POND is so so soooo close to fulfillment ya'll!!!
(This update is going out to backers AND followers of the project. If you haven't backed the project, you can pre-order it...
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Brother Ming Games
about 1 month ago
POND Fulfillment Timeline!!!
Hello everyone!
I have opened and inspected the advanced production copies of POND, given my approval, and POND has officially FINISHED ASSEMBLY!!!
The games will be re...
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Brother Ming Games
2 months ago
POND UPDATES & FINAL DAY OF RE;MATCH!!!
POND PRINTING IS IN PROGRESS!!!
There was a bit of a wait to get us to the front of the production queue but boards, boxes, and cards are being printed now and awaiting a...
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Brother Ming Games
3 months ago
Pledge Manager Locking Soon!
Hello everyone! I have been VERY busy with the launch of the Re;MATCH Kickstarter campaign, so I apologize for the lack of updates here.
There hasn't been much to share in...
The final draft of the rulebook is ready for proofreading!
Read the rulebook here!
If you find issues in the rulebook, please come to the discord and let me know!
For camp...
I am very excited to say that all production files have been submitted except for the rulebook at this point.
We had already entered both the meeples and the custom dice int...
First, I think its important to address the elephant in the room: The Gaslighter-in-Chief's new insane tariffs.
There is a LOT to say about these tariffs, but people much smarter than I am have already written about them, so I'll link to some of the best articles so far on the matter:
For now, I, Brother Ming Games, is taking a wait and see approach. I currently have a small project mid manufacturing that will be ready to leave China in 2 months. If the Tariffs are still in effect by then, I'll just have to eat those costs.
I am hoping POND will be ready to leave China between 8 to 12 months from now. However if 54% Tariffs are still in effect by then, then I will be doing the following:
Shipping costs for US customers will be increasing a bit from $12 -> $18.
A new sticker pack will be available as an add on for anyone who wants to contribute some additional support.
How Tariffs and AI art trends has me feeling (screencap from Totoro)
Ok depressing news out of the way, what's next for POND?
First, thank you so much to everyone who participated in the first playtesting program! We got a LOT of valuable feedback and playtesting data from it.
I will be added 3 and 4 player modes to Tabletop Simulator and Screentop by the end of the month and opening up a second round of the playtesting program for people who still want to earn a free shirt to participate!
The pledge manager for POND will also be opened by the end of the month. This will let you confirm your cart items, pick your designs and sizes for t shirts, or adjust your pledge levels. Shipping and taxes will be not included however. When the project is closer to fulfillment (Sometime between 8 and 12 months from now), the pledge manager will be sent out again to everyone to re-confirm their shipping address and shipping fees and taxes will be added then.
Finally, the artist of POND is currently under the weather, and therefore we weren't able to get the enamel pin designed for ya'll mid campaign. That said, she is releasing two new friends to her collection of plushies TODAY so if you want to cheer her up, go adopt her adorable new friends!!!
Road to Production for POND
Currently we still have some assets that needs to be finished before POND can go into production, plus I want to do a lot more playtesting, so here is our road map for the next 2 months:
Create custom icons for dice and resources (they're all royalty free icons right now)
Add custom art for the long fwooog cards for each faction
Create the art for the card shop playmat
Create a blind test ready rulebook and physical prototype
If everything proceeds smoothly, I am hoping to have polished prototypes ready to show off at Gen Con (I do not have a booth, I'll just be doing ticketed event demos).
I'll be posting monthly updates around the 5th of each month to keep you all up to date~
Thank you all so much for your support. POND received alot more support than I had originally estimated, having even more backers than my first game Re;ACT, despite a HUGE pivot in theme, though for people who have played both, I think you'll still feel my design philosophies of high player interaction with asymmetric gameplay across both games.
But before I give the latest status update, I wanted to give PondHQ’s lilypad ita bags kickstarter a shoutout! She just relaunched them on KS and they are SOOOOOO cute.
If you love Lily pads, cute plushies, and the enamel pins, the POND artist's Kickstarter will be right up your alley!!
Ok shoutout done, what is the current status of POND?
Well first, i sent 6 copies of POND to various content creators, including how to play video makers, let’s play channels, and a professional photographer! Please enjoy a few of these amazing photos by Kevin Cootauco (Board Game Visuals)below:
So, there are 4 shipping hubs for POND, and here are their current statuses:
USA: (USA customers) All of the games have been loaded onto a container and is already at sea. The expected arrival of the container is June 27th assuming there are no delays due to customs. But there usually are delays, so my realistic expectation is that games will arrive in the first week of July. My warehouse in Atlanta will then unload the container, process the inventory, then begin shipping. Overall, I expect games to begin hitting doorsteps between mid to late July.
Australia: (AUS & NZ customers) Armarlo is in charge of importing and fulfilling these games. As of last week, they are currently organizing another shipment from another publisher to sail together with POND. This is in order to refuse the cost of shipping for me and they are estimating that the shipment should arrive in Australia in the first half of July with fulfillment beginning by the end of July.
France: EU & UK customers) PTS is in charge of importing and fulfilling the games to EU & UK customers. The freight has been paid for and they've confirmed receiving of the payment, but we are still waiting for them to arrange pick up of the games.
China: (All other customers, including Canada & Mexico) SFC is in charge of shipping all other games. The inventory has already arrived at SFC's warehouse. They are currently bubble wrapping and adding corner protectors to each individual game. Unlike the other fulfillment warehouses, these games will be receiving extra protection because many of them will be shipped directly from China to your doorstep. This means the games will be traveling packed in shipping boxes for much longer distances, so the extra cost for protection should help ensure they arrive safely. Shipping will begin after the bubble wrapping is done and expected to begin in approximately 1 or 2 weeks!
COME DEMO POND AT GENCON!!!
I will be at Gen Con hosting ticketed demo events of POND Thursday thru Sunday between 1 pm and 6pm. You can buy your event tickets now! I will also have free POND sticker sheets for those of you who play the game and leave a review as well as my convention exclusive "Ming Dynastic Frog" freebie promo card for anyone who comes and says hi!
I have opened and inspected the advanced production copies of POND, given my approval, and POND has officially FINISHED ASSEMBLY!!!
The games will be ready to leave the factory warehouse next week, and we are now contacting freight forwarders to arrange the shipment of the games from China to the USA, Chinese, France, and Australia fulfillment centers!
I expect orders should begin shipping from each warehouse around the following dates: - USA: July 5th (USA Customers only) - Australia: July 10th (AUS & NZ customers) - France: July 15th (EU & UK customers) - China: May 25th (All other customers)
These are estimates though, and I will have a much clearer idea of the timeline once each of these shipments have left the dock.
Overall, we are only about 3 months behind my original goal date of a March fulfillment. I am very very excited for ya'll to get your copies of POND and start playing. I actually was able to play a game with my wife and friends just last night and had a blast!
While addresses have been locked, if you need to change them, you can send me a email at [email protected] to get it updated, but please do it ASAP because I will be sending the finalized fulfillment address sheet with each of the fulfillment companies soon.
There was a bit of a wait to get us to the front of the production queue but boards, boxes, and cards are being printed now and awaiting assembly (gluing to the boards themselves, being cut, etc).
Unfortunately it took a few weeks longer for us to get to the front of the production queue than I expected. My manufacturer is currently saying we can expect assembly to be completed by around April 21st.
This puts us about 2 weeks behind my original schedule but the very first games will hopefully start fulfilling by the end of April or early may (games being shipped directly to customers from China).
The rest of the games will be shipped to 3 different shipping hubs in Australia, France, and USA.
My newest 1 vs 1 asymmetric fighting game in the Re; trilogy has smashed past $400k raised, making it my most successful campaign to date! This game has been the result of 8 years of on and off work and if you like easy to learn, difficult to master fighting games with a huge amount of asymmetry, you are going to LOVE this game.
This game is genuinely unlike ANYTHING that exists in the world, and have been getting stellar reviews across the board from unpaid non-sponsored reviewers!
We're also the NUMBER ONE MOST POPULAR GAME on Tabletop Simulator. You can try the game 100% for free RIGHT NOW YOURSELF.
Hello everyone!I have been VERY busy with the launch of the Re;MATCH Kickstarter campaign, so I apologize for the lack of updates here.
There hasn't been much to share in the last month as we get closer and closer completion with manufacturing, particularly with the 3 week pause during Chinese New Year. But we are VERY close, so close in fact, that I will be locking your orders and collecting shipping fees in order to prepare to properly allocate POND to their respective shipping hubs.
But first, here is some pictures of the box and the box insert samples!
Very happy with how the box insert came out. The color is great, and the embossed logo just makes it feel super premium. Was definitely worth the extra cost imo. This is just a sample though, so the edge of the insert is hand cut. I posted these on instagram a month ago so you might've already seen these if you're following me there~
The mass production of the meeples have also been completed! BUT I am not happy with the green color on the cowboy frogs. It's a bit more yellow / neon feeling compared to the approved samples, so I am having them remade. Because the mass production of the boxes, inserts, and cards are still underway, this should not cause any delays.
The stickers and enamel pins have both finished mass production! The stickers are CLEAR plastic stickers, meaning the parts that are white is completely transparent. These stickers will look really really good on water bottles, laptops, whatever you want!
All of the 3 shirts have finished mass production as well! I already received samples and took pictures of them in a previous update. Very happy with the color and quality of the print. They feel very high quality~
Finally we have the 500 piece puzzle! This was a really fun one to produce because several of my friends have been on a big puzzle binge recently, even going to puzzle competitions! I'm excited to host a little puzzle competition of my own with this puzzle by giving them each a copy to use~
The optional add on socks are being produced. Unfortunately, I was unable to get the price I want with the original supplier, so I am finding my own new supplier and re-did the design a bit to include the hero frogs and a long cowboy frog on the sock! I'll hopefully have samples of it next week, and will share it in the next update.
In the mean time, orders will be locking in 48 hours, so if you need to update your address or want to purchase any additional add-ons, please do so now!
The Art Friends Expansion is SO HECKING CUTEEEE
I am very confident everything will be ready to leave the factory sometime next month, although when specifically you can expect to receive your games will largely depend on how long it takes for the games to arrive at your region's shipping hub. I will provide more exact dates once the games are ready to leave the factory.
Re;MATCH is a highly asymmetric 1 vs 1 puzzle fighter game that uses MARBLES. I'm SUPER proud of how fun this game is, and it's entirely available to try on Table Top Simulator now! Check the page for links, tons of real (not sponsored) reviews, and more!
