Glory to Rome w/ twist + Civ game = Innovation
I am very intrigued....and thinking of preordering. They'll give you some crappy preproduction cards first, and then they'll mail out the actual game during the summer. That's an innovative way of running a preorder program.
posted by Rob @ 3:55 PM
6 comments
6 Comments:
Unfortunately, Carl Chudyk's name is inextricably tied to the customer service nightmare that is/was Cambridge Games Factory.
I hope this goes well for him, and I'll play someone else's copy, and maybe even get one of my own. But preorder? Ehhh, probably not. I'm happy to let someone else do that for now.
In fact, I thought there was still a fairly large crowd of angry peasants with torches and pitchforks looking for any random Cambridge Games Factory employees.... Not reprinting Glory to Rome again seems quite foolish.
Whatever... If the game is cool, it's mine. And... ok, I'll let you play my copy. And, screw everyone who doesn't have a copy of GtR!
:P
FWIW, I don't see how GtR's reprint issues were Carl's problem.
I'm not saying they were his problem, but his name is tied to the problem nevertheless. And I think that reminder may lead some people to be leery of preorders in general. There just aren't that many situations to me where preordering board games grants a significant enough advantage to do it.
If this company can get a fair number of "playtest" copies out and generate positive buzz, then they'll whip up some sales. But I think it would be the same as if they waited to release the completed game--they would generate the same buzz and the same sales. In fact, generating good buzz when the finished game is not yet available might not be the best option, as they might get less impulse buys from people who want the complete game when the buzz is at its highest.
Ok, fine. I'm not in the band that would bundle the designer with the publisher.
And in this case, preordering to me seems somewhat cool because you can get a copy NOW to play around with. Once you switch over to the regular game, there are no perks for having preordered though....so maybe I do prefer the "bonus stuff" for preorderers (eg animeeples) when the actual game comes out. Otherwise, if there is no other incentive, I don't see a reason to preorder (other than to push a not-so-popular game to publishing...like Hellenes which took forever to make it).
I'll play the game, Rob! Order away... :)
It is an innovative way to get the game out there ahead of the months of production, shipping, customs, etc delays.
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