(in a low whisper)
dear insane children,
it's 5:40am in shanghai but i just read an email that i have to share even though i am not supposed to. it's from someone we recently brought onto to project to help move things forward on the dealmaking side.
he wrote this morning to relay important news. a big movement forward in a critical place.
that's really all i can say. but this is great news. and it means that larger gears are turning. this puts us bac...
2020-06-17 21:45:54 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
Font Lord here again, wanting to pick your brains and wrangle some information from out of the deepest, darkest depths of your mind.
When it comes to the calendar we are looking into making, do you think that 'wall hanging' or 'desktop flip' would make the best choice?
(FYI, the desktop flip calendar would be monthly, not those 'daily' ones you see)
Like these examples...
2020-06-17 03:01:07 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
If you've seen the relevant section in "The Art of Alice: Madness Returns" you'll know that the development team really struggled to define the look and feel of Alice's face. Ken Wong directed a multitude of studies by various concept artists and illustrators - trying on different art styles (painterly, photo-realistic, caricature) combined with various facial expressions, themes, and "modes" (asylum, London Streets, Wonderland).
This was a protra...
2020-06-15 23:51:21 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
Font Lord here with a question for you all.
Which are your favorite prints that we have done? :)
This year, we've remembered early enough that we can do a calendar for 2021, so we're looking into that now. Checking out suppliers and seeing who can make the bestest and most awesomest quality ones.
But in the meantime, we have a tricky quest...
2020-06-15 05:29:34 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
A lot of people are unaware of the fact that Alice: Madness Returns was the first-ever AAA Western Console Game to be developed primarily in China by a mainly Chinese development team. Prior to its development, there were lots of Western games (and I mean LOTS) which relied on outsource art production in China. But to have a team of artists, programmers, animators, level designers, led by a group of producers, game designers, and creative directors - all of w...
2020-06-14 23:20:41 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
It's the most magical time of the month again.
When all the good karma you might have built up can hopefully sway the Gods of RNG in your favor as we choose 5 lucky people (from both Patrons and our last YouTube vid) to win... AN OMEGA NECKLACE !!!
One of the new, super awesome ones too!!
Here we go...
Rolling it...
* Nygel Manser
* Mathias Harvyl
* ...
2020-06-11 08:05:02 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
Font Lord here again, coming to you direct from Font Manor, with a few little bits and bobs of housekeeping 'n stuff you might be interested in knowing.
Firstly, as you can see with the large image atop this post, we wanted to remind you of next month's print, called The Ringmasters, by Omri Koresh.
(So that's for people charged in July)
Finally rounding off the triptych o...
2020-06-10 15:17:02 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
Quick update for those of you who've been following along on my Adventures in Massive Migraines.
A few weeks ago an MRI of my head (skull, brain, etc), revealed no brain worms, cancer, or other possible sources of my recurring migraine headaches. This was a relief but also frustrating because it meant I still had no idea what was causing my headaches, nausea, weakness, tingling in hands, ringing in ears, etc.
So we went back for a...
2020-06-09 22:43:40 +0000 UTC
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THERE IS A NEW STORY DRAFT PDF DOWNLOAD AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST.
DOWNLOAD IT. READ IT.
Hello there Insane Children,
Alex here with another peek behind the scenes of pre-production.
Big STORY SPOILERS ahead in the PDF download on this one.
I’ll keep this post spoiler and specifics free, so read on with spoiler god-mode enabled.
Since we last spoke together, American and I have...
2020-06-09 21:29:30 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
We had a lot of fun on the livestream over on Twitch yesterday. In case you missed it, the recording is now up on YouTube. And you can watch it via THIS LINK.
During the stream, we talked a bit about the Circus/Denial Realm and Alice's escape using a balloon to hijack The Moon. (Only in Wond...
2020-06-05 00:40:22 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
Font Lord here again with a reminder about the next live-stream over on Twitch.
So that's Thursday the 4th at 10am Shanghai time.
And here's a handy little chart that might give you a better idea of the time and date where you are in the world.
https://www.twitch.tv/americanmcgee ...
2020-06-03 15:59:01 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
Lots of people asking for my stance (and the stance of Mysterious) on recent events in the US. Understandable request. And apologize if it seems like I've delayed in providing a response... It's just very difficult to sort through my political and artistic positions in relation to the reality of my current family and living situation. A lot of nuance in all this and the internet is not well known for understanding nuanced positions. It's "you're either with u...
2020-06-03 01:24:41 +0000 UTC
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Hi All
Font Lord here with just a bit of info about what's going on with shipping these days (both Pateron and Mysterious)
I'm sure I don't need to explain what COVID has done to the world these last few months, and especially with airlines and shipping routes closing down and not only that, the number of 'boots on the ground' in your country's postal services and port of entry is likely also massively reduced and disrupted. There's basically been delays at every step of the way....
2020-06-02 04:33:18 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
American here... feeling a bit recovered after last week's battle with Massive Migraines of Mayhem. I think I've identified the cause - my computer monitor setup + staring at said monitors for too long every day. But I'll get my MRI results tomorrow... so fingers crossed.
Meanwhile, our team continues working on Design and Concept Art Work for Alice's escape from Denial.
Omri Writes:&n...
2020-06-01 01:19:55 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
This has been a bad week for me. I spent two days in bed with terrible migraines. The other days were spent feeling week and confused. And we've spent two mornings at the hospital trying to figure out what's going on...
If there's any positive to all of this... I am fortunate to have a newly opened hospital just 15 minutes from the house which specializes...
2020-05-29 01:31:40 +0000 UTC
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(There is a PDF attachment to this post. Please download and read it!)
Hello Insane Children,
Alex here with a little bit of news to share from behind the curtain of pre-production.
Over the time we've been working on the Alice Project you might have seen my concept artwork pop-up from time to time on here.
Recently, I've shifted my focus within th...
2020-05-22 23:44:35 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
In case you missed yesterday's Live Stream over on Twitch, here's a LINK to the recorded stream on YouTube.
You'll note that it starts about 40 minutes into the already running Twitch stream because someone (ahem, me) forgot to press RECORD at the start of the stream. Oops. Anyway, you didn't miss much!
During this stream we ...
2020-05-22 00:41:06 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
I'm surprised that no one (not our Insane Children nor our artists) has pointed out the odd fact that our Moon is a man. But as I was going through the design notes and illustrations being created by the team this morning I realized that the wrongness of this is a good thing. Why?
Well, this moon is manufactured. Dare I say... man-ufactured? Har. Puns. I kill me.
Anyway, it's a mechanical construction of Hatter Industr...
2020-05-20 00:27:04 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
What do you do when you've run out of things to do? Hum a tune? Whistle a diddy? Twiddle your thumbs? I don't know about you but I can't remember the last time I even had a chance to practice whatever-it-is-I-do... Between being a daddy, running a company, working on a variety of projects, and... oh, yeah, overseeing an Asylum of Insane Children... I hardly have two seconds to rub together!
Same goes for our ward of insane artists - all of whom are busy...
2020-05-19 02:06:27 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
Get your spacesuits ready! Today we're working on The Moon.
You may recall I previously shared a section regarding Alice's imprisonment in The Circus (Denial Realm) and details of how she's kept captive. Here's an excerpt:
The Circus Realm has become - in recent days - a bore. Alice has attempted to escape a thousand times. Being a precocious and curious child, she’s always in search of something more. She c...
2020-05-13 05:57:12 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
Do you ever feel like everything is upside down and turned around? Like up is down and nothing makes sense anymore? As Cheshire said,
Puurrfect. When you're not on edge, you're taking up too much space.
Because the thing about life is that it's neither safe nor certain. And when we try too hard to organize and control things we only create suffering for ourselves and others.
So embra...
2020-05-12 01:40:05 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
Font Lord here with the moment you've all been waiting for, yes, its this month's Lucky 5 !
Whooo Hooo !!
This month, we'll be giving away the Enamel Pin set to 5 lucky people, chosen from our Patrons and those who commented the correct thing on our latest YouTube video.
(Yes, we have to open it up to other places too in order to meet all relevant rules and regulations)
So, here we go.
MAY THE GODS OF RNG SMILE UPON THEE !!
2020-05-08 04:25:46 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
It kinda snuck up on me and Font Lord so we forgot to mention it but May 1-5 in China was a National Holiday. It's the celebration of Labor Day... though I believe the Chinese holiday is out of sync with what's known as "Labor Day" in other countries around the world (or "Labour Day" if you're into Brit-speak). The origin of the holiday is the same - I think? In any case, the point is...
We just had a 5-day national holida...
2020-05-07 00:21:29 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
Font Lord here with an apology.
It has come to my attention that Backerkit has repeatedly been sending reminder emails out about the Enamel Pins.
I actually planned ahead and asked them specifically head off this problem by deactivating the 'reminder email' system a few weeks ago.
After all, I didn't want to keep poking the people who didn't want the pins.
But it seems that for some reason (technical or otherwise) this deactivation didn't happ...
2020-05-01 03:10:35 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
These days it feels like we're living in an upside-down Escher painting. A barrel of oil "costs" -$35USD, toilet paper is the new gold, and a microscopic particle has brought entire nations to a grinding halt. Can we just call for an early New Year and be done with 2020 already?!
Here in Shanghai, I've managed to work my way through a large chunk of the Art Prints we need to send out for April. There are only 135 left in the system whic...
2020-04-28 16:00:00 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
A sneak peek at what's going on behind the scenes with tasks related to getting the Design Bible off the ground. My notes for continued progression through the early narrative of the game.
Denial to The Queen (4/21/2020)
Still working on the exact sequence of transitions from Alice in her Circus Cage to An Audience With The Queen to Hatter’s Domain but here are a couple of bits and pieces.
The Circus Realm is -...
2020-04-21 06:49:51 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
Let's start today's post with A GIFT.
These days, lots of us are using technology like Zoom to connect with work, school, friends and family. And I noticed a number of artists sharing backgrounds for use with video conferencing programs. So I thought, "Hey! We could make and share some too!"
Behold! Inspired by the world of "Alice," a collection of background images crafted by Omri.
Yay!
<...
2020-04-21 01:33:53 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children
Here's this month's "Lucky 5" give-away.
I bet you thought we'd forgotten?
Well, actually, the delay was because we needed to expand the scope slightly and open this up to the 'fanbase as a whole' to stay in line with Patreon's guidelines on giveaways.
So, now you can also enter our monthly prize giving goodness by commenting on future YouTube uploads when we say it's a give-away month in the video.
So.... down to business for April, who are the...
2020-04-20 06:18:04 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
We're making good progress on the planning and definitions required for building the Alice: Asylum Design Bible. To help put in order all of the required details, Alex sent me a series of questions related to Alice and her story. Here's a sample:
AT THE BEGINNING OF THE STORY (When the player meets Alice - POINT A):
How does she feel?
She feels abandoned, alone, forgotten and that someth...
2020-04-14 05:37:51 +0000 UTC
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Dear Insane Children,
In case you missed our debut on Twitch, I've uploaded a recording of the stream to YouTube. You can watch it on YouTube via THIS LINK.
A big THANK YOU to all of our Insane Children who did find their way over to Twitch. We had a lot of fun and it was fantastic to have you all there!
If you were with us during the stream and have comments or s...
2020-04-09 23:24:52 +0000 UTC
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