Dear Insane Children, 

Let’s get the Bad News out of the way first: 

There will be NO Live Stream this week. Sorry! I have guests coming to my home studio on the same day we normally stream. And several other things going on in the days surrounding… so it’s best if we just move it to the following week – Thursday, September 2nd (HK Time); Sept 1st (USA Time). 

But that’s OK… because it will give us more time to collect and read your feedback on the Alice: Asylum Narrative Outline. You are aware we published that and are now doing Crowd Design on the story, right? RIGHT?! 

So far we’ve received some really excellent comments and feedback from our Insane Children. Thank you! We are reading everything you send it – and a lot of it really resonates with things Alex and I have been talking about. Feels like we’re all on the same track! Yay!

In the meantime, the art and design continue to flow! Here’s an excellent sketch of The Carpenter from Norm. Of this Omri says: 

he looks 50. I love the face, body- he’s too thick. He needs to be slim/skeletal very long, like a dancer. Everything else is spot on.

Google doug jones. The actor.

Hey, Omri… I’m almost 50. What are you trying to say?!

Adam also sent over this series of sketches for the scene where Alice fights the Jabberwock. Which do you like best? 

At this stage, with the Narrative mostly outlined, Alex will be able to load up the artists with the tasks that take them towards the end of the Design Bible. Expect a ton of cool art in the coming months as they fill out those sections!

We’ll discuss all this and more – next week! 

Again, I just want to take a moment to express gratitude. Our Insane Children have not only enabled our team to create all this great content but you’re also helping to prove a new model for game development. I laughed when I saw this Tweet from the lead writer on Fable, Anna Megill: 

Well… it is brave! Brave of you to support something so insane. To put your trust in creators and lend them financial support. To get behind an untested model of developing creative content in the public square. It’s brave because it’s essentially trying to prove that the Old Model isn’t the only way. And, as we all know, change isn’t easy. Even just trying to convince people that there might be *another way!* is difficult. 

So, thank you, for being brave. We could not do this without you! 

From Shanghai with Love, 

-American 

Dear Insane Children, 

This is it. At last… the Alice: Asylum Narrative Outline is available for you to download, read, and join in helping Crowd Design. Instructions for how to consume and provide feedback are contained within the document. Please read carefully and follow those instructions. It will make the process of Crowd Design smoother for all. 

The PDF itself is linked at the bottom of this post. 

The narrative contained within is still very much a Work In Progress. Some elements (dialog for example) may seem downright clunky. The polishing phase for those things will come next as part of the Crowd Design process. After that, this content will be used to drive the production of the Design Bible. And keep in mind that this content is not an exhaustive collection of everything we imagine will be in the game – but the minimum amount required to convey the main story. Once this document is locked, there will be a need to craft additional dialog, locations, and scenarios in greater detail. 

I want to thank all of our Insane Children for the amazing support they’ve provided throughout this process. And I also extend my love and appreciation to our amazing team of artists – whose illustrations really bring to life the ideas we’ve written here. Last but not least, I’m giving a virtual man hug to Alex – my writing partner on this journey. It’s been fun!

We all look forward to your feedback. And to what comes next! 

From Shengzhou With Butterflies, 

-American 

Dear Insane Children, 

Remember in Alice: Madness Returns when Alice goes to confront March Hare and Dormouse in Hatter’s domain and they pop up driving a giant mech robot? You can watch a clip from the game over on YouTube. 

Well… they’re back. And so is the mech robot!

It all takes place inside the Memory Mines… 

And Norm is working on a series of images to illustrate the encounter and eventual boss battle. 

He sent over a really fantastic sketch this morning… 

Let us know in the comments below what you think of this boss battle. Are you happy to see these two make a return to finish what was started in Madness Returns? 

Now… prepare to have your hopes and dreams smushed (a little)… There will be NO live stream this week. Sorry! But I have to drive Yan and her mom back down the the old hometown for some personal business. 

We’ll try to reschedule for the week following… 

In the meantime, dry your eyes! Because there’s something awesome coming later this week… 

** The Release of the Full Alice: Asylum Narrative Document **

That’s right! It’s in the final stages of prep for presentation to you. Alex is doing a last pass to format and prep it as a PDF that we can share here on Patreon. And I think he’ll be finished before the end of this week. So… get ready! 

It’s a beast… 88 pages when I checked this morning. But I think by the time Alex has reformatted it and added more images… it’s going to be 100+ pages. 

And we’ll be asking you to read it, read it again, and then provide your comments and feedback. Crowd Design! Woo!

(Alice leaving Bill The Lizard after kicking his butt and taking The Brain – from Adam)

Look… even Alice is smiling! 

Can’t wait to hear your feedback! 

From Shanghai with Brains, 

-American

Dear Insane Children, 

Three images from Joey depicting a section of Alice: Asylum where Alice explores the burning/flooding remains of London. This is Child Alice revisiting the places, characters, and memories that served as the challenges that shaped Shadow Alice.

From the Art Brief for these images:

Alice steps from the station into a broken and confused cityscape. The streets of East London snake out before her in large chunks of floating blocks – a mix of flooded and burning buildings suspended – some upward, some downward – under a black winter sky. Snow and ash fill the air. Water floods the streets in many places – suspended in air between the empty abyss in between the islands of buildings.

This is where the final piece of the puzzle will be revealed in Radcliffe’s office… if Alice can find it.

We PLAY as Alice navigates the scene heading towards the direction indicated by her Inner Compass. Along the way, she encounters a variety of Chaos Creatures and London Citizens who attack and taunt her. Navigation between the islands of buildings requires a combination of climbing-jumping-floating and running-swimming-fighting. Some buildings exist in down-is-down gravity; and some in down-is-up gravity. So that jumping up can result in falling down, depending on where Alice jumps from.

The Carpenter is found on one of the islands, frantically repairing a ramshackle dike built of stone and wood. “We must not let London sink, my dear! Civilization is all that stands between us and the consuming chaos. Build! Fix! Build! Fix! Maintain the order or we’re all doomed!”

Alice “There hardly seems any point. This entire place is either on fire or beneath the waves… and whatever else still stands is broken beyond belief.”

Carpenter: Exactly, child! Belief! Belief is what keeps us going despite the burning fires and the rising tides. Belief – that doing something is better than doing nothing even when we all fail in the end. Better to have died trying than lived idly, I say!

Amazing stuff!

Let us know in the comments below what you think! 

From Shanghai with Love, 

-American 

Dear Insane Children, 

You know how much I love tentacle monsters. And you know that The Chaos in Alice: Asylum will be a blob of tentacles that takes over Wonderland creatures and turns them into well… 

So I’m thrilled with the Art Brief that just went into Monday (from Alex)… 

Joey and Omri, in regards to the enemy design for the Burning / Flooding London “Cataclysm” area, American would like this area to be populated with “Chaos Infected London Citizens”.

?Which is really just Chaos-ing normal London Citizens.

?Butchers, Policemen, Chimney Sweeps, Rich People, Poor People, Prostitutes, basically anyone Alice would normally encounter in London, but they are affected by Chaos.

?Some references for existing London Characters are below, as well as the Chaos infected reference. Please do not use Card Guards for the enemies here.

?A specific idea American mentioned, was “A Butcher and a slaughtered Pig being consumed by Chaos together, and then a grotesque, Chaos, Butcher-Pig hybrid is the enemy Alice faces.”

?There will also be regular citizens dotted about in this area, (bystanders, lawyers, nurses etc.) and then this leaves them open to be infected by Chaos, and turned into monsters/enemies.

?Any questions, please fire away but think this explains the concept clearly.

That means we get to see The Chaos converting Alice’s memories of London’s inhabitants into tentacle monsters. Yay. And it’s not so much the final product that I love but the animations and reactions we can build into the concept. London characters who witness their friends being consumed… are going to FREAK OUT. Can’t wait! 

Bye, Bye Bill

I’ve posted some Bill the Lizard images recently… and here’s a new one that’s just getting started: 

This scene shows Alice waving farewell to Bill after kicking his ass and taking away The Brain. Fun stuff!

Let us know in the comments which is your favorite! 

Other Updates

I kept meaning to write some general updates about progress on various fronts… and then a week will pass with tons of tasks, writing, business… and that update never gets written. Lots of this is covered during our live streams but I know not everyone gets a chance to sit through those… 

So here goes: 

Writing the Narrative on Asylum. It’s almost done! Alex and I have been hammering away at the narrative document back and forth for… months(?) now. It’s been a great process and we’ve come up with some fun ideas. I think we should be able to share the PDF of that document for your review next week (the Week of August 16th). 

It will be shared in a PDF format with line numbers and instructions on how to insert your comment INTO the document. We’ll then ask you to email your notes back to us at an address we’ve set up for this purpose: story@mysterious.design 

We’ve also put that document in front of my long-time writing partner, RJ Berg so that he can provide feedback, editing, and help with dialog. Look forward to some epic Crowd Design on that! 

Alice: Asylum Design Bible. Once the narrative stuff is nailed down – should be able to hit that goal in another ~1 month(?) – work can resume in full on the Design Bible. The goal remains the same: Deliver a graphic novel of a game design that allows you to read through our entire vision for the game. You’ve already seen all the elements coming together here. And we’ve shared some Work In Progress PDFs of that document in previous posts (search for Design Bible). I don’t know if it’s realistic to get this done before the New Year but we’ll certainly have a ton of work done by that point. 

Business Development on Mysterious Studios. Since bringing onboard a full-time financial advisor to manage the process of securing funds for our projects, things have become much BIGGER and more complicated than ever before. The vision for what we’re building has grown to include a process whereby we secure 50 million USD (minimum) and use that funding for a trans-media play across games, film, merch, etc. I can’t provide exact details – but Alice is in there somewhere – along with Oz, Scruffy Bumps, Akaneiro(!), and a number of other properties that are owned by Mysterious. 

There are no guarantees that this thing will take off and fly but we aren’t just dreaming on paper here. MOU’s have been signed with potential development partners; potential investors are helping to shape the “ask” (for money, etc); and we have REDACTED 1 (and 2!) at the table and active in the conversation. Meetings with both of those parties in the past 1~2 weeks. All very positive. 

I’m not so much nervous that this won’t happen… I’m nervous that it WILL happen and is going to strap a rocket to all of our projects and send us flying to the moon! WOo, boy. 

Btw, everything we’re building is centered on the concept of Crowd Design. So you’re invited to come along for the ride! 

Random Notes. A variety of our IPs (Scruffy Bumps, Akaneiro, Oz, and REDACTED 3) are being reviewed by potential partners for adaptation to either big or small screen (or both). All this work we’ve been doing – art, story, design, merch – is attracting a LOT of attention. All of it good. 

Um… it’s been incredibly busy! So many bits of art, biz docs, story outlines, and ideas coming to life. I’m sorry if I’ve not been sharing enough of this in writing here on Patreon. I swear, the weeks just get away from me so fast! Guess that means I’m having fun! 

A HUGE THANK YOU to all of our Insane Children. You’re the best. And you’ve made all of this possible. 

From Shanghai with Gratitude and Excitement, 

-American 

Dear Insane Children, 

We’re making great progress on a number of fronts. Art tasks for all the design stuff we’ve completed so far are cranking along. Above is an image from Adam depicting Alice retrieving The Brain from Bill The Lizard. Alex has finished a solid pass on the Narrative and I’m now working with him to make final edits before we can share it with you all. And our Biz Dev efforts are generating a lot of positive movement. Yay! 

Omri sent over the final version of this Clogged Memory concept for the Memory Mines. Love it! 

I’ll post more art and story stuff later this week. 

From Shanghai with Braaaaiins, 

-American