Seize the Bean - A Light-Hearted Deck Builder about Berlin!

Mini-Update for Mid-November
about 5 years ago – Sat, Nov 16, 2019 at 12:56:05 AM

Hey everyone! As promised, we’re trying a mini-update to mark the middle of the month. We’ll try to keep it quite short (especially for anyone who feels we email or update too much).  

Currently, we have finalized and uploaded 16 out of 90 files to our manufacturer, Panda. Y’all may not know this but with all the languages there are a whopping 90 files that must be sent to the printer! :O In the next regular-sized update, we’ll share a more detailed overview of all those files for those that are interested. Most of the not-yet-uploaded files are final, but still being carefully checked by our team before uploading. One exception to that is that there are a few very minor changes to do to the card files before uploading (for example: we are swapping two pieces of artwork, based on proofing feedback).

We are currently halfway through our FINAL polish pass of the main rulebook. This is big news because finalizing both rulebooks is the last barrier before English print files can be called 100% done. To clarify, last update we announced that the text is done, so it's just graphics and polishing left to do. We’ll need to follow up with the variant rulebook after. Currently it's unclear if that'll go faster or slower... it is longer but there are some details that make the main rulebook more complex.

All translations are still in-progress but they are going well, and there is nothing major to report there at this time. However, for Spanish specifically, we are happy to say that our friends at Meeple Foundry will be helping to ensure the quality of the Spanish translation! We know people are anxious to see translations when they are done, and if we can do this without causing delays we’ll certainly consider it. As of now it’s unclear if that’s possible.

Lastly, based on estimates from our manufacturer it does not look like we’ll dodge Chinese New Year. We don’t know this for sure yet, but we want to make that statement now, to set everyone up with the right expectations.

Thank you everyone, and see you in the next update in 2 weeks! 

All English Text & Development Done, Delivery News & New Update Frequency
about 5 years ago – Fri, Nov 01, 2019 at 02:57:20 AM

Happy Halloween! We realize not everyone celebrates this holiday but we enjoy a bit of dress up and make-believe, it all helps to relieve stress, which can be important at this, post-SPIEL time of year!

Here’s a brief overview of our progress:

Want more information about the above? Scroll to the end of the update for a break down of each category in the progress table. 

We know that we write long updates. ;) So for anyone who doesn’t want to read the whole thing, here is the summary for you:

• We share some ideas below how we can fix the often late Kickstarter updates.
   
• We finished all of the English text & development in the whole game. Hooray, finally!
   
• Updated delivery news based on our current progress.
   
• Example images of how the game components fit in the box.
   
• Short pic and update from our time at SPIEL.
   

For further details (and awesome pictures!) please read more below. :)

We’d like to address the fact that we missed sending out an update at the end of September. In fact, a few backers have reminded us that we implied there would be more frequent updates now that we’re near the end. So what happened?

As you’ll read below, in order to have a better chance of getting the games out of the factory before Chinese New Year (and thus, get them to you all 1 month earlier) we really need to focus. Every day counts. It may not seem like it, but with a small team, the time we take to communicate often sets us back multiple days in our progress due to people’s different work schedules and ways of working.

Regardless of this, we don’t mean to pose it as an excuse. We’re very sorry to let people down and give the impression we’ve gone “silent”. We certainly haven’t! We are right here, working every day, and despite the long journey we are all very excited to be so close to the finish line!

Other backers gave the idea that we could’ve sent a mini-update stating we are busy and a full one will come later. We agree.

As well, backers reminded us that since the project has been long delayed, updates are very important – even mini ones – to help with confidence and trust. We take this seriously too, and agree very much.

Going forward what we want to do is send out mini-updates, every 2 weeks. These will be a quick bullet list of what is going on and when to expect bigger updates. The bigger updates will not be on a schedule, but will come when we reach milestones, such as having the project in print.

This is a new process for us, and so it may not work. But we want to try because we hear your feedback loud and clear and we really do not want to let you down, especially when it comes to communication.

Please don’t hesitate to provide your input or feedback on this new idea in the comments. If it doesn’t work for you all then there is no point in us doing it!

Finally, at last, we have the text done for the entire project! This includes both rulebooks. This is a huge milestone for Seize the Bean. Now we can proceed to finish the graphic design of the rulebooks while translators run for the finish line.

Normally we share text-only versions of the rulebooks online via Google Documents. At the moment we won’t do this yet, as it costs us time setting up those files and they are most valuable for when we are requesting feedback (which we aren’t anymore). That said, we will do our best to share either a text or a graphical version of the rulebook if and when we can.

(If you have any thoughts or requests regarding this topic feel free to put them in the comments!)

We’d like to quickly note that all development is done by now. We successfully tested the remaining aspects of the game, including higher player count compatibility and take that stress testing. The most notable test was a 6 player game with 3 new players, 2 of our developers, and someone who had played before. We made sure our team used the Expert tokens and the familiar player used a Hard token. The new players announced at the end of the game that it felt very balanced!

We are beyond excited for you all to finally get the chance to play this game. Based on all our playtesting and demoing there is an overwhelmingly positive response to the gameplay as well as the components and art. Obviously this is always the risk with a Kickstarter project so we are pleased to state our confidence in that department! 

In the last update we wrote that “we intend to go to print in September” and thus announce a delivery date then. We missed this due to the complexity of finalizing the two rulebooks. There is a lot of text and a lot of collaboration between our development team, our production team, our graphic designers, and our translators. As with many aspects of the project, we have greatly underestimated the time it takes to do this without rushing it and risking quality.

Looking forward, here is a quick sketch of a timeline once manufacturing starts:

• Minimum 2 months in the factory.
   
• Minimum 6 weeks on boats.
   
• Minimum 2 weeks between customs and fulfillment starting.
   

This means that from the moment we start printing there will be about 4 months of wait. Chinese New Year is in February so if we cannot get games on boats before that it will add another month of waiting.

So when can you expect delivery?

1. If we finish translation in the next two weeks we can maybe dodge Chinese New Year and games would start arriving at the end of Q1 next year (end of February, more likely during March).
    
2. If we don’t finish translation in the next two weeks we will hit Chinese New Year and will deliver in Q2 next year (exact month unknown, but more like April or early May).
    

Currently, we are trying our very best with all resources dedicated to avoid overlapping with Chinese New Year. Unfortunately, due to our incorrect estimates during the course of the project, it is very likely we’ll need more than 2 weeks to finish and therefore the second option above is what you should all expect.

While we know this is not what you want to hear, we want to maintain full transparency. The good news here is that we have only one more major step between now and hitting the big “print” button. And once that happens there will be nothing more to estimate incorrectly or prevent us from a clear timeline.

Thank you everyone for your endless patience on this project and your generous belief in us. We will not let you down. And of course, as always, feel free to share your thoughts, your feedback, your complaints and your encouragement in the comments below!

Last update we noted that we wanted to show how things fit in the box. So let’s do it!

Many of the components have their own containers, so we start by putting them in there. 

Obviously, we suggest packing the cards in the card bags, resources in the resource bags, and all other components in left-over bags. We also like to store the resin first player tokens in player resource bags.

Once everything is sealed up in its own baggie or container we can begin packing the box...

Start by putting the sticker sheets in the box. 

After that, put the rulebooks in. 

Player boards go on top, to the side, with room for the cards. 

All of the cards fit wonderfully above the player boards, leaving lots of room for the other components.

We put in the resource and player bags so they’ll be a bit protected by the other items.

Continue with the second layer... 

All of the various tokens and resin bits fill the empty space quite perfectly. 

On top we add the playing mat (or mats, if you have both). 

The top fits just fine, as you can see above!

As you can see, the game weighs a ton, as we initially expected way back in 2018.

Yes, yes, we know: “But what about with sleeves?” Here's how you can pack it with sleeves: 

Using premium sleeves, we are still able to fit everything into the box, though it takes a bit more effort and careful packing. 

Here's a quick shot above to show that the box top still fits flush, even with sleeved cards.

Finally, you can see the weight with sleeves above. What a beast of a game!

Big thank you to everyone who came by at SPIEL. We really enjoyed seeing you! For those that wanted and expected to get their games, we are truly sorry we couldn’t honor your desires there. All we can say on the topic is that we are working hard to get the games to you, but your presence and energy helps us a lot. And despite being a small team, we had a lot of wonderful game runners who helped us demo many games including Seize the Bean at the event. 

We heard some requests from people to have more than one table with Seize the Bean. To clarify, we can’t do this because we now only have one prototype / pre-production copy of the game. It wouldn’t make sense to devote time to making or ordering more copies this close to finish. So hopefully this explains why we didn’t designate more table space to the game; we certainly would if we could, we desperately want you all to get a chance to play as soon as possible! 

As always, if you want a deeper look into our progress please see the detailed charts below. (Note that each item with a small, orange ‘tick’ next to it, indicates that we have noticeably progressed on that topic.)

Thank you everyone, and see you in the next mini update in 2 weeks!

PPC Arrived & Approved, Box Fit Test & SPIEL Update
about 5 years ago – Fri, Aug 30, 2019 at 11:53:40 PM

Hello everyone! Thanks for your patience with August’s update. We’ve been putting our entire team effort to completely finish files for mass production. And we’re almost there! Keep reading to see what’s left to do.

Here’s a brief overview of our progress:

What more information about the above? Scroll to the end of the update for a break down of each category.

We know that we write long updates. ;) So for anyone who doesn’t want to read the whole thing, here is a fast bullet list summary for you:

• The pre-production copy (PPC, aka the final sample) arrived and it’s gorgeous! We’ve approved it and the factory is ready to produce once we give them final files.
   
• We still have some files that need final graphics and text.
   
• All translations are nearly done and require proofing.
   
• Once submitted, the factory has to approve our final files.
   
• Unfortunately we cannot produce in time to have games at SPIEL.
   
• We still cannot announce a final, accurate delivery date until we go into print.
   
• That said: We intend to go into print next month (September)!
   
• If that goes as we hope it will, we should be able to announce a delivery date during September.
   

That’s a quick, summarized update. If you care for further details (and awesome pictures!) please read more below. :)

We’re incredibly pleased to say that the pre-production copy (PPC) arrived from our manufacturer and we were able to fully approve it! This is a big step and often where many projects have issues and delays. In our case, any changes and fixes were so minimal that they have already been done. We’ll note these below after we share some photos…

The box came out beautiful! It’s very high quality, sturdy and noticably smooth to touch. We are incredibly pleased with Panda’s work here.

We’re giving the box one vertically-designed side for those of you who like to store your games standing up (this also helps retailers too).

There was a lot of discussion about whether the other side should be vertical as well, allowing vertical storage to work no matter which way the front of the box faces. In the end we’ve decided that having at least two horizontal sides is quite nice when the box is laying down. While we are always curious to hear what people think about this topic, it’s important to note we’ll not be making any more changes.

We don’t depict the back of the box because it is one side we haven’t finished yet. We’ll share it once it’s done.

Let’s open the box…

Right, so this isn’t everything that comes with the game, obviously, since the PPC only includes printed and paper components. But already you can begin to see what a monster of a game Seize the Bean is!

The rulebook matches expectations and feels quite nice. (We did not order a variant rulebook because it’ll just be the same size and shape, with different cover and content. We did, however, order a blank one to do accurate box fit testing!)

The sticker sheets are great and came as expected. As the image caption says, unfortunately the PPC does not come with cut stickers. We did however run some tests ourselves, by printing the sheet on sticker paper in our office laser printer and then cutting out on the die lines to see how the labels fit the bags and the aprons fit the meeples. Our tests went well and we’ll share some details on that in a future update (we didn’t want to postpone this one further waiting for images).

The player boards are fantastic! We really love how they came out. Super sturdy, great material, and quality printing. The PPC did have a mistake in it: a missing cut out on the action icons (somehow the factory missed this die line in our files) but they promptly fixed it and sent us new player boards. Unfortunately we didn’t take studio shots of those but perhaps we’ll share them in a future update if need be.

(It’s worth noting that these PPC boards are laser cut so their edges are a bit rough. The final product will not have that effect!)

The punchboards are perfect. We are very pleased with them. As with a lot of these files, it’s important to note that some minor details on these PPC versions have changed already, but the material quality and printing are superb and won’t be shifted.

Let’s punch out some tokens, shall we?

Having the good teviews as actual, thick tokens for the first time has been amazing. We used them in our demos at Berlin Brettspiel Con and attendees just loved them. And we did get all the backer-created good review messages on the PPC files in time so as we played at Berlin Brettspiel Con many gamers were stopping to read out each good review they earned in the game. It was very funny, to say the least!

Typically when playing our team is actually using some of the fun items from the resin snack pack to mark our serving and hype track, but of course we made sure to include cardboard tokens for this for anyone who didn’t buy the resin pack.

Same thing here. Even though the resin bits were a free add-on for all backers, we included cardboard versions. (Also, if you look closely once you receive the game – or once we release the updated variant rulebook – you’ll note that we found a very neat variant that works with the cardboard tokens!)

As the caption says, these are used in a variant that we particularly love because it aligns with our value of awareness here at Quality Beast, rewarding players for embracing diversity. Also, who doesn’t like pandas and cookies?

During the campaign we made a resin snack pack, mostly for fun, at the request of backers. It started as an aesthetic thing, but eventually it made its way into a few variants. Because of that, we decided we wanted cardboard versions too, for anyone who didn’t get the resin pack to still be able to play those variants.

Also included in these are some cardbaord green bean tokens. Even though 10 resin green beans are included in the base game, we found that some games may require more than that if people go heavy on the Health Nuts customer group. Therefore we added some green bean tokens to represent higher values, lowering the chances players would run out of components.

Our testing of the difficulty levels for players and for the solo mode has been exceptionally successful. We are really excited to share more news about this in a future update (hopefully with some more gameplay videos from Dylan).

Due to the way that the die cuts worked on the punch boards we had some extra room so Mario did some lovely illustrations of café signs. These work for labeling your opponent, Starbots™, in solo mode, but they also work for labeling your own café in the solo scenarios where you are playing as various different establishments that aren’t based in Berlin.

Puuuuuh that is a lot of tokens. Hopefully this is showing all of you why we take so long for completion of the game. It’s just a massive chunk of work!

Base game cards. Sheesh. Loads and loads of them. The quality is fantastic and they were perfect. Absolutely no changes.

These are one of the few last things for our graphic design team to complete: the back side of these show a ridiculously small café board for those of you who want to play this game on the go (or in a real café) but are concerned about table space.

Don’t worry if you feel like that’s not enough reminder text with all the icons in the game… the back of the customer group awards and the back of both rulebooks will have a lot of reminder text too!

We’ll let you read about these in the variant rulebook (or maybe watch a gameplay video from Dylan in the future) but in short, the founders act as customers who you can optionally serve at the start of your serve step. Pretty neat for either enhancing customer abilities that you are playing with or even more so for adding a one-off ability to a game that otherwise doesn’t have it! Remi (one of our hardworking developers here at Quality Beast) and Dylan have had a really fun time polishing these for you all!

No explanation needed here. Do you really want robots serving coffee to the world? (Maybe so, actually…)

Wow, that was just the base game! Let’s take a quick look at the rest of the PPC, starting with  the sleeve…

We started with a 4-sided sleeve, which would slide over the game box. But after experimenting we decided we’d rather go with a 5-sided sleeve, similar to how a box-set of books is packaged.

One thing we still need to do regarding the sleeve is add a slight cut mark on the open end to make it easier to pull out the game. It may disturb the cleanliness of the graphic design but our production team strongly believes it is required for usability.

Onto the 5-6 player expansion…

Keep in mind, both the expansion and base game boxes (as well as the sleeve) will all have minor details which have already been changed. At the time of ordering the PPC we wanted to give enough of the completed files to get samples but we didn’t want to delay the process by waiting for final files. This is not the typical approach but our manufacturer agreed, that for “easy” print components like the boxes, cards, boards and tokens this is totally suitable.

Also (as mentioned briefly above) please note that we didn’t show the back of either box because we are finalizing those designs now. That is one of the last major pieces for us to complete besides the two rulebooks.

Here you see how the founder cards are packaged… in a booster pack wrapping.

With the base game, add-on customers and the extra founders the game comes to a huge quantity of cards, 645 in total! (We’ll 100% confirm this number for those of you who want to buy sleeves once we go into print. That way you know nothing else changes.)

Whoosh! We have a PPC and it’s terrific! We did mention there were some minor changes, so here are those:

• Player boards need another sample round but this is already done by now!
   
• Add a cut out in the sleeve to allow easy removal of the game box. (We don’t need to sample this, just update the die lines on the file.)
   
• Adjustment of the sticker die lines to make the apron stickers a little larger. (We’ll talk more about this in a future update but the important thing here is that it also doesn’t require a sample round.)
   

From a production standpoint, we are ready when it comes to the materials, sampling and factory preparation. All that is left is to finalize files!

So what is left to do? Here’s a short list of what we’re working on now:

• Minor graphical adjustments to the base game, expansion box and sleeve.
   
• Back of both boxes need a finalized concept and the graphic design done.
   
• The final cards need to be regenerated after some minor changes we made during the last months.
   
• Both rulebooks have a few last pieces of English text that need to be edited / added.
   
• Diagrams and examples for rulebooks need to be finalized and polished (but all of them are done in draft format).
   
• Our manufacturer has to approve all English files so we can copy them for translation.
   
• Our translators need to 100% finish (they are all very far along though).
   
• Also they need to complete proofing (most of them are proofing as they go, so to not lose time later).
   
• Lastly, we need to take all translations and add them to files and submit them.
   
•  When that’s approved we hit print!
   

We are very much at the tail end now and we are incredibly excited to be this far. We aim to go into print in September but we’ll confirm this once we get closer to submitting final files!

We tried our very best to make this work but unfortunately this is not going to be possible. We are very sorry for this but that is why we announced it as a goal, not as an estimate. Please stay tuned for future updates where we’ll announce an accurate and final shipping date once we go into print.

That being said, please come by our booth (#5H102 in Hall 5) at SPIEL so you can see the final PPC of the game and give it a play if you haven’t already!

A quick note for those that care: we did a box fit test where we tried to get everything (and we mean everything) into the base game box. We are pleased to say everything fits! Yes, we tested with sleeves. And yes, we tested with premium sleeves too! We wanted to share some imagery but we didn’t want to postpone this update any further, so we’ll touch on this topic again in a future update, with images!

As always, if you want a deeper look into our progress please see the detailed charts below. (Note that each item with a small, orange ‘tick’ next to it, indicates that we have noticeably progressed on that topic.)

Thank you everyone, and see you in the next update!

New PNP Release, Variant Rulebook & Gameplay Videos
over 5 years ago – Mon, Jul 08, 2019 at 03:06:31 AM

Wow, we have been busier than ever! As usual, we are hard at work over here pushing Seize the Bean to the finish line. This is the second part of the two-part update we sent some weeks ago and we misspoke in that update saying this part would come later that week. We’re sorry for any confusion this caused but it’s here now and we hope you’ll be pleasantly surprised and satisfied with its contents!

As always, here is a brief overview of where we are:

Also as always, for further progress details, you can scroll to the end of the update.

Before we dive in, we want to first share some news that is explicitly tied to getting the game into your hands. Many of you have asked "where is the finish line" and one of the major things we need to get past is the approval of the PPC...

What on earth is a PPC? (We are going to include this question every time we mention it, so apologies if you already know by now.) A “PPC” is the pre-production copy of the game which we receive from our manufacturer, Panda. In other words, the PPC is the hand-made paper version of the game, including the box, rulebook, cards, boards and tokens. Before we can print the game, not only do we have to be 100% done with all the print files but we also have to approve the final paper quality and dimensions and cut marks related to every component.

The exciting news is that the PPC tracking says it is arriving this week! We are very excited to see it and our fingers are crossed there are no major changes required. We’ll keep you all up-to-date as much as we can once we’ve had some time to pour through it. (Please note this doesn’t mean we’ll send another update next week as we will likely be busy communicating with our manufacturer about the PPC.)

Yes! At last, at last, the print and play is here. We realize this has taken quite a lot longer than we expected or shared or hoped but if you download the print and play we think you’ll see why. It’s massive (a whopping 176 pages)! Onto the point: how can you download the print and play?

As usual we have a public version of the print and play available on our placeholder website for Seize the Bean. You can access that here: http://pnp.seizethebean.com. That link can shared as much as you want. It’s a public version. But please note that this public version only has 11 Customer Groups (thus supporting the 2 Districts showcased in the Gameplay Preview videos below, Kreuzberg and Neukölln). 

If you want to access the full print and play you’ll need to download the private version. This is only accessible to backers (and anyone who purchased it afterwards for a few euros). We are emailing and messaging out links for it now so please write to us at [email protected] if you didn’t receive a link by Monday evening (July 8th, Berlin time).

We are ready to release v0.2.0 of the Variant Rulebook. As with the main Rulebook in the last update, here are some important notes about this release (some of which are copied and pasted from the last update because they identically apply to the Variant Rulebook too):

•  This is a text-only version. Yes, we have a lot of progress on the full, graphical version, but it is not ready for release yet.
•  There are almost no images in this rulebook. That does not mean we don’t have and are not working on images, just that they aren’t ready for release.
•  The examples are not fully written, and those that are written are not polished and may have some typos / mistakes. We did not want to delay the release of this version any longer, so we decided this is OK. That being said, as soon as we polished the examples up (and provided images) we’ll release an updated version.
• As always we are looking forward to hear your feedback!

Here is the Variant Rulebook link: http://variantrulebook.seizethebean.com

We’ve talked a lot about our graphical work on both rulebooks but haven’t shown you much. Here are some quick screenshots below to give you an idea of the visual style we’re working on.

Whoosh! That's a lot of work. Hopefully this quick peek into the Rulebook layout has given you some ideas of what the final outcome will be like and all the effort and love being poured into it not only looking good, but reading clearly too.

Speaking of previews, we promised some gameplay previews in the last update. We know that due to our delays it’s hard to keep your excitement for the game. We hope to put an end to that and rekindle your spirits when you see a bit more of the gameplay that we’ll be bringing you in the finished version of Seize the Bean.

For now we’ve created some playlists on our Quality Beast YouTube channel which we’ll be adding to if and when we film more gameplay previews. We don’t have any shoots scheduled so for now we’ll have to leave that open-ended.

Here are the 14 videos we’ve managed to shoot and upload so far:

As always, if you want a deeper look into our progress please see the detailed charts below. (Note that each item with a small, orange ‘tick’ next to it, indicates that we have noticeably progressed on that topic.)

Thank you everyone, and see you in the next update!

PPC Ordered, Production Update & Delivery Update
over 5 years ago – Tue, Jun 18, 2019 at 02:09:44 AM

Hello wonderful backers! Thank you for your patience and understanding as we took a bit more time this month to get an update over to you. As promised in the comments it’s a big one, so we’ll actually be breaking it into 2 separate updates.

Update Part 1:

Delivered now (you’re reading it!) and includes:

• News about the pre-production copy (PPC) of Seize the Bean... 
• ...an exciting production update...
• ...and finally a delivery update! 

Update Part 2

The next half of this massive update will come later in the week and will include:

• A new print and play (PNP) release…
• ...the first public release of the Variant Rulebook (containing solo mode rules)...
• ...and a few gameplay videos to show what development has been completing!

We hope you are as excited about all of this content as we are. Now let’s jump in!

As always, here is your progress snapshot of where we are.

We know some of you wanted a timeline break down and while we do include a delivery plan update below we do not have the ability to share detailed timeline information in this update. Our apologies about this point! If you want more details please see the end of this update for further, broken-down charts! :)

Let’s start with this since it is likely the #1 topic all of you want to hear about. Please note that we do not have a new delivery date set in stone yet. Everything you read now is a goal or an estimate that we are striving for. Please treat it as such! That being said, we are hearing too much speculation in the Kickstarter comments about delivery dates and we know you’ve all been very patient so we want to be 100% transparent. We are currently targeting a delivery around October. Our hope is that we could overlap the fulfillment with a SPIEL pick-up option. We know many people requested this in the past so if we can offer it and save you some money we’d love to.

Obviously this is past the previously announced delivery date. Once again, this is not final. It could be that we deliver earlier or later than this. You might wonder why it’s so hard for us to pin down a final date. While we can’t explain all of the challenges in a single update we can say that once we begin printing the final game files we’ll be able to share a much more accurate delivery date. Despite this reality, we are very sorry that you have to wait so long and we only hope the following Part 2 of this update (coming in the next few days) will help to rekindle and maintain your excitement by showing off some long-awaited gameplay details!

If you have any questions or concerns about this news at all please do not hesitate to leave us comments or email us directly at [email protected]. We are here to hear all of your feedback and to work out any issues during the course of this project.

Also, before anyone asks: no, we will not be selling the game to anyone until after backers and other pre-order customers have received their copies. Retailers and distributors will have their copies shipped to them after backers and pre-order customers have been sent theirs. And if we make it for an October delivery and bring copies to SPIEL we will prioritize backers and pre-order customers for pick-up. Any leftover copies after that may be available to the public, but we are very aware of the bad feeling backers can get if they don’t have their copy of a game yet and they see it out in the wild. 

With the heavy and more serious news out of the way let’s share something that our team finds quite exciting! Be honest: are you tired of this damn brown sugar yet?! 

We are so pleased with the final version that our manufacturer, Panda, has produced. The transparency, the color… everything is perfect. We are 100% done with this component and that marks the completion of all non-printed aspects of the game. It’s important to note that the final sampling of the brown sugar did not delay us at all. Though, that is not to say that it wasn’t a historical journey for us and for Panda. As it turns out, they ended up doing 8 different samples over the course of the project, which is more than they have done for any other piece like this in the history of their company.

We are very honored that they’ve put in so much work and love to Seize the Bean and we are confident you’ll feel it once you open the box!

With all the non-printed components 100% done and in production we move onto finalizing the print components. This is the last thing standing in our way to complete this game!

Last week we have finished preparing and approving all the files for our PPC. You may still be wondering what is a PPC? It’s a pre-production copy of the game, which includes hand-made cards, player boards, box, etc, which our manufacturer, Panda, sends to us to verify all of the quantities, sizing and material choices.

The creation of the PPC files was a huge undertaking for our team. Since Seize the Bean involves so many cards that each have their own configuration of text, art and iconography, we’ve needed a way during development to quickly produce new prototypes. To solve this challenge we built our own software which automates a majority of the process.

Check out this video above for a glimpse into the process. It’s pretty cool if you like nerding out on how technology can be used to design, develop and produce a board game!

We do not have an exact delivery date yet, but we should be seeing the PPC in the next few weeks. Once we have it, and have approved it, we are cleared on their end to put the whole game into production. On our end we will need to be sure our files are final, and that is what we are working on now, and until the PPC arrives.

As with the last update, we’ll sign off here, leaving you with some detailed charts below to get a deeper look into our progress. (Note that each item with a small, orange ‘tick’ next to it, indicates that we have noticeably progressed on that topic.)

Thank you everyone, we’ll see you again in a few days with Part 2 of this chunky update!