Two Years in the (Game) Making
Hello everyone! Friends, A.E.G.I.S. fans, fellow game developers and all the other cool peeps we’ve met around the region, we thank you. As of today, Zephyr Workshop has been in the biz of making games for two years!!
This whole experience started way back in 2010 with a dream and a sketch of a robot from a game jam. This guy in fact.
Fast forward to 2013 and we were working on A.E.G.I.S. as a senior capstone project, and we were told the scope was way too big and the game would never get off the ground. Luckily, we didn’t listen, and we continued to pour our hearts and souls into this game, because the need for an easy-to-learn, quick-to-play tabletop wargame was too great, and the amount of games centering on combining robots was too few.
40% Game Design Time, 60% “Other”
A lot has changed since 2013. The first big change is that one of the co-founders, Tom Bouwman-Wozencraft, is no longer with us. He has moved on to his own project and has founded another company called Aasguard Studio. We wish him luck in his future endeavors. The other change is that the whole team is now balancing work life and making A.E.G.I.S., and in the midst of all that our company has grown to maturity as well.
Jenna Hoffstein, another amazing Boston game designer, once delivered a talk on how an indie gamedev’s time was allotted. At first, you imagine you’ll be spending most of your time making your game, but it turns out that there’s a lot of money, time and paperwork that goes into starting up a company and developing a product. Even moreso for tabletop endeavors. Incorporating alone costs hundreds depending on how you’re going to do it (S corp or LLC.? Do you use a lawyer or do it yourself on legalzoom?)
Our advice is go with a LLC or S corp, but also find either a mentor or lawyer who can advise you on the ins and outs of incorporation.
Then there are events; we’ve brought A.E.G.I.S. to dozens of events around the region, which takes days of time and is very expensive and strenuous. We’ve delivered talks, had a ton of meetings and sit-downs with business/legal consultants and other developers and most of that also consumes a lot of time and money in exchange for buzz, potential partnerships and valuable information. Then there’s copyrighting your “mascot” character, logo, important graphic designs, and/or anything else you want to make sure is protected. In the end, our waking time working on A.E.G.I.S. itself is about 40%, the average for indies, but the us of 2013 would’ve never thought that!
Now for that other 40%…
Do it with Your Hands
Self publishing your own board game is a beast all of its own. The beast turns into a monster if your game has a lot of assets like A.E.G.I.S., but getting our game out there was more important to us than sitting on a strict prototype forever in hopes of a big break. Through lots of effort and research, we were able to put our game together as a sell-able product with a lot of game-play content. Designing 60 playable, balanced robots was only the first step. We had to graphic design and illustrate everything, assemble the documents, design the rulebook, design the play mat, and then get it all printed and put into a box, which we also had to design and logistically figure out. Normally, if you go through a publisher most of this is covered for you; you only have to worry about the design and direction of the game. We were on our own, so we did everything, and we encourage everyone to do the same! There’s no better way to learn than to go all the way and finish something.
“Don’t beg for things, do it yourself or you won’t get anything!”
Then there’s the business. There’s an important margin to know for self publishing that is, you take the total cost of one box assembly (pieces, cards, dice, rule book, box itself) and multiply that by at least 200% to 400% so you can make money on your game. These numbers don’t cover the brick and mortar stores’ cut of your game. Retail stores and distributors take a collective cut of least 60% (or more) of the price of your game. So roughly, you lose 60% of your potential profit for the game by publishing it and having it in stores. It’s very difficult to make a lot of money via retail stores, but it’s great for getting the game out there.
We needed money to continue publication for a second and third print, respectively, and A.E.G.I.S. is expensive to print via our method. In the end, we found an affordable price for the content we were supplying, while getting enough money back to continue operations.
If you’re not into business and arts&crafts, there are two solutions:
1. Do a Kickstarter, which is a different kind of huge undertaking. We chose against this route because even with an enormous backing, we didn’t have the resources on our team alone to create and plan a truly great Kickstarter and work on it for 30 days while it was live. Running a successful Kickstarter takes months of work and preparation from a variety of people for a game of A.E.G.I.S. scale. For smaller, simpler games with a much less niche appeal, this is a great route.
2. Find a publisher. The publisher’s cut of the game adds in a whole new wrinkle to everything, but you will probably no longer be worrying about production, marketing, etc, and you can concentrate on just designing the games you want to design. You find publishers by getting your game into playable shape and going around to conventions like GenCon and physically meeting people to show your game to. It can be a long, vague and sometimes fruitless process.
Year 3 in a Big Way
So you may be wondering why all the business talk about the cost of incorporating and self publishing? (There are other hidden costs to, we could go on and on about them.) Well do we have some big news for you…
A.E.G.I.S. is now officially signed on with a publisher!
We can’t officially announce who it is yet, but when we can, we will let everyone know!
What does this mean? Will the game be different? Will there be miniatures? Will there be a Kickstarter? Will you be able to buy it at your local game store? Too soon to tell! This is all very exciting, and make sure to follow us in the coming months!
If you have any specific questions, you can always shoot us an email at zephyrworkshop@gmail.com.
Where to Next?
As we continue working hard, we’ll still be going to events!
Warwick, RI
February the 5-8th
Mansfield, MA
February 19 – 22nd
Boston, MA
March 6 – 8th
We have especially big plans for PAX, which we’ll announce closer to the convention.
Thanks again for following and believing in us these past two years. It means a lot and we hope others learn from our story and experiences enough to make their own awesome games.
FIGHT AND UNITE
-Zephyr Workshop