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Legacies

Created by Jason Brooks

A thematic, mid-heavyweight euro strategy game spanning the past, present, and future.

Latest Updates from Our Project:

Many Wheels in Motion
over 3 years ago – Tue, Jul 14, 2020 at 09:54:55 PM

Do you yearn for the day where we can again sit shoulder-to-shoulder with friends immersed in a world with unique challenges and choices while in a competition of wits and fun?  I know I do!  In the meantime, we continue to prepare and progress Legacies to the point where it can be one of the newest games you pull out on the table when we again are back to some semblance of normalcy.  I'm excited to share our progress with you below and look forward to hearing your thoughts and comments - and even seeing many of you online in an opportunity to help bring Legacies to its final design steps!   

Art

The building overlays are complete and the immortalization art is now well underway.  The feeling of progression through the centuries will be quite evident as you advance through each play of Legacies.  Here's a peek at the present and future hangouts of the General and the Promoter.  One of these four images was inspired by one of my absolute favorite places to go in my childhood.  Do you know which one?  Feel free to put your guess in the comments!

General Overlay - Century II
General Overlay - Century III
Promoter Overlay - Century II
Promoter Overlay - Century III

Colors

HUNDREDS of you responded to our survey on player colors!  Clearly you're passionate about the colors you use to represent you in games. :-)  Thanks to your votes, we were able to put together a pallet that represents our backers' interests and we've made sure to make the specific shades of the colors friendly for our color-blind gamers. Curious what the most popular color choice was???  The answer is at the bottom of this update...

Game Trayz

I've had some great exchanges with our friends at Game Trayz in response to their first iteration of the insert designs.  We've made sure there's plenty of space for sleeved cards and have made some design choices that provide value in multiple ways (e.g. both for storage and for gameplay).   Later this summer I will have images to share with you which reflect a near-final version of the insert layout.

Timeline / Final Playtesting

Our progress continues to be strong as we have LOTS of wheels in motion including Yoma with art, Jeff with graphic design + the rulebook, pre-production planning with GameLand, and deluxe insert design iterations with Game Trayz.  For a taste, here are some updated views of the new rulebook layout.

Rulebook Layout Progress - 1
Rulebook Layout Progress - 2

With that said, there are a couple of elements that are taking longer than planned which may extend our timeline a bit.  The one that I'm most concerned about is final playtesting.  With the pandemic, nearly all playtests that have happened over the last three months have been limited to an extremely small number of people.  To feel confident that the additional content unlocked through stretch goals and the changes I've made to some of the special actions are balanced and fun, I need to expand the number and variety of players testing these changes. 

Legacies evolved to the great game that it is via feedback from numerous playtests and a diverse set of players.  I was counting on the same for the final touches/changes and need to find a way to make that happen.  Since there are no live events where I can do that in the near future, I am going to make that happen online.  If you're interested in helping with the final playtesting of Legacies, please reply in the comments or via direct Kickstarter message and I'll be in touch when I have a version ready on Tabletop Simulator in a few weeks.

I truly hope you are doing well and finding ways to make the most of these still crazy times.  Thank you for taking the time to read this update.  I think about you every day as I progress one or more of these aspects of Legacies.  There's a lot that goes in to it and many of you have shared your enthusiasm and desire for me to not rush and "get things right".  When Legacies arrives on your porch, I trust that you will genuinely be delighted - not just because it's in your hands, but because of the joy it brings you in the first, second, tenth, or even fiftieth play!  In the meantime, take care and be safe.

--Jason  

P.S.  The answer - Blue!

True Colors
almost 4 years ago – Fri, Jun 05, 2020 at 02:09:13 AM

I appreciate you!  Not a day goes by where I don't think at least once how lucky I am to have all of you believing in us and the game we're pulling together for you.  The time is flying by. We're making progress.  We still have more to do, but we're closer to getting it all finalized and into the hands of the manufacturer where Legacies truly starts to become a reality.  We have a couple of notes of progress to share and a poll in this update.

Pre-production

Our factory is currently working on samples of the metal coins and the dual-layer board. We'll be sending them the files for the tri-layer player mats and the custom resources very soon so they can also create samples for those.  We've dialed in the colors for the custom wood resources and are in the process of deciding the colors for the six sets of player tokens.  We'd love your feedback!  We know it's important to choose shades that can be recognized by color-blind players and will be sure to do so.  We want to know which player colors YOU want in the game.  Take this poll to let us know your top choices for player token colors.    Your feedback on the Level 6 Heirlooms and Events from previous updates has been hugely helpful!  We trust your taste on colors will help us round out this aspect of the game as well.

Playtesting

The solo mode is coming together including versions with varying difficulty.  Additionally, we've tried out multiple game rules for the Level 6 heirlooms you unlocked during the campaign.   Remember, those are the deep dark secrets that you do NOT want your opponents getting their hands on.  We're close to locking in their function and will reveal that when we share the rulebook with all of you for review in the next couple of months.

Art

The final character overlays for the board are getting their finishing touches before Yoma moves on to the art for the remaining successors, including the immortalization backers.  Here are some more haunts of the characters in the present and the future.  (Note: the numbers are just placeholders and will be updated on the final version.) 

Philosopher - Century II
Philosopher - Century III
Master Thief - Century II
Master Thief - Century III

I'm excited for our continued progress and look forward to sharing more with you in the coming weeks. In the meantime, stay safe, have fun, and remember that with every choice we make, we're all shaping our own Legacies!

Art, Partners, and Polls
almost 4 years ago – Mon, May 04, 2020 at 08:33:10 PM

I must admit that the concept of time has been odd as we continue to be sheltering-in-place here in the Chicago area, but the good news is that a LOT has transpired for Legacies since my last update.  Below you'll learn a bit about how we've progressed on art and with our partners.  We've also added a couple of polls at the end for you to continue to shape and influence the final product.  As this point we are still on pace for our target of December fulfillment.  The next 2-3 months will be critical as a LOT of wheels are now in motion  (which you'll see below in the partner update).  Enjoy the update. We look forward to your feedback!

Art Progress

Yoma has been hard at work adding to the beautiful art in Legacies.  Most of the overlays are complete showing the evolution of each character's main haunt as you progress through the centuries.  To give you an idea, here's where you'll find the Inventor and the Transportation Baron in the present and the future. (Note: the numbers are just placeholders and will be updated on the final version.)  

Inventor - Century II
Inventor - Century III
Transporation Baron - Century II
Transportation Baron - Century III

Partner Progress

Over the last few weeks we've locked in a number of contracts and begun early work with our partners including:

Manufacturing: We are excited to share that we have signed our manufacturing contract with Gameland who is responsible for Too Many Bones, Cloudspire, and In the Hall of the Mountain King.  Our first order of business will be to sort out the dual-layer main board and the triple-layer player mats for the deluxe edition of Legacies. We'll follow that up with the custom metal coins and custom wood resources.  As we get samples we'll be sure to keep you updated along the way.

Fulfillment: Our contract and account is set up with Quartermaster Logistics for delivery of your games when they're ready.  They have relationships with a number of partners around the globe and extensive experience getting Kickstarter games safely into the hands of backers.

Custom Inserts: We've had the first detailed component review with GameTrayz so they can begin work on the rough draft of the inserts for the deluxe edition of Legacies.  We ARE taking into account the fact that many players like to sleeve their cards.  

Rulebook: I've partnered with Jeff Chin from R2i Games for help on the rulebook design and layout.  He's already pulled together a great looking draft that we'll solidify over the next couple of months.  Currently Jeff and his R2i Games co-owner, Andrew, have an incredibly beautiful game on Kickstarter now called Canvas.  Be sure to check it out!

Card Sizes: OK, not a partner update, but since I brought up sleeves earlier, some of you have asked for card counts & sizes in the comments so I thought it would be good to put those in this update as well.

  • 291 cards will be 63mm x 88mm (150 Player Cards w/ 50 per Century; 60 Successor Cards; 45 Event Cards w/ 15 per Century; and 36 Solo Cards w/ 12 per Century)
  • 70 cards will be 44mm x 63mm (the Heirloom Cards)

All together we've made a lot of progress by getting the ball rolling in each of these key partner areas.  In addition, we've been working with Retailer backers to finalize their orders and immortalization backers to select their cards and collect their photos which will be immortalized as one of the Successors in Legacies!  

Poll - Events

I wanted to wrap this update with a poll.  Many of you provided some great suggestions for the Level 6 Heirloom Names which I hope to reveal in the next 1-2 updates.  In the meantime, here's another chance to influence the content of Legacies: Events!  During the campaign you unlocked 9 new event cards (3 per century). Events from the past tend to be somewhat innocuous and easy to deal with, present events - somewhat bigger in impact, and future events have possible outcomes that can range from moderate to extreme.  You always have 2 generations to plan for future events (either to take actions to mitigate the risk of an opponent choosing an outcome you don't want, or maneuvering yourself in turn order to make sure you get to choose the outcome of an upcoming event).  For the new cards, there are TWO threads (both hosted on BoardGameGeek)

  •  What event TITLE (real or fictitious) would you like to see on an Event card in Legacies - representing either the past, present or future?
  • For those that have watched playthrough videos (like Rahdo, Heavy Cardboard, etc.), you got an idea of the impact of events.  What potential event OUTCOMES would you like to see?  (Many events already cause players to either gain or lose resources, weaken or strengthen relationships, increase or decrease industry values, gain or lose gold, etc...  What other interactions could you envision an event causing?) 

That's it for this update.  I'm excited to share more with you soon - especially as we start to get some of the pre-production samples in as well as more of the incredible art from Yoma.  In the meantime, take care, be safe, and have fun!!!

--Jason

Progress, Pledge Manager and a Poll
almost 4 years ago – Mon, Mar 30, 2020 at 02:49:52 AM

Hello everyone--

We are in some weird times right now and I want to start by sending well wishes and positive thoughts to any and all of you that are currently required to stay at home (like myself) and/or have friends or family affected in some way by the current pandemic.  I'm sure we all look forward to having this crisis behind us.

Progress

Legacies continues to progress well and at this point we're still on track with our timelines. If at any point that doesn't look like it will hold true, I will let you know.  The one challenge I see is in playtesting the new content that was unlocked as part of the campaign.  I have some ideas for that and will be sure to let all of you know if there's an opportunity to contribute to that testing online.  I DID get the chance over the last few weeks (before our lockdown) to playtest some of the changes to Legacies with several backers and their friends around the Chicago area.  I can't tell you how awesome of an experience it was to share Legacies with players who had heard about it and backed it, but not yet played it.   

One of the big things we've accomplished recently is improving the language independence of items that sit by the board (as opposed to in players' hands).  We're making it clearer for players to identify and understand global action tiles, scoring tiles, and events from across the table since they all hold important information.

Pledge Manager

Many of you have completed your pledge manager details for Legacies.  Thank you!  In a few days, for those who have completed the pledge manager we will charge cards.  You'll still have the opportunity to change your address as needed until we lock those details down closer to fulfillment.  If for any reason you want us to delay charging your card until the next batch in the pledge manager, please feel free to reach out to me directly by April 2nd and I'll work with BackerKit to keep your pledge response in progress until closer to the pledge manager closing.

If you haven't completed your pledge manager yet, you still have plenty of time.  It will be open until the middle of August.  

Poll

You unlocked a ton of amazing content during the campaign, and I'd welcome your ideas.  The Level 6 Heirlooms are a unique and thematic addition that will truly require players to focus on heirloom acquisition - a key part of gameplay.  The Level 6 Heirlooms are the deep dark secrets - the heirlooms that the characters don't want anyone else to see.  Throughout the Kickstarter campaign and over the last few months I've shared the backstory of each of the characters.  Based on the backstories, I'd love to hear YOUR ideas for what the level 6 heirloom should be for each character.  

When unlocked during the campaign, we shared the Politician's Level 6 Heirloom - Deceased Voter IDs.  What secrets do you think the other characters are hiding?  What "heirloom" would they want hidden from the public that really helped them become renowned?  Take this poll to share your ideas and maybe yours will end up in Legacies!

Top 20 Most Anticipated Euro Games of 2020

One more piece of big news... Legacies finished as one of the most anticipated Euro and Economic games of 2020 in the recent Board Game Geek poll with several hundred nominations across major categories.  Thanks to ALL of you that voted and shared your support for Legacies.  I can't wait to get your game in your hands so that "anticipation" can turn into "excitement and fun"!

Top 20 Most Anticipated Economic Games of 2020

Take care... be safe... and keep playing games!  

--Jason

Brookspun Games

Pledge Manager Now Fully Open!
about 4 years ago – Thu, Feb 27, 2020 at 01:31:40 AM

Pledge Manager is now open!

The smoke test went smoothly so the Pledge Manager is now being opened up for everyone.  If you don't see your survey, please check your spam folder.  If it's not there either, you can message me directly on Kickstarter and I'll look into it.  Please note that it may take a day or two for all of the survey e-mails to get sent out so please don't panic unless you haven't seen it by Friday.

Once you launch the survey for BackerKit the process should be fairly straightforward.  There are a couple of key notes:

Can I upgrade my pledge level?  Absolutely!  You can either, click on the "switch your pledge level" link just under the big "Get Started" button on the first page of the survey OR if you already started the survey, click on the link near the top of your screen under "Your Pledge Level" to go to a screen that will let you switch pledge levels.

Are any Add-Ons already in the Deluxe Edition? Yes!  The Deluxe Edition already comes with the Dual-Layer Board and a complete set of metal coins.  You do NOT need to add either of those to your cart if you got the deluxe edition.  They're there for people that want an extra set of coins or people that want the dual-layer board with their Standard Edition.

Any special notes for Group pledges, Retailers, or Immortalization pledges?  YES - please see the previous update (#20) for important notes that apply to you.  '

Why is the neoprene mat add-on $44? I thought it was $39.  The neoprene mat has a $5 flat-shipping charge built into its cost in BackerKit.  To keep the mat in the best shape possible for shipping, we will have the fulfillment center roll it and put your order in a larger box (or the mat in a separate box) to accommodate it.  

Who should I ask if I have pledge manager issues/questions?  BackerKit has amazing customer service  and should be your first line of defense with any questions or issues you're having with the pledge manager.  If they're unable to assist or if you're more comfortable doing so, you can always private message me via Kickstarter instead, but I may be a little slower to respond.

Final Character Art

In addition to announcing the launch of the pledge manager, we also wanted to take this opportunity to highlight the last two characters in Legacies

Politician

Politician

New nations are so naïve. While it may seem easy for every man, woman, and child to proclaim their disdain for practices they abhor, it takes a true artist and visionary to shape the ideals and practices that those same people will root for. The Politician knows how to garner the support of society and rally them to his causes. He never fails to elevate the voices of his constituents while manipulating both the masses and the individuals by his side to proclaim and evangelize his political agenda to be the one and only true path forward - yielding a future that benefits all.

Master Thief (the most popular in playtests!!!)

Master Thief

At the age of 8, she and her teenage sister stowed away on a cross-pacific sailing vessel in hopes of starting a fresh life in the new world. When her sister succumbed to scurvy, she was forced to fend for herself by petty theft of the basic necessities. The constant influx of tourists eager to seek their own fame and fortune meant her pool of unwary suspects never waned. As she quickly became astute at the art of pilfering and pickpocketing, she set her sights on bigger and brasher targets. Items of great import and value kept disappearing while authorities continued to be baffled. The one thing they all agreed on was that there was a single culprit of these crimes. She came to be known as the Moonlight Menace and the legend of her exploits spread quickly. Authorities actually suspected her and accused her directly on a number of occasions, but they were never able to produce any evidence of her exploits and often found themselves looking foolish in the process. The Master Thief generally kept her loot for her own amusement, but was also known to sell the occasional masterpiece on the black market before giving the proceeds to needy immigrants and orphanages.

Legacies = Most Anticipated Game of 2020???

Legacies is currently up for voting as one of the MOST anticipated games of 2020! This is incredibly amazing and humbling for us as we ended up not just in the final vote for the Euro and Economic game categories, but we're also up for the OVERALL most anticipated game of 2020! Are you excited for Legacies? I know I am!  Help build excitement for the game by casting your vote on BGG for Legacies in all 3 categories: Overall, Euro, & Economic!  Voting closes on Sat. Feb. 29th.

I'm so excited to be one step closer to getting Legacies on your tables!!!

--Jason