Dear Insane Children, 

Where does the time go!? Another day, week, and PA! PO! Another Livestream! Hit THIS LINK to set a reminder so you can join us at 9AM Hong Kong Time on Thursday, August 30th. Head over to International Meeting Planner so you can check out what time that is wherever you’re located…

Remember, YouTube is poop about reminders. If you want to join us be sure to set your own old-fashion alarm for the event. 

We have TONS to discuss – all the art from earlier in the week plus… Lots of new weapon and enemy artwork from Joey.

“Cranky” the doll-bear-monster (manbearpig, anyone?) is the latest frightful beasty from Joey’s imagination. I’d hate to go up against this thing in combat without the appropriate weapon. But Joey thoughtfully solves that problem by sending along the Nutcracker Cannon. 

I wrote to let her know I think the Nutcracker Cannon would make a fine addition to Alice’s arsenal. Seeing as how it has a face and mouth I can imagine we might even want to give a bit of personality and a voice. Might be funny to hear it trying to give Alice advice on combat with a mouthful of projectiles. Might also make sense to give it enough brains that Alice could leave it (or a small army of them) arranged around the battlefield to act as automatic turrets. 

What do you think? Is Cranky a bear-able enemy? What sort of wisdom might a Nutcracker dispense? Let’s see your comments, QUESTIONS, and SUGGESTIONS below!

And… suddenly Cranky looks downright cuddly and cute! Man, how I HATE Bumby. But he does make a perfect “Devil” card for our Alice Tarot Deck. I’ve been back and forth with Joey and Alex on design thoughts for the in-game and real-world versions of the tarot deck. Both are destined to be great. And we’d love to hear from you tarot experts out there on how best to design and present these. Might be a good section to add to the Alice: Asylum Wiki. 

Obligatory Chaos Coin Message

We’re only a few days away from August 31st – at which point your chance to get the Chaos Coin via the current Patreon promotion will vanish forever. Do the thing!

More Art, Design, Love

Tons more artwork to share with you during the stream tomorrow. And I’ll post more art and design notes here on Patreon after tomorrow’s stream.

To all the new Insane Children who have joined our Asylum over the past week – WELCOME!!! We’re growing our ranks at an incredible pace. And I do hope you’ll all stick around in the months to come. Your support and input make everything we’re doing here possible. 

Got questions or comments you want to share NOW? Check out our Discord Server. We’re always hanging around there and happy to chat, help, and support your insanity 😉

From Shanghai with Love,

-American

Dear Insane Children, 

The Chaos Coin Set offer ENDS on August 31st, 2018. Don’t miss out!

Here’s how to take advantage of this limited time offer before it’s too late:

1) Set your Patreon Pledge to $35 (or more)

2) Leave your pledge there until September 17th, 2018

That’s it! And for that you will receive the following…

The Chaos Coin Set will be expressed mailed anywhere in the world (for FREE). Plus you’ll get an in-game coin upon which you can inscribe a name and message. We’ll collect shipping and inscription details in September! 

Don’t miss out or you’ll look like Alice in her Rage Dress. Seriously. 

From Shanghai with (Spam) Rage, 

-American

PS: Apologies to all of you Insane Children having to suffer through all this marketing spam. I just don’t want people to miss out for not seeing the messages. All of this is almost over 😛  

PPS: I actually ate (Japanese) Spam for breakfast this morning. Spam in, spam out. Yay!

And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts…

(the entire dialog is worth a read)

Dear Insane Children,

Our little heroine has so many parts! All these costumes seriously have me thinking about the “fashion simulator” aspect of the new game. I can imagine Alice entering Wonderland after the fire with a very limited set of dress options – perhaps she only has the Denial Dress? And we then explore through Wonderland collecting the elements necessary to craft the next outfit? In some instances these become a sort of badge/skin representing the progress she’s made. In other instances they might represent a concept or mask being forced on Alice by some dark aspect of her psyche? 

In all cases we might want to allow a certain degree of customization by, you, the players. What differentiates your version of the Rage Dress from my version of that same dress? Maybe… these Embroidered Patches we’re creating? Imagine collecting those all over Wonderland and having the ability to affix them to dresses – each of them imbuing the dress with additional powers and features. Stick a Cheshire Cat patch on your Rage Dress and enable night vision along the invisibility! Meow!

What powers or abilities would you give the patches we’ve made so far?

And behold the New and Improved Circus Dress! Wow. 

I didn’t say much about the original version of this dress because it wasn’t really doing it for me. My feedback to Omri was basically “make it more like the Tweedle outfits” – and he did just that in this revised version. Now I can say quite clearly: LOVE IT!

But I know what I think … let’s hear what YOU think – post your feedback along with QUESTIONS and SUGGESTIONS in the comments below. 

And did someone say Rage Dress? RAWR!!!

Omri’s done a slight reimagining of the original Little Red Dress. He asks “Can every dress turn red?” which sounds like a question the Cheshire Cat might respond to with, “We’re all red on the inside…” Just need to make a few incisions. 

We’re adding all these dresses along with design notes over on the Asylum Wiki. This week we’re also adding a few new Community Editors who will take your feedback and our design notes and make sure those make it into the wiki where appropriate. We’re also looking for ways to link your Discord discussions to the content going into the Wiki. Please let us know via SUGGESTIONS below and by sharing your thoughts on Discord – how can we further enable the Crowd Design concept via these tools? 

Your input and ideas are CRITICAL!

Omri also shares a progression chart for the White Rabbit – as seen from the asylum (real world) and heading into Wonderland. I asked him for this because I intend to have White Rabbit play a much larger role in Asylum. He’ll be by Alice’s side as companion and guide. And I believe he’ll play a big role in the overall narrative of the new game. More on that later… 

Following the White Rabbit… This week on Friday I’m heading (back) to YiWu in search of manufacturers who can produce plush toys, metal figurines, and a ton of other fun stuff. I’ve actually been to YiWu before and posted a vlog of that trip over on YouTube. If you’ve never heard of it before, YiWu is the world’s largest wholesale market… thousands of showrooms for all the factories in China which make al the things the world consumes. If you have a “Made in China” thing nearby (and you most certainly do) then chances are it began its journey to the West via a showroom in YiWu.  

Who wants a White Rabbit Plush Toy? Might make for a good Patron Goal in the future.

Ah, and speaking of Patron Goals… we’re only 3 days away from August 31st. If you want a Chaos Coin then MAKE SURE you’ve set your Patreon Pledge to $35 (or higher). Do it NOW. Then keep it there until September 17th. That will ensure you get the world’s most awesome Alice collector item!

From Shanghai with Clowns,

-American

Dear Patrons

Martin here with a little FAQ about this ‘Discord’ thing you might have heard about.
This should cover most of what’s being asked, but if there’s anything else you’re unsure of, pop it in the comments.

1. What is Discord?
Think of Discord as group Skype chat (text and voice), and our particular Discord Server is only for you Alice loving Patrons.

2. How do I get in on that action?
You need to be at the $5 level (and above) for at least one month. The $2 or $1 Tier doesn’t have access to Discord (consider upgrading?  🙂

Now you also need a Discord account.  
Don’t worry they’re FREE and EASY to set up by heading over to https://discordapp.com
Once you’ve done that, go to your Patreon/Account settings and you’ll see a way to link your Discord and Patreon together, this bit is important.  
(Hint:You can use Discord on web-browser or as an app on your mobile device.  Handy!)

3. So you’ll add me to Discord now?
After completing all the steps in point 2, you’ll automatically be added and have access to ‘Wonderland’, our server, when logging into your Discord account.

4. OMG, WTF, LOL I did all that and I’m still having problems.
Well, you shouldn’t be, but if you are really REALLY stuck, PM US  🙂

5. Do I have to join Discord?
Not really, but you know, the more the merrier and it’s already quite lively there.

So there you have it. All the Discord info you’ll ever need.
Hope to see you over there.

– Cheers

Dear Insane Children, 

And you thought the Circus Dress was the height of insanity. Ha. 

Ha!

THE MERCURY DRESS

Omri’s snorted a nose-full of mercury and rendered the maddest Alice outfit of them all! When I saw this I wrote and said, “Kylie, is that you!?” 

My feedback’s been sent already but let’s see what YOU have to say about the Mercury Dress in the comments below. 

LIVESTREAM

We’ll go through all your QUESTIONS and SUGGESTIONS (please mark them as such if you want them read during the stream) during the YouTube Livestream scheduled for Thursday, August 23rd at 09:00 Hong Kong Time. Hit THIS LINK to set a reminder. And please SUBSCRIBE while you’re there – I’m almost at 20,000 subs – yay! 

Check that date/time over on International Meeting Planner to see what time that is where you live. It’s about 20 hours from now (as I post this).

Remember, even if you subscribe, hit the bell, and sacrifice your first born to the YouTube Borg, you might still NOT get a notification when we go live. So be sure to set a separate reminder on your phone or something. We are, after all, not allowed to actually, like, subscribe, or be reminded about the content we actually WANT to see over on YouTube. Fantastic!

One of my favorite cos-players, Faerie Blossom, is working on a makeup test and outfit for the Death Dress. She sent along some impressive pictures of her progress thus far and I’ve included one of those as the YouTube cover image for this week’s stream. Go give her a follow on Instagram if you want to keep up with her progress on this!

CHAOS COIN

I joked yesterday that we could solve the world’s energy problems by harnessing the endless creativity of people’s questions/problems regarding the Chaos Coin promotion. Again, if you want the Chaos Coin Set here on Patreon follow these simple rules: 

1) Pledge at $35 (or higher) before August 31st.

2) Wait until September 17th. 

That’s it. 

If you do that and then cancel your pledge after September 17th it’s fine. You’ll still get the Chaos Coin. And it will only have cost you $35.

Yes, we’ll collect your mailing address and other details (name / message for the coin) in September. 

Yes, I know it says you won’t be charged until September 5th (or something). Patreon charges you in September for the previous month (August). Just do step #1 and #2 and trust me, it’ll be fine. 

Yes, you can pledge at $75 and (if it’s your first month there) get the Chaos Coin Set, Chaos Necklace, and the Art Print for August (Alex’s Card Guard Poster). 

Yes, if you are already at $35 or some higher pledge you will automatically get the Chaos Coin. 

No, you cannot get the coin if you previously pledged $35 in some other month and are now at $2 (or any amount less than $35). You must be processed at $35 (or more) for the month of August, 2018 (a payment which Patreon will pull from you on-or-around September 5th). 

Yes, we will express mail the Chaos Coin Set to anywhere in the world with a tracking link which you can request at a later date. 

Yes, if you keep finding creative ways to make this more complicated than it is my head will explode and there will be no 3rd Alice game. At least not by me. It’ll be “Font Lord’s Alice in Fonty Land” and you’ll all be screaming about Alice’s Comic Sans Dress not being historically accurate because Comic Sans didn’t exist until 1994. 

Woo!

Alright, all, I look forward to catching up with everyone on the livestream tomorrow! And I’m seriously impressed with how much our little Asylum has grown. Some real love and creativity flowing over on the Discord Server. If you’ve not yet jumped in there, do it now! 

From Shanghai with Crazy Brains, 

-American

Dear Insane Children, 

Today’s post is going to be all about “strife and discord” but in a gonad way!

First up, Omri sends along The Circus Dress. And if the reaction over on Instagram, where I previewed a little snippet of this yesterday, is anything to go by this dress is going to cause a fair bit of strife…

I don’t mean to be, well, mean, but I really don’t like this ???? 

The only dress I’ve seen from Omri that I completely hate. It’s not even the dress itself (can’t see it all in this pic), but the hair… 

 So disappointing. Sigh. ? 

But it wasn’t all negative… In fact, most comments were positive…

Wow, new hairstyle! Very interesting!!!

IT S AMAZINGG

Wow!! ????

This is adorable! I can’t wait to see the rest.

And I have to repeat, “If you aren’t failing you aren’t trying.” One of the things (I think I’ve mentioned this before) I like about what Omri’s doing is that he’s exploring. He’s got a really solid map of the ‘known territory’ and he’s poking around the edges of it in all directions to see where else we can go. 

Exploration like this is CRITICAL. It’s how we ended up with, to name a few examples, the amazing ‘hair tech’ in AMR; how we got the ‘butterfly cloud’ when she jumped; hell, it’s how we even got the first game green-lit. 

Of this new dress Omri says: 

So i had this design stuck in my head for a while, I CAN turn this design lighter in spirit if we want it to look less creepy but i thought about like, she gets into the Tweedle’s circus, she has fun, things turn dark and they force her to participate in some kind of way.
She CAN sing, i know Susie Bran can sing.
So this is literally a costume, i can turn it darker/lighter and her makeup will totally change.
I really wonder what the fans will say on this.

Well, fans, that’s your cue… what will you say? Leave your feedback, QUESTIONS, and SUGGESTIONS in the comments below. 

Do keep in mind that nothing is set in stone. We’re creating a LOT of content but none of this is guaranteed to make it into the game. Think of what we’re doing right now as mapping the possibilities. Some we’ll embrace, some we’ll discard. 

DISCORD!

We have set up a Discord Server and linked it to Patreon. Discord is a chat app (like Skype but 10000x better) which you can access via your phone, web browser, or desktop client. Our server has lots of different channels in which we can discuss game design, story, weapons, management of the wiki, and much more. 

Patreon has a useful Help Article on Discord you might check out.
But in a nutshell, firstly, you need an actual Discord account (they’re free to set up).  Then simply go to your Patreon/Account settings page and link the two.  This should also fix the issue for the people who weren’t auto joined into our Discord, so please check out your account settings page if this is you.

We’ll work to integrate this with our live streams as well – which might allow us to do things like a Patron chat overlay and hosting guests for voice interviews and chats. Other ideas? Share those in the comments!

I did send out a link to a SurveyMonkey Page yesterday which we’re using to interview those who might like to help with Discord and our Wiki. Thing is, I stupidly forgot to include the bit where I ask the name/email address of the person taking the survey. Doh! That means the first 4 people who took the survey did so without entering any info we could use to contact them. This would have happened in the first hour of the survey being live. If you suspect you are one of those people please contact us via DM here on Patreon (or try to take the survey again?).

CHAOS!

Quick update on the Chaos Coin Set… This morning we received the final piece of the set, The Collector Card. 

This is – for the first time in the history of The Universe – the entire Chaos Coin Set all together in one place! I swear I heard a faint humming of magik power filling my studio once all these pieces were brought together. Good thing I was wearing my brown pants. 

As you can see the full set contains the following: 

• Elegant Logo Box with Shiny Magic Silver(tm) Chaos Symbol
• Nifty black velvet Chaos Containment Bag
• Level 50 Envy Inducing Frame of Holding
• Double-sided Collector Card (1 per set)
• The Chaos Coin (insert “ahhhhhhhhh…” sound effect)

I dunno… are you sure you should really get all this for just $35?! Martin? What have we done???

Hehe. Anyway, these are all the pieces, DONE. All this will be ready to ship next month after we’ve hit our goal and collected your shipping info. Super! 

Speaking of rewards… 

REWARD YOURSELF

Thank you, for the feedback yesterday on the next Reward setup. Looks like we’ll set the amount at $10 – that means anyone at $10 or more when we hit the next Goal will automatically receive Embroidery Patch Set #2 (plus the Patron-exclusive patch), yes they’re shipped worldwide and yes there’s no extra shipping charge. Don’t know yet what Patron Count we’ll set the reward to trigger at but we’ll do our best to make it relatively easy… depends largely on where the count is come end of August.

From Shanghai with Clowns (yikes!),

-American