Manufacturing has been delayed, and here’s why:
We received some frustrating news from our manufacturing partner last week: a 2-month production delay. As a bit of backstory: when an assembly line is started for any product, the manufacturer does a test run to create a “first article“, so that they can catch any potential problems with the process. It turns out that when they inspected the first articles of our pop-up rooms, they identified some issues that caused concern, which they informed us of immediately.
They’ve let us know that they are making some corrections to the production process, and are going to create a new first article of the complete game to send to us by next week. Then we do a last inspection of the final game and give them the go-ahead to restart full manufacturing. But it also turns out that during this time, their region is going into a new Covid lockdown due to recent surges, and parts of their team are quarantining. So adding all that up equates to a 2-month expected manufacturing delay.
Are we maddeningly frustrated? Oh, you bet. Is this just one of the many delightful parts of manufacturing your own game? Absolutely, and we know that. So it is with both regret and humility that we are letting you know that your games probably won’t get into your hands until late July. But we think having a proactive manufacturing partner who is dedicated to assuring the highest quality is better than rushing a potentially flawed game out into the world. Please feel free to vent your frustrations and/or support in the comments below.
On a more positive note, we have a new YouTube channel!
We’ve created a new Pop Fiction Games channel, so you can dive deeper into the world of The Shivers! Watch game-creator Andy as he takes a deep dive into all the spooky detail in each pop-up room, unveils never-before-seen early prototypes, walks you through all 8 playable characters, and more! Be sure to hit follow to see all future content. Here’s an example video below:
Changes to our downloadable print files
Early in our Kickstarter campaign, we received lots of support and interest from people worldwide for whom English may not be their first language. A handful of them reached out to us directly, inquiring if we could make our printing files available for download so that they could make their own translations for their gaming circle. Our policy all along was to try to be as open as possible, and so we let them know that we could make our files available for non-commercial translation. However, now that our game has gotten more international interest, we are in early discussions with some publishing partners who may be making their own official translations. We learned that having unlicensed translations floating out in the world, along with our printing files, REALLY complicates the licensing process and makes it an untenable business decision. We directly informed these international backers of this change in policy, and we apologize if this causes any difficulties for our worldwide audience.
What are committed to still making available are our downloadable templates. We’ve created blank Story Cards for each room as well as blank Episode Guides, so that Shivers fans can create their own incredible DIY adventures. The link to those downloads will be posted in the coming months as the game gets closer to shipping.
So that’s it!
Kind of a mixed-bag update for this week, we’ll continue to keep all of you updated as soon as we learn more. Please stay safe out there, Shivers fans.
– The Shivers Team