We're plugging away here at Exploding Goat Games. As I mentioned in the last update, we're in the birthing stages of creating our own core gaming system that is dynamic and interesting enough to make for great gaming, yet versatile enough so that we can lay "templates" over it and create new games around it. This is no small task, but Kermit the Rules Breaking Overlord is on the project and we're confident that the basics thusfar fit the bill. We hope to have it publicly play-testable sometime in the mid-spring 2010. We don't have any details to release just yet, but we'll be dropping teasers out as we can.
In the more immediate future, we've had a major new development in one of our game concepts. Several years ago, we conceived of a little game called Gearmageddon. Gearmageddon is a tabletop miniature car combat game that we wanted to keep fast-paced and fun. The project got lost in a bit of a shuffle, but life was breathed back into this project by a good friend of ours, Carl Fazzina. Carl has the unique ability to throw EVERYTHING he has into a game. Some might call it an unhealthy obsessive compulsive disorder.. we call it good gaming. Well, Carl went on a tear and came up with a truly phenomenal core system. We've taken the helm on this one and are headlong into the playtest phase.
The basic mechanics are very smooth and simple. You'll need some cars, d6's, d8's, and d10's, pen, paper, tape measure, and terrain. For cars, we've been focusing on 1/64 scale BattleMachines by Jada, but also have a smattering of Maisto and other vehicles in the garage. You can even play it with HotWheels or Matchbox cars, so it doesn't cost an arm and a leg to get launched into it.
Players start off by building cars. There are several different basic types of vehicle, each of with the basic stats and capabilities. You then "purchase" weapons, upgrades, armor, and the like through load and hard point caches that are dependent upon the type of core vehicle you're using. Once you spend a few minutes building these vehicles (don't worry, the basic game will have some templates so you can play right away), you put 'em into the mix and start shooting each other to pieces.
We've playtested with 2 players up to 8 players and the general game time runs between 1 and 1 1/2 hours. Its simple enough to run at conventions and we find that there's more smack talk and laughter around this game that we know what to do with...
I'll be posting playtesting pics in the near future and we're hoping to have this game out at Cold Wars in March 2010 (that's just 4 short months away). We're investigating options for manufacturing card decks (for weapons, upgrades and armor, as well as driver cards), as well as special templates. While we're still eons away from manufacturing miniatures, we're looking into the possibility of stocking some of the nicer die-cast vehicles.. but those are still in the pipe and nothing has been solidified as of yet.
Well, that's about it for now.. hopefully I'll have pics available within a week.
