Quest Complete!
almost 7 years ago – Sat, Jul 01, 2017 at 11:56:09 PM

Congratulations everyone – we did it!

After an exciting campaign, we’ve emerged victorious and Escape the Dark Castle is now officially happening. It’s a dream come true for us, and we’re having a hard time expressing the many emotions flying around the studio. What we do want to say is that you, our incredible community of backers, deserve just as much credit as we do. You have every right to feel proud that you helped bring a brand-new game into existence from a small, independent publisher. You’ve started something, and that doesn’t happen every day. 

Oh, and you’ll be getting an awesome game in the post too! 

What happens next? 

Payments 

We’ve been informed that Kickstarter has already tried to gather your pledges, and most of those have gone through. 

We’re aware that Kickstarter was not able to take payment from some of you. This is pretty normal as we understand it, so don’t panic if that’s you. There are all sorts of reasons why a payment can fail, and you have 7 days to get it all sorted. So please just double check your payment details, call your bank, or ask Kickstarter directly what the problem is. We don’t have any control over payments, but we’re here to help in any way we can. Drop us a line if there is anything we can do. 

BackerKit coming soon… 

You should all have a confirmation email from Kickstarter showing the total amount you’ve pledged. None of the add-ons will be listed on there yet, that comes later. 

We are now working hard to now set up BackerKit – a simple interface which will let you easily see which items you’re getting, and give you one last chance to add anything you missed-out on. We’ll send out another update as soon as that is ready to rock. 

For now, rest assured that if your payment has gone through you’ve got nothing to worry about, so just sit back and enjoy our moment of collective triumph. 

Keep in touch 

Don’t forget to sign-up to our mailing list here. It’s the best way to make sure you never miss an update. And please head over to our Facebook page, drop a like, and share your comments with us. We’ll be posting cool stuff on there from time to time and you can follow our progress as we head towards launch. 

Thank you all!

Final Call
almost 7 years ago – Fri, Jun 30, 2017 at 09:43:02 PM

Dear Backers, 

We are now into the final 90 minutes of the campaign!

Please have one last look at your pledge total and payment details to make sure everything is in order. 

We are on-hand to answer last minute questions. 

See you on the other side! 

The Final Days!
almost 7 years ago – Fri, Jun 30, 2017 at 08:08:39 AM

This is it, folks. We’ve arrived at the final days of the campaign – and what a month it’s been! 

Before we descend into the mayhem of the final few days, we wanted to take a moment to thank each and every one of you for supporting us this far. This community has surpassed our expectations to put it mildly, and we are constantly aware that none of this would be possible without you. 

Here are a few important notes for all backers about how the final days are going to play out: 

• The campaign ends at 11.59pm this Friday June 30th BST (British Summer Time). For those of you in different time zones, please check carefully what that means for you in terms of your local time. For example, in the USA the campaign will end a lot earlier – don’t miss out! 
• Also, please don’t try to wait until after the campaign to pledge for your add-ons. We can’t guarantee we’ll be able to accept late pledges. To avoid disappointment, please make sure you’re happy with your final pledge amount, including all add-ons and shipping, well before 11.59pm on the 30th. Besides, if everyone gets their final amounts in now, we’ll surely rocket past the final stretch goal!  

That’s all for now, but you can expect regular updates from us as we move ever closer to the finish line.

And remember: we’re here to answer your questions and guide you through the process, so don’t hesitate to get in touch for whatever reason. 

Let’s do this!

Cult of the Death Knight
almost 7 years ago – Fri, Jun 30, 2017 at 12:46:31 AM

It is our great pleasure to unveil the title, and further details, of our first Adventure Pack:

Cult of the Death Knight

The dreaded Death Knight and his vile cult of demented followers have emerged from the shadows and risen to dominance, twisting The Dark Castle and its foul inhabitants to their unnatural will. 

The corrupting influence of the Death Knight will thwart escaping prisoners at every turn as a new adventure unfolds in this exciting expansion for Escape the Dark Castle, including new characters, new rules, and all-new Curse cards. 

This expansion can be played right out of the box* or mixed into the base set to create yet more atmospheric adventures.  

Contents: 

• 3 New Characters & their Custom Dice - each a powerful specialist 
• 15 New Chapter Cards – taking you to new areas of The Dark Castle 
• 1 New Boss Card – the Death Knight himself, Lord of Decay 
• 3 New Item Cards – Introducing Curses, terrible afflictions to thwart your progress

 *Escape the Dark Castle base set required 

We’ve made this expansion available as an add-on, open to all backers immediately. The best part is, it will ship at the same time as the base game, so you’ll get all this great content in one big bundle! 

How it works: 

To claim this add-on, simply choose “manage my pledge” and increase your pledge amount by £12 + the additional shipping cost for your location. We’ve added a chart below to help make this clear, so please check before you pledge. 

For example, UK backers need to pay an additional £1 to ship the expansion alongside their base game, and should increase their pledge by £13 (12 + 1) to claim this add-on. Elsewhere in the world, the increase is higher, and sadly that’s a reality of shipping games to distant lands. Please be assured, we make no profit on the shipping – it’s an unavoidable evil, much like many of the things you’ll encounter in the depths of The Dark Castle…

Important information for all backers
almost 7 years ago – Fri, Jun 30, 2017 at 12:10:22 AM

The Kickstarter campaign for Escape the Dark Castle will end in less than 24hrs.

Here are some important guidelines to help everyone cross the finish line together.

Please read the following carefully: 

Deadline 

The campaign ends today, Friday 30th June, at 23.59pm BST (British Summer Time). Please check what that means for your local time zone. We don’t want anyone caught out by this (which happened with out early-bird offer). 

Pledges

Please make sure you are happy with your total pledged amount BEFORE the campaign ends, including your pledge itself, the shipping to your location, and any add-ons you wish to claim. 

Add-ons

As a reminder, the following add-ons are still available: 

• Adventure Pack 1 – Cult of the Death Knight - £12 (plus additional shipping charge) 
• The Story Pack - £8 (digital item, no extra shipping charge) 
•  Soundtrack Cassette Tape - £5 (no extra shipping charge) 
•  Become a Prisoner (Boss level only) - £55 (no extra shipping charge)

Multiple Copies  

Escapee, Prisoner and Boss pledges each include one copy of the game. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t get more than one copy if you wish. You can order as many copies as you like, and as many add-ons as you like. Simply increase your total pledged amount to cover everything you want, but please be aware that doing so may increase your shipping costs. If you want multiple copies of things, we suggest you message us directly first and we can get a bespoke shipping quote arranged for you. 

Payments 

Please make sure your payment method is up to date on your Kickstarter account before the campaign ends. We have been advised that around 5% of payments fail at the first attempt, so please help us by making sure that isn’t you. 

A note for Boss backers 

Since the campaign went live, there have been a couple of changes to the Boss pledge (for the better):

In case you missed it, your pledge has been automatically upgraded to include The Story Pack (instead of just the 6 initial stories) at no extra cost. 

 Also, for those of you who have claimed the Become a Prisoner add-on, or are considering doing so today, you should know that you’ll now get 2 copies of your personal character card (at no extra cost). This way you have one copy to play with and one you can frame or otherwise keep pristine as a mint condition collector’s item. 

Please share! 

Today is our last chance for one big final push. You’ve been an amazingly supportive community and we’d like to ask for one last hurrah. Please share the project one more time with anyone you think might be interested. Posts on social media, emails to friends and family, chats with colleagues, whatever you can think of! If each of you could convince just one more person to join this amazing community of backers today, well the effect would be just incredible. 

Any Questions? 

As ever, we’ll be on hand today to answer your questions as quickly as possible. Since there is likely to be a lot of traffic on the comments feed, we suggest any urgent messages are sent to us directly rather than posted on there. 

Thanks for reading all that, and here’s to a great final day!