Dear Insane Children,
First up: A quick note to confirm that there will be NO live stream today. Sorry about that – but I have been super busy across projects and personal life such that I’m not able to set aside the time. For the record, when we do a live stream it really means a “live stream day” for me since it involves Martin coming over at 8AM and not leaving until 8PM (or later) due to his dislike of traffic on an elevated freeway. So it’s an all-day commitment and, recently, I’ve just not had a full day to set aside.
We will resume our regular live stream schedule next week (10th of December) and we’ll have TONS of stuff to cover at that time!
Be sure to subscribe over on Twitch to be notified when we go live:
Chamber of Anger
In my last post, I shared the Alice: Asylum Narrative Outline. And several of our Insane Children are busy engaging with Crowd Design around the narrative. If you don’t mind spoilers and want to join the conversation, hit the link above, and check out the comments section.
Mentioned in the outline is a section where Alice makes her way through the Queen’s Dungeons… a place filled with lots of angry prisoners.
The final Boss of this section of the game is Fire Alice (main image, above). She occupies a special chamber just below the Queen’s Throne Room. Omri sent over an initial sketch of this area and the encounter. About which he said:
OK this took me a moment but American you said that the ceiling leads towards the queen’s throne room. i think it only makes sense for it to look like a doorway?
if we are doing the room Eshcer style of course we can make it far more complex then this – and i will add platforms and stuff but- please tell me if This is the right direction.
my thought was to use chains with the chaos as one and using arms as the main enemy. nothing too human and defined not to take away from the child’s look.
i can imagine the player doing a boss fight and then trying to figure out how to get to the ceiling… that’s the point.
To which I replied:
Alice doesn’t travel through that door by “normal” walking, jumping type movement. She gets there because she’s magically lifted up through it and into the Throne Room by the Queen of Hearts.
That being said, I still like the design you’ve presented here. It’s great. But you don’t need to worry about making it functional for the player to traverse.
This is one of those emergent details that I really like – Omri designed the room to look like you might actually climb up through the door at the top… but we’ll ultimately be lifted up through it by a magical force used by The Queen.
Let us know in the comment below what you think of this scene.
And how many of you are avoiding the Narrative stuff because you don’t want to read or see spoilers? I’d love to know!
Decision Coin – Crowd Design
Alex is applying his amazing coin-design skills to the 2020/3-Year Anniversary Coin.
After chatting with him for a while, we hit on the idea to present a Decision Coin – one that, when flipped, comes up with either a “YES” or “NO” type of design. In this case, we’re thinking it would be something like “ADVENTURE” (follow the White Rabbit) or “DEATH” (you fell into lava).
He wrote in a follow-up note about these designs:
Rabbit on the “yes” side (The Fall Continues). An allusion to tumbling further down the rabbit hole.
Skull and Fire Alchemy Symbol on the “no” side (Everything Ends), with relation to 2020.
On the rabbit side, I’ve worked in a “3” which is dual representative of the 3 years celebrating the Patreon, and also, the third potential game in the series. It’s abstract enough for the dual meaning to land with the target audience.
The skull side has some vorpal blade-ish vines, and some heradlry and loose crown / queen motifs. Chaos is in there too, but in more of abstract way, more representative of the Chaos of 2020.
Both sides can be ringed in text, which is TBC, but again, this is the easiest thing to change or drop in when we’re ready.
…having the positive coin as “Madness Begins” or “Madness Continues” is a good riff on Madness Returns. “Everything Ends” is pretty final, but it could also be “Madness Ends”, in keeping it on brand and on tune.
When he mentions it being “ringed in text” – it’s in reference to this…
Where you can see that lines of text are wrapped around the outside of the coin. We really like this design style and plan to include lines around the outside of both faces of our coin.
Another Crowd Design opportunity… what’s the text say?
I was thinking some classic Alice in Wonderland quotes like “believe as many as six impossible things before breakfast” and “all the running you can do, to keep in the same place” – what do you think? What AiW quotes are good for communicating Yes/No or Life/Death or Foward/Backward?
Let us know in the comments below!
Rabbits Multiplying
I’ve mentioned before that I funnel all the Patreon money back into Patreon and our Art/Design Team, and that my family is supported by The Mysterious Shop. So whatever sells at Mysterious is what supports me, Yan, Lucky, and Lulu… and for a while now that’s been RABBITS.
It’s a strange thing but I guess it makes sense? We do a lot of marketing (when it’s working!) via Facebook and Instagram. And our Distressed, Love, and Angry Rabbits do really well with that audience. So we’re selling quite a few of the little critters these days. To the point where the Plush Rabbits and related products (hoodies, wallets) are always in the Top 5 Best Sellers every month.
So… since they do so well, let’s make more! CROWD DESIGN TIME!
But the question is… what design is going to appeal the most to that audience?
I’ll tell you that the order of popularity for the existing rabbits is:
Love, Distressed, Angry
And the Love Rabbit outsells everything else by a large margin.
So, obviously the cute/love rabbit style is what gets people clicking and buying.
Jen did up some new concepts and I’ll share them here:
In terms of what you think would appeal to someone who bought a Love Rabbit, which rabbit above is the best?
Feel free to pick one or say “none.”
Got ideas for a Rabbit Type that we should sketch as a concept?
I told Jen (half-jokingly) something like: Baby Momma Preggers Bunny AKA Baby Bun in the Oven Bunny.
Let us know in the comments below what sort of cute/funny/awww type Bunny you’d like to see. Or maybe you have an excellent idea for a not-so-cute bunny. Share that too!
From Shanghai with A Bun Out of The Oven,
-American