I'm creating right yeah maybe it's complementary too but um there's there's so many permutations and iterations of games that I mean it's okay to help other people out you know it doesn't it's not going to hurt you if anything it's going to help you network and meet other friends in the industry that can maybe help you in another way and uh and certainly I think that most of us try to approach that industry in that way yeah and the longer that you're involved in the industry the more opportunities come up the more people you get to network with and and conversate with and and that is inspiring in itself yeah when a funny thing happened uh uh getting close on time but last uh the last convention I was at it was that uh it was one of the Game X conventions and I was uh demoing my game over and over and I had to one of my best friends who wasn't there he I wanted to give him a get a Buy in a board game since there's all these other vendors there and yeah I even had my neighbor across the street watching our dogs at home so she was house sitting for us yeah and so a lot of kind of a lot of things going I knew she'd come over and play at our board game nights and so I went over to one of the board game uh dealers a couple aisles down or booths over and I was like you know what uh let me buy a copy of space space and I actually because I knew they both loved it let me get two copies of this I'm just gonna buy it for them and uh actually uh and so when I did uh the the guy who's running the booth he's like so how does it feel to know that the uh the the maker space space demoed your game last night I was like what he's like that was that was John Claire but I know it and he's like yeah I didn't even realize I didn't know what he looked like and I heard he was at the convention that weekend doing like a talk uh a presentation or of sorts so yeah he actually came back him and his wife had showed up and both of our wives have little babies with them and they were just uh they were talking and I demoed the game to him and showed him what was what it was about and he actually came back with his his older son a little the next day that same day it was funny I was texting my wife I was like did you know who that was and then sure enough uh he came back and um I have to admit I was I was fanboying a little bit I was like how cool upon Reflections like full circle it's so cool to to meet someone like this organically yeah that you know and it only happens from just keeping your foot on the pedal you know pun intended uh for my micro games but just just keep doing what you're doing and things start to eventually happen uh in ways you wouldn't expect and uh so and yeah you didn't say the game was awful so yeah okay well that's great advice and uh yeah just keep keep trying to meet as many people as you can in the industry yeah you'll be surprised how much stuff will just kind of naturally fall into place when you do that um just just absorb as much as you can from others and uh and it's going to kind of come along um after these games are done are you are you going to keep kind of flushing out the same uh kind of car IP or have you now you've got a big collection of games that are thinking of broadening even outside of cars and racing I'm sticking to this IP for a while I I want to create a little mini Universe yeah uh within it and of course the comic books are gonna they're coinciding that the fir I'm doing a 10 part comic book series and the first nine comic books essentially are prequels to the micro and the macro game and it's introducing all the characters and then once that happens I already have a sequel to the macro that is what happens to the characters after this Death Race you know what what goes on after that and so I I do have more in line uh for that and I thought about it should I make another set of 10 comic books to go along with a new game and so I'm the the wheels are turning and it's like wow I I can definitely ride this for a while especially now that I'm adding some literature I love to write a fantasy science fiction or or My Jam so for now I do have some other ideas I've thought about and I look forward to to being able to say talk about those but I don't think it's the right time and then the same thing that you have to contract those out to like a freelancer to help with like the illustrations and so forth or how did you approach that absolutely um I might have showed you I did show you this earlier but here's a cover for the Cami zuka uh this is the action pose volume one uh the Escape Death Race 2182 uh it's the uh legendary Stratos League essentially so the whole comic books are going to be called the legendary Stratus league and but this mini series is escape death rate and yes I wrote the comic book and then hired someone to illustrate it uh a uh awesome gentleman uh Ricardo in Argentina did that for me and on my Kickstarter page there is a uh there's a trailer I had another awesome individual create a trailer he animated that comic into a a minute and 15 second trailer that just came out beautiful and I had a I had a voice actress do the you know the voiceover for The Script and she did a phenomenal job as well so yeah it definitely takes a team to do things and sometimes those it's not a team member that works in the cubicle or the office next door or it might not be your best friend or a family member it might be just a total stranger and it's okay to do that yeah and then how do people fall along this so I know you've got a Kickstarter to link up uh which is kind of the the preview or the kind of the the advanced guide notification page but uh on your website is is there a way people can get to like your email list or they can follow you on Facebook or is that how best do people kind of interact with this story and follow this along yeah absolutely it's uh gooddaysgames.com that's the best place to uh to reach out and get subscribed to our newsletter you can find me on Instagram and of course the kickstarter the pre-launch that would be a great way to to find us as well oh amazing well Jesse I want to wish you all the best with this IP it sounds really exciting and uh certainly you're passionate about it and your passion certainly comes through when you're talking about it I can't wait to see when you uh you launch this hopefully reach back out to us let us know so we can give the audience a heads up when your next Kickstarter goes live and we'll go from there thanks so much James I appreciate it no problem my friend all the best Cheers this has been an episode of the board game binge podcast hosted by James Staley produced by James Staley and Mike Bruner with original music by Nick Smith if you would like to watch these interviews live simply subscribe to our YouTube channel board game binge and you'll get access to live interviews giveaways and interesting board game content from across the industry I can't wait for you to join us see you next time [Music]