Wicked Cribbage

Guten Tag

Some significant progress to report. Sky Games sent us the first sample of the finalized game, and it looks amazing! The cards have a linen finish that is pleasing to touch and easy to shuffle. The box’s spot UV makes the vines look alive. The plastic insert was perfectly tooled to fit both the box and the cards. And the Sir John playing cards turned out as wicked as the Wicked Cribbage cards!

You might wonder what pretzels have to do with Cribbage. We’ll tell you: absolutely nothing! Except that our kids have been bringing them home from 'die Bäckerei' every morning for the past 2 months. Back in June, we moved Only Then Studios to Germany for the summer. And what an amazingly productive summer it’s been. Not only were we able to progress Wicked Cribbage through some important stages ahead of schedule, but Jess was able to finish revisions to her second novel (if you haven’t seen her first book, This Impossible Brightness, click that link to check it out on Amazon) and we found inspiration for Only Then Studios’ next game.

You see, we’re smitten with the concept of Symbiotic Overlay, putting existing gameboards to new use, and stretching our imaginations for ways to make old things new. A pretty obvious target is…chess! Unlike Wicked Cribbage, our next game won’t borrow a single rule from the original game. It’ll just take that tried-and-true, 8-by-8 chessboard and assign new roles and rules to those pawns, rooks, bishops, and the rest of your faction. Your choice of playing one of two symmetrical sides—white or black—will be replaced by a diverse collection of asymmetrical clans. We’re going to add a dozen different victory conditions, a handful of dice, and dual-layer gameboards to track the game’s progress as well as its unfolding story.

We’ve been juggling the idea for this game for several years now, and want the asymmetry to be sleek, the rules minimal, and the story both dark and rich. What’s a more German impulse than that? 

Until the next shuffle,

Jamison (and Jess)