Classroom Deathmatch RPG! Jake Richmond Interview part 2.

Panty Explosion is a role-playing game about psychic girls and school drama. Classroom Deathmatch, the next RPG Jake had worked on is based on Battle Royale, to a degree. A game where a class of students must fight to the death.

This part of the interview will deal mostly with Classroom Deathmatch, but also with The Magical Land of Yeld, a fusion of Zelda, the secret worlds of Narnia, and Final Fantasy Tactics’ job-system, a game about children in a magical world of adventure.

The previous part of the interview can be read here, dealing mostly with Panty Explosion, and the work-process Jake and his co-creators engage in.
I will have my comments (in italics and parenthesis), and most links had been added by myself. Hope you’ll enjoy it :)

1. How did you decide on Classroom Deathmatch after Panty Explosion?

Matt and I had been selling Panty Explosion at GenCon (The biggest role-playing convention in the world, AFAIK), and the booth across from us was am import DVD seller called Cine-East. The couple running the booth were really enthusiastic about the game and helped us promote it at the show, and Matt and I ended up buying a whole mess of DVDs from them. Survive Style 5+, Saikano and a whole bunch of other stuff. One of those was Battle Royale 2, and Nick came over to the house and watched it with me a few weeks after the con. We were about half way through the movie and one of us was like “we could totally play this with Panty Explosion”. And then at the same time we both blurted out something about a Battle Royale/Panty Explosion game. We wrote the entire thing that night.

Originally we had planned to release a yaoi-flavored version of Panty Explosion, but it never really happened. Maybe someday.

 

Figure Purchases; Overview and Decisions.

Ok, this post will cover figure thoughts: Which figures I’ve bought recently, which figures I regret buying, which figures I want to order, which figures I have on pre-order, etc. Also, this is a good place for you to offer suggestions, insights, and advice :D

Figures Purchased:
These are the figures I’ve purchased, how much I’ve paid for them, and whether I’m happy these days with them or not. This came to me when I thought of Saber Lily Distant Avalon, more on this later.

Figure Friday – September 18th to 24th.

Figure Friday is back on track, covering the figures announced and released during the past week. Since it had been the Silver Week in Japan from the 19th to the 23rd, there was a relative dearth of figures.

I did not skip this installment, though it is slightly smaller, because some of the good figures were really great, and already on this Friday (which goes to next week’s post) I’ve seen two really lovely figures, and I couldn’t handle next week’s post otherwise, so here goes :)
UPDATE: More re-stock items.

As always, click on the first picture to go to a site with more information on the figures, and the pictures after the description for the Flickr page, where bigger photos can be had. As always, post is not entirely safe for work, be advised.

Four Hot:

1.

Lineage II Elf 1/7 PVC figure by Orchidseed

Images both from Nekomagic and Kumo‘s blog.
On any other week, this figure definitely would have been number 1. This week it has to share the title.
Best elf I’ve ever seen. Love the details, love the filigree, love the lace-design. Her leg isn’t too big, it’s the ankle-bone and a trick of perception. Her hair is a bit bland. And in case you worry about the seam in her arm when her top is off, there’s a nice bracelet to cover it. Now that is smart design. Just wish her arm next to her face had another configuration.
December 2009, 227mm, 7,429 yen. Reserve.
(Slightly short elf, she’d be 158 centimeters due to scale, /with/ those high heels).

Postal Office Hate. My Life.[Longish]

I’m sure many of you who do not live in a major country can empathize, and when it comes to ordering stuff from say.. Japan, most of you can empathize. At least, the non-Americans; who do suffer, but to a lesser degree*.
(This post will also cover why I didn’t order the figure of Saber Lily Distant Avalon)

For as long as I’ve been able to read English, the Israeli Postal Service and I, we had been at odds. I wished for books, for DVDs, for media, for life, and it had conspired to keep these things out of my reach. Out of my hands.
I am not talking only that the customs office had taken my packages and kept them for longer than it should have (even when it did), but of all the times when we did not even order, for fear and knowledge, that the customs will stop us.

Panty Explosion RPG! Jake Richmond Interview Part 1.

Panty Explosion is a light Role-playing game which draws inspiration from Japanese school life, anime, and Korean and Japanese horror films. Jake Richmond is an indie RPG designer, the co-creator of Panty Explosion and other games, and a talented artist. And I have him here for an interview. The second part will air in a week’s time.

Indie RPGs are like doujinshi, in a way. The creator does more or less everything on their own, but since it’s their own IP, it is official. Most sell for about $20, for interested parties. Story-Games are usually lighter on mechanics than most RPGs.

I will have my comments (in italics and parenthesis), and most links had been added by myself. Hope you’ll enjoy it :)

1. Tell us a bit about yourself?

My name is Jake Richmond. I live with friends in Portland, Oregon. I’ve been a full time freelance illustrator for about 5 years and a part-time art teacher for about 3. I make comics and games, and I publish my games under the label Atarashi Games. I rarely wake up before 1pm, and I never go to sleep before 4am. My blood type is A. I like Indian and Mexican food, collect video game art books and have a glasses fetish.

Figure Friday – September 11th-17th.

This is the Figure Friday post for the dates of September 11th till September 17th. I would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a happy new year (Rosh HaShana), and may you have a good year (Shana tova!) :)

This is also the source of the slight delay of this post; family gatherings, including some which got their dates moved. I even tried to post this from my family’s, but it didn’t go well. I managed to insert the first figure’s posts and then it crapped out on me.

As always, click on the first picture to go to a site with more information on the figures (usually Nekomagic), and the pictures after the description for the Flickr page, with bigger photos.

Five Hot:

1.

Toushin Toshi III Moe Collect Plus 15 Hazumi Flame 1/7 PVC figure by Volks M.O.E.

Definitely my figure for the week. Cast-offable, though it might actually require the body to be swapped out as a whole. Love the design of her dress, detailed yet dynamic. She has a pretty face and nice hair.
Also, she fulfills what I want from a cast-offable model: I like her both dressed and undressed. Though her hair might seem to be a tad big with her clothes off, but that’s life.
This also gives me hope in regards to seeing “La campanella della benedizione Chelsea Arcot 1/6 GK by Volks Turn A-brand” as a PVC figure.
Winter 2009, 220mm, 7,500 yen. Volks Web Store exclusive; preorders taken since August 25th. You’ll need to use deputy services.

More pictures after the “More” tag, not all safe for work.

Blog Success. Part 2; Getting Them to Come

This is the second part on how to get your blog a certain amount of success. This entry deals mostly with what to do once you have a blog with some content. Here‘s the first part, dealing with getting your blog up and running.

Letting People Know:

Once you “build it”, it’s not enough. After all, if people don’t know about how hot the content in your blog is, they won’t come and read it, would they?

Be advised, because this takes time, and because of how people work, new visitors are not going to visit most of your older blog posts. This means that if you have truly mind-blowing posts you want a lot of feedback on, you might want to save them for later. This is not to say that the early posts should be throw-away, because if they are, people won’t come and read your future posts, defeating the purpose.

Blog Success. Part 1; Building.

This post will help you achieve more success with your blog: More hits, more comments, hopefully. This post will describe what it takes to get about 2,500 hits a month. Follow less of the steps and/or make less posts, you’ll get less hits. Follow more of the steps and/or be more active about both the steps and making more posts, and you could hit several hundred hits a day.

This post had been split into two parts, because it turned out to be very massive, and quite comprehensive. The next part will appear in about 13 hours, and will deal with how to get your blog the attention, once it’s there.

I’ll begin with the age-old adage, “If you will build it, they will come.” That’s almost correct, I’d append it to say, “If you keep on building it, and keep telling people that you are building it, they will probably come.”

I want to make one last thing clear: I don’t do things just to get more hits. Almost everything I do is how I do normal blogging, I just tweak it slightly to increase the amount of hits I receive. My advice will help you get more hits, but hopefully you won’t do these things just for the hits.

The Basics: Posting.

This is the most basic thing, and a blog that does not have posts, and new posts, is not a blog worth following. In other words, you need to write blog posts; I know it sounds elementary, but it should be hammered in, time and time again. The more blog posts that you will write, the more that people will come, but more important than number is the regularity and spacing.

Figure Friday – September 4th-10th.

This is the Figure Friday post for last week. Not much news, and we’ll keep the restocks and new releases to this week’s Figure Friday. Not entirely Safe For Work

As always, click the first photo to get taken to a page with more coverage and pictures, and the photos at the end of the description for larger versions.

Five Hot:

1.

The Devil on G-String Usami Hal 1/8 PVC figure by Toranoana

This is a very attractive figure. Cool socks, sweet face, very nicely sculpted and posed. The ears and tail seem to come on and off, perhaps magnets.
Very sexy figure, in a certain pose she might be too much for some companies. The original art is included in the phone card version for 500 yen more.
Seems to be limited.
November 209, 100mm long, 5,500 yen (tax included) for normal version, or 6,000 for phone card version.
Some NSFW post the “More” tag.
Toranora online store exclusive (use deputy services). Normal and card (limited) versions.

Figure Friday – August 28th-September 3rd in Review.

Ok, this is the post for the figures and news of the week running from the 28th of August to the 3rd of September. It is a tad late, I do realize. That week had more than its share of news, but slightly fewer figures, so we only have “Four Hot” and “Four Not”. Last week’s post will go up Monday or Tuesday.

And as for this being Monday my time and not Sunday, with such a great semi-final in the US Open between Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, what can you expect? :)
For those who wonder, I think I did pretty well on my test!

As always, click on the first photo to go to a page with more details/photos, and click on the following pictures to see a larger version.

Four Hot:

1.

Vocaloid #01 Nendoroid Petite trading figure by Good Smile Company

 Some more photos on Kumo’s blog.
CUTE overload! I especially like Megurine Luka (with the red hair), and Sakine Meiko, the bopping redhead (orange hair).
Miku Saihate, with the flower (at a funeral?) is also adorable.
Reserve, 6,000 yen. November 2009.
Update: Second shipment opened for reservation right now.