Mass Production Approved and Pledge Manager Opening Shortly!
over 4 years ago – Fri, Nov 12, 2021 at 09:47:35 PM

Hello everyone!

We have a few updates we wanted to share with you today. Thank you for your patience. With this being our first project, the communication with the manufacturer, freight forwarders, and fulfillment partners has taken a little longer to get all sorted out. We are pleased to announce we have green lit mass production to begin, worked out the final details with the fulfillment company selection, and the Pledge Manager surveys will be going out over the next week (initially to 5% of backers today). Our shipping month (April 2022) is still possible, but the schedule slack I had built in is almost all used so production ending by the end of January will be the most important milestone at this point. We will keep you updated as we move forward.

If you like your updates short, those are the highlights of this update and you can pop down to the last section "Final Thoughts"; the following is the expanded details for those who prefer knowing a lot more about the inner workings of Kickstarter projects:

Pledge Manager Surveys (and Pre-order store) Will Open Up This Week

We finally have the shipping/freight all worked out (details in the next section), and we were able to finish the Pledge Manager survey details. For those not familiar, before Pledge Managers can be sent out, you have fill out all of the shipping rates locked in.

For those who haven’t had to do this before, it is a lot of work because you have to collect all of the rates from each fulfillment center you opt to use, create shipping rates for each location to be shipped to, and insert them in four places for BackerKit (for our project at least). You have to insert the rates for each Pledge Tier (two in our case that had physical items), a section for existing backer to purchase extra copies, and a section for new customers rates. To keep the rates as low as possible for those buying additional copies, we went through the weight ranges (2, 4, 6, etc. #KG) to provide the most accurate rates.

While we tried to fill out for every major region, we may missed a few. While you are filling out the survey, if you have shipping price of $999.99, that means we did not create a shipping profile for you location. You will need to direct message our Kickstarter page, and we will create a new profile so you get accurate rates. We have a survey question also alerting you about this as well.

As such, we will be sending out the initial batch of Pledge Manager surveys today (to roughly 5% of backers). This “smoke test” will allow those 5% to pay for their shipping and select add-ons; we expect there will be a few issues that could pop up during this initial batch of surveys and hope to work these out before sending out to all of the backers. We imagine we will be sending out the rest of the surveys mid-late next week (17~20th). 

You will still have until likely late December/early January to change your mind about add-ons and finalize shipping payments. We will be closing these surveys about 2~3 weeks prior to manufacturing wrapping up so we can provide the final shipping data to the manufacturer with packaging instructions as well as our freight forwarders.

Shipping Freight Updates

We finally got all of the shipping prices finalized for the EU/UK, which is what had held up this progress. As you may recall, we originally had planned to use a single fulfillment company for this project, but in July as our project was wrapping up on Kickstarter, they had announced due to the changes within the EU/UK, they were no longer serving those region. We had to spend the last few months chatting with potential alternatives. We finally settled on the following: QML for the Americas and ShipQuest for most of the rest of the world. This combination allowed us to keep the shipping rates for backers the same as we had originally planned during the Kickstarter. So, there will be no increases to your shipping rates.

Our freight will be higher than originally budgeted for, which anyone who has been tracking the current state of shipping will know. We decided we will absorb this cost to keep our estimates to our customers in place. That means we will not earn any profits from this project, but we decided since this is mostly a two-person team and we each have jobs, that is fine for this game. As a new business, we obviously want to have some profit, but we see this game as our start in the industry and want to maintain a good relationship with our customers. All we ask is please understand we have kept the shipping as low as we feasibly can without having to pay out of our own pockets to get the games to you.

Mass Production Approved to Begin

We have officially signed off on the mass production files. The manufacturer took a little while (3~4 weeks) to go over all of the files and provide update comments. Jon was very quick to turn around the modified files the same day they provided the comments. Mostly minor things to double check like bleed lines and to make sure they were using the latest files and not files from the sample print.

Now that we have approved of the files, it can be added into their print queue. This doesn’t necessarily mean it will begin next week, but it should start this month. As we know more on this, we will update you all.

Overall Schedule

As I had originally planned about 2 months of slack into the schedule, we are getting very close to that slack being all used. One major piece that delayed everything was getting the production sample. I think it took roughly 4-6 weeks from the time we requested the sample before we received it. Our previous sample in 2019 took about 2 weeks to arrive, which is what we expected for this one. 

As of right now with the durations our partners have told us will be needed for their work, we still have a chance at being on time for April shipping, but I will know more once we near the end of the manufacturing. Freight, of course, is the wild card; we should be avoiding the freight from the holidays so that will work very well in our favor. 

My hope is we can have the games on a boat by the Chinese New Year (first half of February) to avoid any additional slowdowns. That will essentially be what determines if we still have a chance of getting the games shipped out from our fulfillment companies in April as planned. Obviously, once it is on the boat, it should reach the fulfillment country on time, but how long it takes for the boat to be able to dock and unload is the major unknown as we have seen with other projects. We hope early 2022 will be much better in this respect.

Again, as we monitor our schedule, we will provide you with more details. Once manufacturing actually begins, I will work with Jon to create an updated Schedule graphic to provide a better idea of what our current project timeline looks like. 

Final Thoughts

Thank you again for supporting our first project. I plan to do a video unboxing of our production sample in the next couple weeks. I had planned to have it done sooner, but we wanted to get everything else wrapped up first.

As we are getting to the point with this project where we have less direct control of things for a while, Jon and I will be resuming our development of our next two projects. We don’t have a lot of details to provide now, but one will be a direct expansion for SKEPTICS while the other is in the same universe but will be a separate card game. We look forward to revealing more next year after the current game is in your hands.

Let us know if you have any questions or comments. Feel free to publicly share them in the project comments or direct message us. Have a great weekend!

Jon and Brian

Usiak Games and Designs

The Files for SKEPTICS are ready!
over 4 years ago – Fri, Oct 22, 2021 at 11:34:23 PM

Hello everyone! 

I wanted to give a quick, exciting, and awesome announcement! The other day I put the deposit down to the manufacturer, and a half hour ago I gave the Green Light to start MASS PRODUCTION for SKEPTICS!!!!

Now we will have to sit back and get on a cue so they can begin the process!

Next week Brian and I will be discussing about finally getting this pre-order store open! So look out for that announcement coming soon!

Sorry about the delays, but we were waiting on so many things to fall in place (Freight, fulfillment companies, our sample package, etc. etc.). Things are always moving forward though!

Thank you very much everyone! Have a great weekend!

Jon Usiak

Brian Moats

Usiak Games and Designs

The Sample Package Has Arrived!!!
over 4 years ago – Mon, Oct 11, 2021 at 02:58:02 AM

Hello Everybody!

The sample game copy of SKEPTICS has finally come! The manufacturer was a bit delayed, but it is here!

So now that I have it in my hands, I will be looking over everything and making sure there is nothing printed wrong, typos, etc. I must say everything looks fantastic so far! 

Minor things:

The dice are still an Olive Color, where it should be a lighter green, but our manufacturer told us because it was a sample copy, that we would be finalizing the color during production. 

Also, there is a 2mm discrepancy in the insert tray that holds the Magnifying Glass tokens, leaving 1 of the 5 not able to fit. This is a very minor concern, and if it costs more just to push it down 2mm, we are going to leave it be.  The Tray is beautifully designed, so I don't want to sacrifice depth in other places where we need it, just to appease one small token. 

Other than that, the sample came out wonderful, as expected. See the images attached for the unboxing (I didn't make a video this time, but tried to present it nicely). 

PRE-ORDER STORE

On another note, we are almost ready with the Pre-Order store. Still waiting on more forms to fill out, and waiting on one last update from BackerKit to help adjust some things in Pledge Manager. We were hoping to have it open in September, but things were delayed. Brian recently wrote up a long update about that.

Thank you everyone! We will keep you updated!

Jon Usiak 

Usiak Games and Design

Quick Update on SKEPTICS
over 4 years ago – Thu, Sep 16, 2021 at 01:57:55 PM

Hello everyone! We want to make sure we are posting updates at least once a month, even if nothing is going on, and more often when something IS going on. 

I wanted to give just a quick update about the game. Our Manufacturing company has just emailed me saying the SKEPTICS Sample Game Package is almost ready to go and should be shipped out in two weeks. We were expecting it to be here at the end of August, however this slight delay is because they had a backup of other games on their cue, and they had to have the dice made at another partnering 'dice' factory. 

Either way, things are moving along. Once I get the sample in my hands I will go through Each component to make sure everything is good to go, then I will Greenlight the go ahead for production! We are still aiming to meet our schedule, with a finalization to production in December. Even if there are more delays, we put enough buffer in our schedule to reach key milestones.

On a side note, we are almost ready to open up our PreOrder store and just waiting on a few more contracts to sign and finalize.

We will keep you updated soon!

Thank you Everyone! Enjoy your week!

Jonathan Usiak

Usiak Games and Designs

Progress Update and Pledge Manager Status
over 4 years ago – Tue, Aug 31, 2021 at 08:30:54 PM

Hello everyone, 

I was holding off on this update until I had more concrete details, but since we have received a few questions about the Pledge Manager and Pre-order store, I will provide an update for where we are. 

For those who prefer shorter answers: 

• Production Sample requested 2~3 weeks ago, and we will approve mass manufacturing to begin shortly after we receive and inspect it. Planned Manufacturing Window: July 2021 - December 2021. Overall manufacturing schedule still on track. 
• Issues with UK/EU shipping has required changes with our planned fulfillment approach. We have been looking at options for that region specifically. The rest of the world fulfillment is still fine.  That is delaying us from opening up the pledge manager and pre-order store. We are hoping to resolve this in the next 2-3 weeks. Freight Schedule December 2021 - April 2022. No impacts to overall project schedule at this time. 

For those who prefer much more details, here you go.  :) 

Production

In July, we received the final manufacturing quote from the Manufacturer that included the Stretch Goal items and upgrades. We provided the manufacturer the "final" files about 2~3 weeks ago and requested an updated manufacturer sample. We are just waiting on this to arrive so we can inspect it to make sure all of the cards and components look fine. While there hasn't been a great deal of major changes since we received our last manufacturer sample in October 2020, we didn't want to take a chance with something slipping by due minor updates within our files. Once this sample arrives, we should be able to approve the start of mass manufacturing within a couple days. 

We were told mass manufacturing will take about 60 calendar days to complete and to expect a one week break for Golden Week in October. Assuming we get the sample in the next 2 weeks and begin manufacturing, that should have that finishing up in mid-November. 

So per our Kickstarter Schedule, it appears we missed our July 2021 Production & Approval milestone, but I had envisioned the approval process was going to be a few week process. I had built in a total of 5 months in the schedule for the whole production process, which is roughly 2~3 months per the manufacturer. So we should still be on schedule for Mass Production to complete in (or before) December as scheduled. 

We will do an update specifically announcing when the Mass Manufacturing has started. 

Pre-Order Store and Pledge Manager (Shipping Details)

A few people have asked when the Pledge Manager and Pre-order store will open. Prior to our Kickstarter, we had everything figured out with shipping and freight forwarding; it has been the same plan since our 2020 launch. Right after our Kickstarter wrapped up, we were discussing the timeline with our fulfillment and freight partners, and they informed us due to changes with UK/EU shipping laws, they no longer provided fulfillment for that region (literally a policy change that week). 

Jon and I have been exploring fulfillment options since then to resolve this issue, and after many meetings with companies, we believe we have a plan to resolve this that will require 2 fulfillment companies. We don't want to announce those details here yet until we have the approvals with the target companies, but we expect this mostly to be transparent to you all until you receive emails from those companies to confirm shipping details near the end of this project.

Our goal with these discussions has been to focus on keeping delivery on schedule and keeping the costs near what we had estimated during the Kickstarter Campaign. More on this to come in an update just before launching the Pledge Manager. 

So while this is currently delaying the Pledge Manager and Pre-order store opening, this has had no impact to the overall project schedule, and since that is not something that even comes up until December, we fully expect to have this all worked out well ahead of time. 

I do expect the Pledge Manager and Pre-order store will be open in the next 2-3 weeks. I actually have everything already setup, but I need to be able to list the fulfillment company in the Backer Kit forms before it can go live. 

Once we have everything signed with the fulfillment companies and freight forwarder, I will provide those details in an update. I will provide an explanation of our Freight and Shipping schedule near the end of the manufacturing process; as with manufacturing, I have 1~2 months of padded time in the schedule to help account for docking delays. 

Wrap Up

That should cover the current status of SKEPTICS. I apologize that there has been a delay with the Pledge Manager/Pre-Order Store. We just want to make sure everything is correct in it when we launch to avoid needing to make further changes to shipping further in the process. 

This being our first game, we have certainly learned a lot and hope we can use this knowledge to make the next game even smoother. On that topic if you are interested...

Unrelated News

Obviously, our focus has been on getting these business details worked out for this Kickstarter, but there has been a lot of downtime waiting for email replies and time in-between Zoom calls. Jon and I have been starting the drafting process on the next two projects in the SKEPTICS universe. Jon has been drafting a direct expansion for the board game while I have been working on a prototype card game. 

We don't have any timeline on when these will be ready for Kickstarter, but it won't be until after the current game has been shipped to you all. We want to see customer feedback about the SKEPTICS base game before we finalize the direct expansion.

We won't derail this Kickstarter Project's Updates with upcoming project announcements until the current game is in your hands, but I did want to say if you are interested in hearing about future game details and the potential to help playtest before then, sign up for the newsletter at https://usiakgames.com/.  We haven't done much with the mailing list yet, but this is something I plan to work on once everything is sorted out with shipping/fulfillment

Again, we won't create updates on this project solely for future projects, but occasionally, we may end an existing update with a quick preview of future projects like I have teased here.

Have a great week :) 

~Brian and Jon