Board game: Need graphics artist, and any help publishing it?

Boysano

Hi,
a year ago I designed and play tested a few time an epic board game...
it is like monopoly with dungeon crawling and card creature fighting combined. With lots of focus to always keep at least 2 people playing, instead of only 1 person at a time, so it is more fun... Any case back in the day my friend and myself got too busy with work and life, now I went fulltime indie dev and want to rescue this project and revitalize it.

So to do this I need 2 things:
1. A graphics artist partner,
2. any help on how to publish board games?

Here is the original FB page for it:
https://www.facebook.com/KingsVsHeroes

Tuism

@LexAquillia would be the person to speak to regarding board games, he's got one in the pipelines (!!!) also, do you hang out on Board Game Geek? They're a really good resource for all things bg, including publishing. The boardgame design forum is great: http://boardgamegeek.com/forum/26/boardgamegeek/board-game-design

As for artisting I may be interested :P

Boysano

Thanks alot for the info, any the FB like +1 to you

ph-rios

Hello I am interest in helping with the graphics part of things. This seems like a projects that could have some awesome fantasy art! Here's a link to my portfolio: http://philport.blogspot.com/

Boysano

@ph-rios yes it most certainly will be "fantasy" style fun graphics and will be well suited to your style. I enjoy your showreel video!

Boysano

You have to decide to either buy land (which tax players when landing on it - just like monopoly) or try and bypass the outer ring (outside world with land) by going via a dungeon...but as all dungeons (inner rings) goes they a more dangerous and you have to fight monsters (creatures) almost MTG style... Then in time you have to improve your weapon and creature cards to decide when you throw a double to either go to the bazaar or go fight the random Boss! From that point the first person to win the Boss, wins at the game... Always have 2 players playing, since dice roll fights between boss and player or creature and player...works very well. My friends whom playtested this a year ago, all where MTG and DnD, settlers, etc players.

dammit

Getting a boardgame published in SA is kind of tricky business - but we ( @LexAquillia and I ) have had some interest from the SkyCastleGames company. Maybe give them a try?
http://www.skycastle.co.za/

Fengol

If I can make a suggestion, do some Let's Play/Review/Preview videos of your game. Just like a digital game you need to sell the sizzle and it's especially hard for boardgames. Check out the product videos on the Fantasy Flight website and watch Tom Vasel's reviews on the Dice Tower and, of course, Shut Up & Sit Down.

Then it's polish, polish, polish! I know you're currently looking for a graphic artist but you basically need to take the finished product to the publisher.

Boysano

@Fengol I agree, so I want to complete it first, this is why I'm looking for a graphics artist partner...thing is this game actually does work and is loads of fun to play so I think it is worth the effort. Then go to publishers....I'm entertaining the though of some kinda digital distribution model. I also know it is easier to distribute via an online company to other countries where you upload your game design and select premade figurines etc, then they will publish or make the physical product per order. So there are options to still publish to other countries from SA in terms of board games.

So far I have already 3 interested graphics artist...so I'm really impressed with the response from this post, thanks!

LexAquillia

@Boysano, don't get to hung up on getting "great" art for now. If you are going to go to a publisher they will most likely reskin your entire game using their own artists. What you want to do is get the game looking nice to sell your vision of the game :)

Tuism

One of the biggest lessons I've learned about boardgame publishers (through various people's experience and reading around), like @LexAquillia said, is that if your game is complete, they'll buy it without the art. They're not looking for an artful game, they're looking for a complete game - and in that case the design is what makes it complete, not the theme.

Design as in making it easy to read and play, making things understandable, not pretty :)

Fengol

Boysano said:

@Fengol I agree, so I want to complete it first, this is why I'm looking for a graphics artist partner

No! Do the videos now while it's still in beta so you can get feedback from fans, players & designers before you invest time and money with artists, publishers and distributors.

Boysano

ok thanks
[edit]

Fengol said:

No! Do the videos now while it's still in beta so you can get feedback from fans, players & designers before you invest time and money with artists, publishers and distributors.

But, then how do you plan to protect the IP?

Fengol

Boysano said:

But, then how do you plan to protect the IP?

This question really should be in the FAQ, @Dislekcia and others have answered it many, many times. I'll try to find a post he did on it.

Short answer you don't. No one cares about your IP enough to steal it and the tiny splash you're going to make on the internet won't even reach enough people until you're nearly finished anyway. However, the benefits you're going to get (see this post about releasing early and as much as you can) in terms of valuable feedback and positive excitement you're going to get far out ways hiding it in your bedroom.

Fengol

Gazza_N said:

I want to echo what @Tuism said - I saw a lot of games with a lot of potential that could have benefitted immensely from earlier feedback. Post. Builds. Early. Doesn't matter if the only art is a bunch of cubes or if the input's a little iffy, you want to nail as many problems and get as many suggestions as you can right at the start. As you can see, we aren't all out to "steal your idea". We're having too much fun with our own. :P

Kobusvdwalt9 said:

Yes I am with @Karuji. On makegames we really advocate open development(broforce/death smashers/Bear Chuck) and trust me no one will steal your idea (the guy that does gets slapped) so yeah just post it, you will get a lot more replys that way.

Microdot said:

Thanks to all who are reading. I will do my best to post more, I am part worried other project steal these good ideas but in the end without sharing them, I wont know if they're bad avenues either!

Ant said:

I wouldn't be so concerned about IP and such, though...no one is trawling forums like this to steal work.

AlphaSheep

With regards to protecting the IP, if you're really that paranoid, you can slap a little "(c) 2013 Boysano, all rights reserved" onto everything, and keep proof of dates, etc that you make stuff. Afaik copyright is automatic, and that's enough to protect your idea.

Boysano

Why I ask is that I do follow this approach when making digital games, but as a boardgame is so easy to make, you are suggesting that you are actually only selling convenience of a ready made game.
Then I can just as well give the game away for free on a digital format, and when it has enough fans, sell an expansion..

I didn't realize the board game industry follows the same trend as digital.

dislekcia

Never try to sell something until people are asking to buy it from you.

LexAquillia

@Boysano it is much, much, much harder for a person to "steal" a boardgame than a digital one.

Boysano

Thanks I have found an artist for this project

mattbenic

+100 to what's been said about getting the gameplay refined before polishing the art, but once you do get to that point if you want a more polished prototype than handmade, you can always go with GameCrafter: https://www.thegamecrafter.com/