Dear Insane Children, 

In case you missed today’s live stream while we were live, here’s a LINK to the shenanigans. In this broadcast I continue fumbling around Wonderland and falling into the abyss. Martin reads your Patreon comments. And Lulu actually hung out on my lap for a while. We also shared some amazing new art from Joey!

Joey says of these images… 

Here is a concept for Alice in mermaid shape in the deep sea, I add a little game of collecting bubbles to bring back ‘The golden fish queen'(from that fairy tale of an old man and a golden fish he released) to life. 

Also, we talked about not capturing young Alice face very well, I did her face again, front view and side view, she is our main character, we may need to keep fixing her all the time.

Some really fun design and location ideas emerging from the brainstorming we’re doing. But… another swimming level? We heard a fair amount of negative feedback on that idea. What do you think? To swim or not to swim? 

Joey’s presentation of Alice’s face… I’ve told her I still feel this looks like a much older Alice than what I’d expect. In Asylum she’s going to be around 13 years old. The girl in this picture… well, she doesn’t look 13! But as Joey says, we have to work on this idea a lot before we’ll find the final version. 

Last but certainly not least we have the final art/design for the Chaos Coin from Alex! I feel we’ve struck the right balance of detail and simplicity between the two sides. I know a lot of you were fans of the ‘heart’ motif layered in there with the chaos symbol – but for me that really muddied the meaning we’re trying to convey. 

Anyway, as they say, ‘the proof is in the pudding.’ Let’s get some physical samples of this made and then we can have a final round of comments and adjustments. 

As always, leave your feedback in the comments below. Hope to see you during next week’s stream. We’ll adjust the timing to make it more UK/EU friendly!

From Shanghai on a Rainy Friday,

-American (and Lulu)

Dear Insane Children, 

Back today with a new image from Omri and the link for this week’s LIVE STREAM. It’s set for May 25th @ 9AM HKT (6PM on 24th for people in US PST). Click that link to set a reminder for the event! Heed! Now!

For the next-next stream I’d like to set the time to align with our Patrons in the EU-ish part of the world but need some advice on timing. Check out this LINK which will take you to a chart like this… 

Have a browse and suggest a time you think would work best for those of you in the EU-ish part of the world. Ideally between the hours of 8AM and 8PM HKT. 

Onto the ART!!!

Omri says of this beautiful new image: 

…for me the story is that some of the soldiers protested the queen so she Chopped their heads off. The cemetery in my mind is located somewhere in the large maze around the castle, you can see the Queen Becoming who she was in the first game by the area with tentacles. When i imagined Alice visiting the graves of her family, i thought of the terrible guilt she felt for surviving, so i tried to capture that. 

Shout out to cosplayer Eva Sirin, the model in this image.

Amazing piece of art. Seems like it would make a great Patron reward?

And Alex also sends along a revised version of the Chaos Coin which returns to the original design of the chaos symbol…

I like this a lot more and I think feels more like the Chaos Coin I had in mind. I can see this making a beautiful physical item as well as being very nice in-game. For details on the Chaos Coin, required pledge level, etc please check THIS POST.

What do you think? Share your thoughts and questions regarding Omri’s latest artwork and Alex’s revised Chaos Coin in the comments below. We’ll go through all your comments and feedback in the upcoming live stream. Yay! 

PS: I wrote an update regarding the embroidered patches in a recent post HERE. But it seems a lot of you (who are sending PM’s and emails) missed that. Please scroll to the bottom of the post and you’ll find details about production and delivery of the patches.

From Shanghai with Love, 

-American 

Dear Insane Children, 

Joey’s sent along a new illustration of a playground area in Wonderland where Alice might forget her troubles. Joey says of this image…

…where kids play and forget all their unhappy memories, maybe we could use this for one stage in which Alice is trying to forget the death of her family. Actually I am thinking, maybe at the beginning of the game, Alice wandering in her wonderland in order to find her sister, she goes between her area and the asylum, she totally forgets she was put in the asylum, so the asylum becomes a horror place she gets stuck in from time to time… 

There is a fine balance to find between recollection of painful events and denial of those events happening in the first place. Too much dwelling on trauma can lead to a downward spiral of negative emotions. Neuroscience has shown that visualization of an event or action plays back in the mind as powerfully as the actual experience or action itself. The mind is unable to recognize the temporal difference (this thing happened in the past and isn’t actually happening right now) and the body reacts as if the trauma was real and present. 

People trapped in PTSD recall their trauma(s) over and over again, feeling out of control, like a passenger aboard a run-away roller-coaster. In this case, the mind’s natural function of replaying a “teachable moment” (from burning one’s hand on the stove to witnessing the death of a loved one) never reaches its conclusion. That conclusion should be the acceptance of the event and subsequent understanding of the lesson contained within. 

The mind is asking, “How do I survive this and avoid it happening again in the future?”

“Don’t touch the hot stove!” Is easy and self-contained because we personally control and understand the general parameters. But the trauma caused by a caretaker placing a child’s hand on a hot stove – the questions, doubts, and emotions generated by such an experience are not self contained – nor easy to understand. 

“Why?” is the primary question for many who suffer from PTSD. The inability to find an answer powerful enough to overcome the trauma is at the center of why the trauma persists. 

When that “why” cannot be answered… Many would prefer escape – through drinking, drugs, or death – to being trapped in the never-ending state of trauma. And areas such as the one presented by Joey are a perfect example of the child’s version of blissful unawareness in a “happy place.” 

Meanwhile over in Alex’s happy place…

Progress is being made on the Chaos Coin design. 

I like the Cheshire Cat “head” side and think this might be near to finished. I’m not so sure about the Chaos Symbol side – mainly because it departs completely from the design we’ve been working with so far – the design found in the Chaos Necklace, t-shirts, and even on my boat, tattoo, etc. Do I now need to get all those things redesigned?! I LIKE my tattoo! 

Anyway, I’ve asked Alex to look at reverting this to the design we’ve been using. And, if white space is a problem, consider moving the Solve et Coagula to the Chaos side of the coin (in the center of the symbol). 

That brings us to the embroidered patches…

The factory’s confirmed that they are producing the patches and expect to have them finished by end of this month (end of May 2018). As outlined before, we then need to send them to Shenzhen, then out to customers. This would put delivery date to your mailbox (assuming everything stays on schedule) around end of June. Fingers crossed. 

Final note… of of this writing we’re at 1,246 Patrons heading towards our goal of 2000. If you want to unlock the Chaos Coin goal sooner, please consider spreading the word of our efforts via your social media channels. Feel free to re-post the art we’ve created and the coin designs. Get your friends and family to join our insane asylum! The more the madder 🙂

From Shanghai with Love, 

-American

Dear Insane Children, 

Here are details for our next Patron Reward Goal!

When we reach 2000 Patrons we’ll send out a physical Chaos Coin to all Patrons at the $35 level or higher (at the time the goal is reached and the pledges are collected for that month). 

Ownership of a real Chaos Coin means your name (as approved by us) will be digitally embedded within a unique virtual coin placed in Alice: Asylum. Coins will be placed all around the game environment and linked to an in-game collection mechanic.

Viewing your name in-game will require finding your coin and examining it via an item examination interface.

This is a unique way for you to make your mark on Wonderland.

Coins will be delivered via express mail in a beautiful collector item box and coin bag. 

As of this posting we have only the “chaos” side of the coin rendered as not-yet-final concept artwork. The “head” side of the coin will feature the Cheshire Cat’s unique face and smile.

Please join us in working towards the final design of the coin and our reaching of this exciting next goal. 

Chaos Coins will be available for sale after this reward offer has been reached but we expect prices will be increased significantly. 

Here’s the actual coin front and back…

Comments and feedback are welcome below. We’ll keep an eye on this section and respond in the weekly live streams. 

UPDATED INFO in this post: https://www.patreon.com/posts/chaos-coin-chaos-19415603 

From Shanghai with Love, 

-American, Martin, & Lulu 

Dear Insane Children,

Back today with a couple of bits of new artwork and announcement for our next… 

LIVE STREAM on YouTube 

Hit that link to set a reminder! Join us tomorrow morning (Hong Kong Time, 9AM – PST 6PM) for a live stream where I continue to fall, drown, and die through “American McGee’s Alice” while discussing Alice: Asylum, Out of the Woods, and the Chaos Coin.

First up in the update – some have been asking for progress on the embroidered patches. Here you go…

The designs for patches and packaging are DONE. And everything’s been sent to the factory. They’ve told us it’s a very busy time for manufacturing – embroidered patch season?! – so we’ve not yet actually started production. As soon as they do start production and give us a delivery estimate I’ll be sure to share it here with you first. 

But let’s assume ~1 month still for manufacturing… then everything gets sent to Shenzhen for shipping… then another ~20 days for delivery. So, we’er probably looking at around 2 months before you might expect to receive these in the mail. 

I am pushing Yan to push the factory to make things go faster. Again, will update once I know more. Your patience and understanding are appreciated! 🙂

Next up… some artwork from Joey. Work continues on the world-map layout and design. I think this is “final” enough – so I’ve asked Joey to move on to some visual representations of what this setup might look like in-game (as in your view of these islands floating around the ether from a location on one of the islands). 

Meanwhile Alex continues to make progress on the Chaos Coin and the EA PPT.

The heart symbol was in the drawing I shared with you last time we saw the coin concept illustration… but in this new version I feel it’s overpowering the Chaos symbol. What do you think? Does the heart detract from the chaos? Should we keep it like this or ask for a version without the heart? 

Lastly, we’ve got some mock-ups of the Out of the Woods card game box…

We’ve turned around a couple of minor comments on these and sent them off to manufacturing. With that done we now have the game, illustrated book, and coloring book being manufactured! Once that’s done we can start sending these to customers around the world. Yay! 

If you want to grab a copy of Out of the Woods you can do so here. 

See you all in the live stream tomorrow!

From Shanghai with Love, 

-American (and Lulu)

Dear Insane Children, 

I recently traveled from Shanghai to Guangxi, China – landing in Guilin and then making my way by river ferry to Yangshuo. You can check out the things I saw along the way in this travel log video on YouTube.

During the trip I captured a lot of footage with my Mavic Pro and decided to edit that together into 8 minutes of 4k video goodness. The music in this video is “Koto” from Clozee and you can also grab it on YouTube.

Now… as I am getting ready to publish this post I can’t seem to get the video to actually play in 4K on YouTube – but that’s very likely because I am in China on a really slow Internet connection… let me know in the comments below if you see 4K (or anything higher than 360p) as a quality option. If not I can try another upload or something… 

During the summer I plan to travel around China a bit – it’s not a great time for sailing in Thailand due it being the Southeast Monsoon. Trying to figure out a couple of places to visit… are there places you’ve always wanted to see in China? Let’s make a list and I’ll pick a top suggestion and head there to capture some adventure. Yeah? 

Look forward to your feedback and suggestions in the comments below.

Oh… the Chaos Coin design came in while I was gone… and I think there’s some new art from Joey here as well… Hmmm… all in the next update! 😛 

From Shanghai with Love (and Lulu),

-American