Welcome to Meeple to Meeple uniting players around the world, a 30 minute exploration of PJ and Gareth's four-game experiences from across both sides of the Atlantic. Each episode, they share their thoughts and opinions on the World of War games, including their favorite themes, games, hot topics, and much, much more. Hey, guys, and welcome to episode 71, Fled. Can you escape as always? I'm PJ. And I'm Gareth. And today we've got a special guest.
We've got the designer of the up and coming game that's going to be launched tomorrow on Kickstarter, Mark Swanson of Fled. How are you, Mark? Pretty good. How you guys doing? Great. We're glad to have you on. It's great to finally meet you. Yeah, it's good to be here. And then to discover that we're like an hour away from each other as far as where we live, which is so cool. We totally need the game. Let's. Yeah, that. Yeah. No, I've got no FOMO on that. Missing out, no more gaming.
Happens to be all, all around where PJ lives. But yeah, so Mark, we've been, I've seen fled appear on my socials over the last month or two. He's definitely been dialling up. And with the launch, it's the 5th of March at 2:00 PM UK time. I think it was 9:00 AM Eastern Time. That's right, do. You want to give us an overview of of Fled and the concept behind it?
Yeah, sure. Well, I based the game after Spike Island, which is a British Fort turned island prison off the South Coast of Ireland. I mean, maybe you've you've heard of that? Place, Googling, Googling. Now I'm clearing out some. Basically Poland's Alcatraz. And so back in the mid 1800s, the British government sent young lads there for minor infractions like stealing a potato during the Irish Potato famine, and fled is like a game of that I've always wanted to make, you know, I've always
loved movies about escape. So you know, like obviously Shawshank Redemption comes to mind, but also some old old ones. Count of Monte Cristo's The Escape movie, Escape from Alcatraz. And so another thing that kind of motivated me is one of the very first Euro style games that I ever played that kind of introduced me to the hobby was a lighter weight game called Cartagena, which is a is a pirate LED jailbreak from a
fortress. I, you know that was back in the early 2000s I I played the game and inside the box there was a pamphlet on other Euro style games. I'm like this, this is different than American games and that's what launched me into the hobby. And so in a way, this is kind of a tribute to the very first Euro that I played as well. And what? So you're you're escaping from the from the Victorian prison, It's two to four players. Yes, well, there's a there's a solo and multiplayer variant as
well. So technically 124 players. But you know, I I first started thinking about this when when I when I played Carcassonne many many years ago. I love tile placement games and so at some point I began to envision a modular tile placement mechanic where like a prison would grow as the game progressed and every tile in the game is a a dual purpose tile that can be played to to form the prison or traded to secure the tools that you need to
escape. And I think I've been watching the the How to Play video and I think actually it's 6 by 6 left to right and 6 by 6 above. So it really does grow like those Carcassonne maps, and I think the tiles are they can be windows, they can be doors. So you're trying to build out the the prison that both suits yours, I guess your escape route, but also hinders other people as well? Right. There are warders, as they used to call them, wardens or guards in the game.
And you can play a tile with a little whistle on it that activates the one of the warders in the game. And then you can move that guard closer to your opponent in in hopes of shackling that person to essentially slow them down or eventually sending them back to to their bunk. So you you have to kind of balance thwarting your opponent's progress without making your own progress.
It really looks like the the as a map grows out you've got that every round you have to play a tile that's mandatory out of your hands and then you have to use tiles for their he's got, it's got different icons so you can use some for soaring through bars which I think it's the file and you've got the boots to walk in through through pathways so you've got that whole what tile do I play to move on but at the same time you need to keep the
tiles back to to progress. It's a really fine boundaries. That's right. You're kind of navigating your way through a labyrinth of corridors and rooms, a mess hall, a yard, a a courtyard, different different rooms in the in the prison. And yeah, you you have different tools, like a a file or a key or a boot that allows you to move through an open corridor or through a locked door or
through, you know, bars. And you have to work your way to certain rooms so that you can find contraband like stamps or buttons that you then eventually will trade for the tools that you need to escape. So it's kind of like a first you look for contraband, then you trade them for the tools you need and then you are ready or in a position to make it over the wall. And do people always escape? Not always, I would say. Most of the games.
I mean, my wife won't play this all the time now, and it's it's almost, I'd say 90% of the time that we escape. OK, well, both of us escape because one person can escape and then everyone else has one extra turn. Usually multiple players can escape, but it's the one that earns the most victory points that wins. So I'm really curious about. So you have the chaplain, which is kind of a helpful warder, but what's the story with the Combs?
Gareth and I are both bald men, so we don't we don't relate to Combs. So, so any, you know any life in prison is hard. So anything that's kind of a luxury item like stamps or buttons, you know that that prisoners have to use alternative currency, right. So a a a grooming tool or or a stamp or a button, those are, you know, you can trade those essentially for other more valuable items like a key, a a warder's key. And so that's, yeah, that's the story behind the comb.
OK. And and each Each contraband item is related to a particular room. So Combs can be found in in in the washroom. Plum cake can be found in the mess hall. A stamp can be found in a bunk, so there's kind of a thematic association with the contraband that you're collecting. So since you brought it up, I've got to ask, how does one Shank someone with a plum cake? Yeah, you're you're referencing Ryan Creighton from Nice around the table.
He he, he he loves to put fun here and there, but he he, he used that phrase, take taking a plum cake to to Shank your opponent, just to kind of allude to I guess more some of the more sinister things that happened. Happen in prison. Yeah, right. Right. And we said it's two to, well, one to four, four players. Any difference in scaling? Does it play well 2-3 and four or is there any any any rule, mechanics or anything change?
So, so in the three and four player game you actually play with six more tiles to accommodate more players. But so it plays really well with 2-3 or four. And then yeah, I've worked hard to develop the solo player variant this which which introduces a a ghost called the Spectre, which is actually based on a ghost in Spike Island that is part of history. So all you know, all of the elements of the game relate to some aspect of the prison's
history. I need to go and do some research on Spike Island. In the back of the rule book there's actually names every every meatball colour is related to an actual character in history that was imprisoned at Spike Island and 11. Fella for instance was guilty of stealing a he, the constable of in England, caught him for stealing a pint of milk and then later he steal He stole an entire cow and so he went to Spike Island.
Another fella was was caught for being married to two women at one time and you know, of course bigamy was not allowed. So Spike Conan do when? Spike Island you won't. I'm just looking at photographs of it now. I mean, it's incredible, stunning scenery and the and the size of it. How did you learn about Spike Island? Like, how did you learn about this story and then decide I'm going to write, make a game
around this? Well, like I said, I've always been interested in prison movies and I was looking at, you know, world famous prisons and stumbled onto Spike Island and started reading about the history and found it fascinating. And it it it's kind of tragic because you know, in this case we're rooting for the prisoners because more often than not they were thrown in there for stuff that we would just kind of roll our eyes at.
So you know the the the the British guards are the kind of the villains in no offense Gareth, but the the villains in the game and you're rooting for for the prisoners some of them which were you know 1516 year olds that were were you know were down on their luck and had to swipe a a potato that's. Interesting. Yeah. I'd never heard of this story, and I'm a historian, so I'd never heard this. I was looking up. I was like, I wonder how, how do you find this, this?
It seems kind of obscure and hidden but so fascinating, so that that's pretty cool. Is there Was there a book that you discovered or was it just kind of like a specific inspiration or? Yeah, several, several books. And. And some, of course, some online literature too. Sure, I can't remember a habit lying around here somewhere, but I'll have to. Yeah, I'll have to tell you about it. Have you spoken to the prison themselves? Have you spoken to the the prison themselves to get any
research? Out of them. No, no, they, you know, Spike Island has a website. And so I I. Did. Research from them. In fact, I'm I'm hoping to actually visit Spike Island on on a future trip to Ireland. Yeah, I must admit it. It looks. It does, Yeah. Good. A bit of history I never knew anything about. So there we go. There's a whole part of of Ireland I need to go and do some visiting to. How long has the the game taken to design from to to the point today? Over a year.
OK. Yeah. Anything about the design process that's been challenging or or which has it been a smooth experience from you from AI guess from concept through to testing through to today? Well, anytime I do, I do a design I4. Things are super important to me. The story, the mechanics of the game, the art and then production value. You know you have to have a killer theme. Unique mechanics spectacular art. And Clemens Franz is the artist
of this game. He's you've probably known from Agrikala, Caverna, Lahav recently, Boone Lake. Just amazing style and then quality bits. You know, I I these meatballs have UV printing that are that where the it's actually engraved in the wood itself. Oh, OK. Not like a, you know, a. Silkscreen. Screen where where it's kind of like a glossy sticker applied to the meatball. I don't, I don't like that. I I like.
I like stuff that's either layered on there as a an actual print, like a two or three color print, or if there's multiple colors, I think UV is the best. Because the because the images, I think that's what when I first saw the images of appearing like this say Instagram, they really pop. Like the the little characters, the wardens and the the convicts, those shots of them inside their cells just really stands out as a as, as artwork on their own.
And I say you do you do recognise Clemens Fran's work as soon as you see it. So was that was that, was that a straight yes from from him in terms of doing the artwork? It's funny because when I call Clemens or didn't call him, I actually emailed him. I didn't know what kind of response I would get. You know, here's this world famous artist and and and right off the bat he said, Oh yeah, I know you. Yeah, you're you did feud him. I said oh oh wow, maybe I'm the famous one.
But it was great. And I and so he said I'm in. I mean, I I got to believe that like there are hundreds of folks that want him to design their game. So I felt, I felt great about amazing meeting him via e-mail and then working with him. It's been a breeze. So he's very responsive. He works quickly. He's extremely polite and professional. It's it's been a joy to work with him. And how much of A brief do you give?
Do you just give the concepts of the game and and some style or does that come from, yeah, not being an artist? Or all the artists that I work with though if you could hear them talk they they would tell you that I probably over deliver when it comes to reference material because I'm very particular, you know I like to direct my creative very closely. I I allow for the artist's style and uniqueness to shine through. I don't try to be you know push their pen so to speak.
But I do have but I'm familiar with their work and so with Clemens you know he his his style is very unique and pretty consistent but there are some deviations So I had to kind of home in on a particular style that that he has done and show
him references of his own work. This is the kind of work I like this is what and almost pretty good about following that and very open minded when I said could you do this a little bit more and and then of course at the last minute almost almost the 11th hour I said hey you know I've been thinking about a plane mat people have been asking about a plane mat. He he delivered that you know 11th hour and it looks right stick. So I'm excited about the plane.
Mat, I can't wait. So we've talked about the story. We've talked about, I guess, the art and design, how's the production? So this goes Live Today, which is the day of the day of the shoe. What can backers expect in terms of production? In terms of how long it will take to produce. Yeah, and and I guess components and is there, is there a deluxe copy or is it just a straight standard copy for everybody else? Yeah, yeah, no.
There are three reward levels. There is the Kickstarter edition that comes with all the stretch goals, which will be unveiled as certain goals are earned. And then the stretch goals have to do with historic aspects of the prison. So Clemens designing tiles that are specifically related to the history of the of the of the prison.
And that, and that's what a lot of a lot of backers have told me, that they like stretch goals that have to do with gameplay, not superfluous extras, but they want the gameplay to be enhanced. So that's what I focused on. There are. So there are. There's the main reward level, and then there's a reward level with the solo variant, and then there's the reward level with the main game, the solo variant, and the play net. Nice. So what is your favorite feature
of Fled? Whether it be a rule or a component or anything in the game, that's your personal favorite that you're really proud of. Well, I I love games that that truly have unique mechanics. You know, I mean, there's nothing wrong with the usual affair of area control and worker placement and action programming or or hand optimization. I mean, you name it, there's a a slew of mechanics out there. But I think it's important to set a game apart with something
that hasn't been done before. You know, games, games have multiple cogs that work together to run the machine. But if you can make one of those cogs unique, then you're on to something. And so with Fled, there's this element of a dual use tile, where you have a tile in your hand, a series of five tiles, and any one of them could be
placed to expand the prison. But then you could also need to hold some back because they have a contraband or tool icon on them that you might be able to use in in a better way. So there's this, this management of resources and tiles in your hand that you're you're thinking about and then the order of playing them becomes very important and I think that's kind of unique And so I hope people will will get excited about that and discover all the strategies when they play.
I think when I watch the, when I watch the playthrough, that's the bit that I was like, oh that's the that's the delicious decision making part. But I'm going to be in a bit of a spin here because this is going to be really useful. But if I give it that up, then I'm not going to deal with this. And how much forward planning can you do? How many rounds could I? Two or two or three? How if I'm? 11 So after you lay a tile in in the prison, you play two more actions and replenish your hand.
And one of the actions that you can do is let's say there's a tile that you really would like to use, but you don't. It's it's premature. You want to use it later. 11 Action is you can surrender that tile to the Governor now. Later on, when you're replenishing your hand, one of the tiles can be replenished from the Governor's inventory. You can take back the tile you had previously put there.
However, while it's in the Governor's inventory, some other players could potentially grab that tile. So it's kind of a temporary place to store something you might need later, but look out it someone else might. Grab it. High risk, high risk strategy, yeah. Another thing I saw was the the way that if you get caught then you get the the ball in chain.
Right, right. If if if you play a whistle tile and move a warder onto an opponent's space, then you get to draw from one tile from their hand, flip it over and then it adds it. It it connects right to that player's prisoner tile and it depicts that prisoner with a little shackle and you can you know it it it it just simply means that that player has a -1 victory point at the end of the game. But if that player gets caught again, he has to go all the way back to his bunk.
He is de shackled at that time but now he's kind of has to start the central location again. So it it it's forgiving in the sense that you can kind of start over again, but it doesn't necessarily, you know, devastate you. Because with the right tools, you can navigate pretty quickly around the prison, especially with spoons. Spoons allow you to kind of tunnel multiple tiles away, so if you have a couple of spoons in your hand, you can, you know, shoot across the prison pretty
quickly. Yeah, I do like that The 11 spoon or two spoons or you can make a musical instrument was was also an option on the on the video. Yeah, I think, I think, I think that's the thematic part of it, whether it's the the the shackle which is when you flip flip it over and you you build out that piece versus you know the files, it all fits together really smoothly. When when do you think this will ship? I know that's a tricky one with the Kickstarter.
How far away is this? A year or is this? Yeah, no. Well, so it all kind of comes down to the manufacturer and whether or not all of your I's are dotted and T's are crossed. And so I have once once the campaign funds knock on wood, then it's usually a six or seven month process. So you know, I I pull you know, a month after the campaign goes by, all the orders are confirmed through backer kit and then I pull the trigger with Panda.
And then Panda will take you know 6-6 months essentially to have it ready to ship to all the worldwide hubs. So that means that it could ship as early as September. Yeah, nice. Fingers crossed. That would be amazing. Great. What did you learn from the feudal campaign? Because I think you did three or four, right? Yeah, Feudal was my first baby. It it, you know, its its
popularity took me by surprise. Truthfully, it was kind of a a game that kind of combined my love of medieval fantasy with my growing love of strategic Euros. It's also kind of echoed my obsession with economic games that reward resource management. But the the success of it has caused me to do 3 print runs and and now I'm doing a fourth print run in the form of the Centennial edition of the game on Game Found.
And it's going to feature, you know, some art additions to the board, a special clockwork behemoth, and a few other surprises. But I've learned basically everything about the international game publishing
business that you can imagine. I mean in the early days I gleaned all the information I could from James Matthey's site Rest His Soul, as well as the Stonemire blog and other you know, fellow publishers that have kind of been there, done that and learned all about local is that, you know, localizing games internationally like Feudum is is in 11 different languages and our worldwide localization partners in in so
many different languages. I learned that there are very dedicated fans that will e-mail me and will it will will send me packages with their game expansion ideas. And you know, initially I was like, oh oh you know what, what are you doing? Get get a life. But then I realized, hey, these ideas are good and I found myself collaborating with with fans out there.
In fact, Rudders and Ramparts, which was a artisan edition set of castles and vessels, was all inspired by a very dedicated fan who sent me emails of drawings and painted miniatures and 3D sculptures that he and a sculptor worked on. And they were so amazing that I said, hey, I'm not going to ignore you this time, let's talk and and we collaborated and of course I gave gave them credit on the Rudders and Ramparts page and now I probably talked to him once a month. Amazing. That's awesome.
So what? Because you've learned. It sounds like you're you've learned so much. What one piece of advice would you give to a new designer getting ready to publish a game? I'm going to share, I think, the first sentence out of Jamie Stag Meyer's A Crowdfunders Guide to Kickstarter. You don't have to launch tomorrow. There's kind of this inane sense of urgency where people think, oh gosh, I better do everything quickly and get it out the door. But you have to have everything
ready. You know, you have to build a a presence on social media. You have to have a, you know, presence on Instagram and Twitter and Facebook and you know a website with a landing page and start collecting emails about people who are interested in your launch.
And that takes time. You have to go to the cons because you know, even if you don't have anything to sell or even if you don't have a prototype, going to the cons helps you understand the business better and you inevitably will meet people that play an instrumental role in your company's growth and you don't even see it coming.
You just go there and you meet people and you network and before you know it you're you're learning and you're you're better able to navigate the business and and so yeah you have to kind of immerse yourself. It's not. It's hard for it to be a part time thing, right? I think it's a shift. I've seen that. I guess I've been doing Kickstart since 2012 where people were doing it as a part time thing and they're the ones that often got in trouble.
But you know, these days you know the you say the prep work you see put in in, but that's the socials, whether it's play testing or just engagement like at cons, I'm thinking. Yeah, I think one of the biggest decisions that a would be entrepreneur has to make is do I want to self publish or do I want to what what they call speed date at a convention and talk to other indie publishers or even big publishers who will then enter into a royalty agreement.
So I either, let's say that I, let's say that Z Man Games meets me at a conference and they like my idea and they say we'll give you 5 to 7% royalties and we'll handle all the manufacturing, all the marketing, we'll take creative control of your game, we'll choose our own artist. And you know what? We're going to change a few rules as well.
You're OK with that and you're OK with getting 5 to 7% royalties, then you'd better hope that that game sells millions of copies because 5 to 7% is, you know, 5 to 7%. Or or alternatively, you do everything yourself and that is a lot of work. That's a lot. Of work, that is. You know, trying to figure it all out and and and you have to be smart about what you don't know. You have to understand. You have to be self aware and know what is good artwork.
You know you don't want to put out something that's shoddy. What are good mechanics? Had it had you know? Has the game been thoroughly play tested? Do you have a social media presence? Have you engaged with enough influencers and and and have you been on any podcasts like To Meatball for example? Thank you for that. Thank you. It is. I think it is that that you said that have you got a good story? Have you got the right design? Have you got the right artwork? And then the production.
There's this, those four alone. There's a shape of advice and guidance that you know that all of them are complex, even that production part that you say Panda, but people have tried so many different routes. Obviously people see things and visually quite quickly and you can, you know, you can start to lose traction. Just on the fact that the components are subpar. Yeah, it's a. It is a. It's a tricky 1 to navigate,
yeah for sure. I've got one last question for you, Mark. It's probably the most difficult question of the show. What is hitting your table right now? Oh wow. There's a game about throwing lavish parties in Victorian England called Obsession. We didn't we? Didn't prime you about this, did we? Promised we did not. So we we talk about obsession nearly every episode. It's a bit of an in joke that we talk about. Interesting. So. So yes. Tell us more about obsession. Yes.
Yeah. Well, I was, I was at a a local miniature market and I was waiting for a friend who was late. He was 10 minutes late, 20 minutes late. I'm like, OK And then just some random guy said, OK, we need another person at our table playing this game. I'm teaching him like, OK, I sat down, met a complete stranger. He taught me obsession along with a couple other folks. And it was, you know, Tableau built well, you know it, right? Yeah, we do.
Getting to boss a bunch of servants around, I guess, and throwing lavish parties and then you know, being self deprecating about being a rich American because you've kind of guessed these points if you're a rich American, uncouth American. But I I the, the theme of the game meshed really well with the mechanics and it was just fun. And I've been playing that with my wife a lot. She's beat me the last three times in a row. I just, I can't.
I can't figure it out. Let's see what else I don't know. Some oldies, you know, I've been playing a little bit of Goa. OK. I've been playing RAW. What else have I played? Got to look at my my bookshelf. Oh, there's a game called do you remember ERA? It's it's a game called ERA where it's it's almost like a you have a a pegboard where into which you you put medieval buildings and then you surround. It Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then there are there's floods and disasters. And us?
Little bridges and each building does something a little different and you roll dice to to to gather resources and whatnot. That's that's a fun game. So yeah. It's a great game, yeah. I always wonder whether there's probably any more errors or it's oh, they stop in there. I I've, I've got, I've purchased every, yeah. Yeah, I think I'm missing two of the little boxes and then they're really hard to find. So they. Are really hard to find.
Yeah, we had Dan, Dan Halligan on the show when they did the last Kickstarter. Back in back in October. Back in October, so that's worth a listen. Anyone who wants to know more about Obsession, because yeah, I think that's one of the games when we got PJS coming over in a couple of weeks time to UK. So Obsession will be on the first times, first games. I think we can have to play PJ dressed up in Victorian costume, of course. I've. I've got myself. I'm coming. Yep.
Tea and scones and jams. Any other English tradition I can find? So thank you Mark, for joining us today. Campaign, for anyone who's listening, is live on the 5th of March. How Long's the campaign on for? 30 days 30. Days. So please do go and check out Fled. They'll be on our socials today on all channels. So with links to the Kickstarter if you can't find your way there.
Otherwise the best luck. Best of luck, Absolutely This one, and I think we'll speak to you again with the feudal release in a few more months time. Sounds. Good to me guys. OK. Thanks everyone for listening. Thanks everyone for listening. Please subscribe. And as always, we'd love to hear your thoughts and ideas, so make sure to leave those in the comments. And don't forget, you can also chat with us both on Instagram at Meatball to Meatball.