After the Chinese New Year, the factory was slow in its response to us, and when they finally did get back to us, they came back with a higher price than originally quoted. Moving forward with mass production with this factory was going to cost us an extra $14,000, which wasn't an option for us. So instead of downgrading the product and moving forward with them, we spoke with some of our other factories whom we partner with (we work with several factories for different games and different products), and we are moving forward with a different manufacturer who is able to produce it at a more affordable price. Of course we want to ensure that the quality is up to our standards, so we are in the process of ensuring that with the factory by having them make us a new sample.
We apologize for the delay in communication while we figured this out. It's been an interesting and challenging year, and factories in China are having to adapt for their own survival as well as they get hit with higher costs and also lose many of their own regular customers who weren't able to persist in the current economic landscape.
Thank you all so much for your patience. We are truly excited for this to be released and we know you're all going to love it!
We hate to be the bearers of bad news, but this has been delayed a bit. We continued making revisions--some small and some big–to the packaging, rules, and art, but the main thing we worked on over the last month or so was getting the furniture correct. The cardboard chairs and table are more durable than they were before, so even after assembling them and disassembling them repeatedly, they do not break or chip. This was an issue in the original Japanese edition. Now with our updates, not only are they more durable, you can even shake them a bit and they do not come apart. Also, the factory has found an even better source that we are happy with and up to our standards for the deluxe wooden table and chairs and rugs as well.
While everything is fully ready for mass production now, the Chinese factory let us know that they wouldn’t be able to begin mass production until after Chinese New Year because they have a queue of projects from other companies that were in line ahead of us. This means mass production should finish around late April, and shipping in May, and fulfillment in June. We apologize for the delay! The game is super solid at this point and has shaped up to be something we are very proud and excited to release.
Ever since we received the pre-production samples, we went to work reviewing and updating various things we found that needed some improvements. Most of it might be considered 'small' updates, but when all added together, they make the game feel more polished. This included graphical updates to the box design, graphical updates to the chipboard furniture, updating the shape of the chipboard furniture chairs to be slightly more robust so they are more durable, and some edits to the rules and their respective translations to make a few points more clear.
So it isn't as exciting news as something like the game is in mass production yet, but we've finished all those updates now and the game is as shiny as can be. We just sent all the updated art files to the factory today, and we plan to make one more pre-production sample of just the updated chipboard furniture, to make sure it's as durable as we believe it to be now. After that, we can head to mass production! We thought we'd be ready to head to mass production earlier this month, but there were many changes, albeit not huge issues, but issues enough that we felt warranted these updates and would make the game have more long-lasting appeal. We hope to begin mass production in early December, then we expect mass production to finish in January, and receive the games in late Feb/early March, and you receiving the games sometime in March as well.
Let us know if there's anything particular you'd like to hear about in this process!
We received the pre-production samples and they are looking AMAZING! We are still reviewing them to make sure that all the files and graphics are correct, but our initial review is very positive. These are samples from the factory and not the final product, so these do not have the gold foil on the box cover yet, but the final product will include that.
Samples of the new red and blue editions!
We are very happy with the way the magnetic flap and the new plastic window design have come out.
The new magnetic closure, plastic window insert, and the new blue ceramic tea set!
You can fit the player post cards in the top section if you'd like to display the art side instead of the tea cups.
Here is the original Japanese edition, for comparison, which does not include the new box and window design.
The original Japanese edition. This will NOT be the edition you are receiving.
We hope you like the updates we've made to the box. There are also many quality of life graphic updates on the cards themselves as well. Here's another example showing the original Japanese edition graphics (left) versus the new Japanime Games version graphics (right) on a few of the components.
Left: Original Japanese edition graphics; Right: New Japanime Games edition graphics
We hope you like all the updates we've made! After our in depth review of the sample, we will make any updates necessary, and then move onward to mass production. Let us know what you think!
All translations, rules, and art files have been finalized and were sent to the factory in order to start the sampling process. We are awaiting the ‘art proofs’ from the factory that will show how things will actually be printed when laid out on the physical materials, which they should send over any day this week. At that point, after we review them and if approved by us, the factory will create a sample of both the blue and red versions. Then if those samples look great and we approve them, we’ll move forward to mass production. I will share any pictures or videos of samples with you all when we get them! I expect to have samples in 4-5 weeks depending on how quickly the factory is able to work on it. The wooden character meeples take a little longer to make samples of versus the paper printed components like the cards or boxes.
Tea question!
Has anyone been drinking tea this month? If so, what kind(s)? It’s been a bit hot where I live (there’s a heat wave), but I still drink tea in the early morning sometimes. Recently, I’ve been enjoying sencha, a Japanese green tea. I highly recommend sencha!
