🥒 We're making a game! (plus trending campaigns) (2024)

I've been designing board games for a little while now, but always just for fun or for friends to play. Last year, I decided I'd take my hobby a bit more seriously, and wanted to learn about the process of actually taking a game to market.

Fast-forward about 10 months and with a team of seven, we're actually launching our first game: HotShot Pickleball!

Over the coming weeks, I'll share updates about our progress, challenges, and how we're going about the process via this newsletter. I'll dig into elements like game design, art direction, play-testing, crowd-funding vs publishers, marketing, manufacturing, and everything in between. If you'd like to follow along, be sure you're subscribed to this newsletter!

First up though this week: I'd love to introduce you to the game of HotShot Pickleball and give a brief overview of what our game is, where it sits in the market, and the way we're approaching its launch.

HotShot Pickleball is a fun casual game that celebrates the love and passion for the fastest growing sport in the world: Pickleball. Sometimes called a combination between tennis, badminton, and table-tennis, Pickleball has spread like wildfire in recent years, especially in the US. From country-clubs to neighbourhood parks, to professional teams owned by celebrities with their matches broadcast live, Pickleball has become a phenomenon that's shaken the sports world in new ways.

Our game celebrates both the game, and the more unique elements that make it so fun and accessible. Elements like the lingo (the no Volley area is called 'The Kitchen', a type of shot is referred to as a 'dink', etc), and of course the name invites a lot of low-hanging brined fruit when it comes to making a fun and accessible board game.

The game is pretty simple, and involves a court, a ball, and characters (who are all pickles of course), and you draw cards that help you move and hit the ball to specific spots for your opponents to then have to try and reach to return the rally. If you can't make a shot, or you're just wanting to spice up your game a bit, you can always draw a Long Shot card. Some are great! Like Dicey Slicey, while others aren't so great, like Negative Self-Talk.

The market positioning

We see it as a fun casual game that would be well-suited as a great addition to someone's regular game night, a game fit for the whole family, or a great gift for anyone with a pickleball fan in their life.

From a game market perspective, we see this as sitting in the 'casual' segment of sports games, with its run-time averaging around 30 minutes, and suitable for 2-4 players (though we're working on a single player version, as well as a possible expansion with 'ref rules' to get it up to 5 players).

Because of the subject-matter and design approach, we also see it as having mass-market potential that could be attractive beyond Pickleball enthusiasts. From game design to copy, to artwork, we've tried to strike the balance between something that's geared towards adults, but still accessible for younger players.

The game's been through 13 iterations with countless play-tests and feedback sessions with everyone from regular gamers, to pickleball enthusiasts, to older fans of the game to make sure the rules, tone, humour, and art aren't exclusionary.

We've also engaged with a variety of manufacturers in Europe, the US, and China, 3rd party logistics companies, and countless board game designers and indie publishers to understand strategy, areas of challenge, and potential unexpected rabbit holes that might get in our way.

In the coming weeks, we'll dig into all of this and more. If you'd like to follow our journey, subscribe! And if you'd like to help support HotShot Pickleball's launch, head here to sign-up, and here to get notified when our kickstarter goes live!

Now without further ado, here are some other crowdfunding projects we think are great this week!

🛶 New Arrivals

🏞️ We All Take from the River (72%): A game of environmental diplomacy! 👉 Kickstarter

🃏 Symptomatic The Card Game (89%): A card game of sickness, survival, and betrayal for 3-8 players. 👉 Kickstarter

🗼 TOKYO CAPSULE HOTEL (146%): It's the next TOKYO SERIES tabletop game featuring real time bartering, hand drawn land subdivisions, and of course capsule hotels! 👉 Kickstarter

📓 Cairn 2e Boxed Set (159%): Explore a dark and mysterious wood filled with strange folk, hidden treasure, and unspeakable monstrosities in this ttrpg boxed set. 👉 Kickstarter

🦄 Mythwind Reprint & New Content (❗623%): A singleplayer and cooperative cozy board game with asymmetric characters, magical sprites, persistent world and an unending adventure. 👉 Kickstarter

🐾 Woof Days, Cat Days and Dino Days: Easy Coffee Table Games (❗458%): Fill your week with your favourite animals. Battle it out against your friends with these 3 fun card games that fit in your pocket! 👉 Kickstarter

🔭 Coming Soon

💿 One-Hit Heroes – Co-op Boss Battles With Only 1 HP!: TPick your hero and take down bosses to unlock card packs and power up. Save the world with just 1 HP in this co-op card game! 👉 Kickstarter

🏛️ Railroad Tiles: A game of tile placement and transportation network construction inspired by the critically acclaimed roll & write series Railroad Ink™👉 Kickstarter

🏰 Warlord: Saga of the Storm: Journey into the Accordlands with this brand new age of Warlord: Saga of the Storm, the trading card game you already know how to play. 👉 Kickstarter

That's all for this week!

Know a game that's launching or just want to say hello? Get in touch! 📮