How’s that for melodramatic? For the last thirty-six hours I’ve done nothing but proof the Mardi Gras 3000 cards. I’m talking coffee, espresso, Red Bull, Coke a Cola, gatah and Frappuccino. No sleep. No breaks. Just me courting my anal retentive, oppressive compulsive, nit-picky side. This is the eleventh hour. Any changes to the Limited Edition of the cards had to be done now or never. I didn’t put it off but I wanted to weigh everything and test different structures by mocking up various Beta Deck cards. I was lucky enough to have Jennifer and Cris, of course. But they’ve got more than two hundred authors to work with plus the general business of running the staff and a household and home-schooling two gifted kids with special (medical) needs. Okay. So, they were great at making sure I didn’t just curl up into the fetal position but they couldn’t be too hand-holdy.
Was this my first real taste of work? I thought the creative building was demanding—the research, balancing the teams, balancing the Skills, reviewing the artwork, talking with the art techs, creating notes for the layout team, anticipating the “extras” that players will need, writing (and rewriting) instructions, play testing for ideas, play testing to find errors. This fine tuning was brutal. I had to make myself finally let go. Get up and walk away from the table. I’m really pleased with the end result. Now I want nothing more than to sleep... then to hold the final cards in my hands.
Wonder what’s up over at the forum? Perhaps my father is still the last registered user. LOL. Nah. I think I’ll sleep a little first.
