A Farewell and a Free Game
5 months ago
– Tue, Sep 30, 2025 at 04:05:40 AM
Backwards backers,
This campaign has come to an end. Orders have been fulfilled, and issues should be sorted. It's time for the warehouse to return the leftovers to me. That said, if you have not received your order, please message me ASAP.
Thanks to the artists who did such beautiful work, and thanks to the writers for sharing their stories and experiences. Thank you also to Flying Cloud Fulfillment, who was very easy to work with. And finally, thank you to all of you for your support on this long journey. It would not have happened without you.
As a token of my gratitude, please have first dibs on my new game, SPINE: A Dark Solo TTRPG About Losing Yourself in a Book. You can claim it for free while it's in prerelease. It comes out in two weeks:
What is it?
SPINE is a solo TTRPG that looks like a book. In SPINE, you play as a researcher who has inherited this strange book from an estranged relative. You play by reading the book and following the prompts that you find in the endnotes. But you soon discover a catch. You are being absorbed by the book — getting lost in it. The only way to lessen its power is by defacing the text.
Piece together the story without losing yourself in it.
If you grab a copy, I hope you enjoy the game. If you would, please consider helping me spread the word by RTing or QRTing my pinned post on Bluesky, which will go out soon after this update is published.
-Asa
The End of the Road
6 months ago
– Sun, Sep 07, 2025 at 06:57:38 AM
Backers, friends,
Thank you for your support and patience during this campaign. It has been a long road, but the campaign is now complete. Your orders should have been fulfilled, and hopefully you have been able to flip through some brand new books/PDFs in recent weeks. I hope that you enjoy them and all of the work that our artists put into them!
That said, there are always a few exceptions. If you did not receive your rewards, please let me know as soon as you are able, and I will see what I can do. Common reasons for not receiving a reward include:
- You have yet to give us an address in Backerkit or there was an issue with the address listed
- You have yet to pay your shipping fees
- The postal company made an error
And other miscellaneous reasons, some of which could be the fault of my own or an error during fulfillment. That said, I've been very happy with our choice in fulfillment company, Flying Cloud. I would recommend them to other designers!
Likely, I can only keep our extra stock in their warehouse until the end of the month. After that date, my options become much more limited. So, please reach out as soon as possible with any issues or concerns. I'll do my best to resolve them quickly.
With sincere gratitude for your support,
Asa
Final Reminder: Review your orders and addresses
8 months ago
– Wed, Jun 18, 2025 at 03:56:38 AM
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
June Update - Update Address, Prepare for Shipping Charges
9 months ago
– Sun, Jun 15, 2025 at 05:39:13 AM
June 2025 Update
Hello, Backwards Backers!
Digital Rewards are out.
Digital rewards have gone out via Backerkit. Apologies if anyone had duplicate emails on Friday evening, and feel free to send me a message if you did not yet receive your digital rewards.
Shipping and Fulfillment
Shipping and fulfillment is almost always one of the biggest pains for indie campaigns and generates the most complaints. However, creators have little control over the costs.
If you decide that shipping it too expensive, I will switch your physical pledge to digital only and process a refund equal to the difference.
What goes into calculating the cost of shipping? Postage accounts for most of this cost. It is also what I have the least control over. Postage varies based on time of year, weight, the "zone" of your address in relation to the fulfillment center, and whether something is shipped as a parcel or book only (in the U.S., not for elsewhere). Weight is a big factor for us, because we are shipping large books, and the weight adds up very fast when multiple books are involved. Additional expense is incurred when the recipient's address is far from the fulfillment center.
Postage can get a little spendier when non-book objects are involved (dice, minis). Beyond postage, shipping costs also include materials (boxes - the bigger the book, the bigger the box, and the greater the cost) and an extremely modest fee per order for the folks who are packing the boxes.
What's Next
Here are the next steps:
- Review your order now that shipping has been updated. Make sure your address is correct. Most orders have been locked but if you decide that shipping it too expensive, I can switch physical pledges to digital only and process a partial refund.
- Orders will be fully locked on Wednesday 6/18. After orders are locked, the print orders will be sent to the printer. Around this time, you'll receive an upcoming charge message via Backerkit.
- Addresses will be locked in on Friday 6/20.
- Shipping is being charged on Monday 6/23. Mixam will print the books, send them to Flying Cloud fulfillment, and then Flying Cloud will mail the books on our behalf. This process can take some time, and I will provide updates as I receive them.
Previews
May 2025 Update
10 months ago
– Sat, May 03, 2025 at 07:14:53 AM
May 2025 Update
This is our monthly crowdfunding update for May. If you’d like to hear more from us, you can check us out on bluesky, sign up for our newsletter, follow us on itch, or chat with us in our discord.
Hello, Backwards Backers!
Final stages
All of the new books are done in layout. Proofs are on the way. I had planned to touch up the layout for our original books (Backwater and Backroads) as well, but my old hard drive crashed and I lost their InDesign files. (All new files are fine and backed up). I brought the hard drive to a computer repair place near me and they weren't able to recover anything. Fortunately, however, I still have their print files!
Currently, I'm making the stretch goal character sheets form-fillable and putting finishing touches on the bookmarks, while I wait.
As for logistics: I am managing to avoid significant impact from tariffs, at this point. Some of that is luck and some is because I'm small beans over here. In contrast, I saw a recent campaign facing unexpected expenses equal to around 10% worth of their total funds raised. As a reminder: Please be patient and supportive of creators during this time.
At this moment, expenses remain rather stable for the campaign. I double-checked shipping and fulfillment expenses as well, and they remain stable too (a slight raise in some international rates, around $1.00).
Soon, I hope to begin releasing the digital rewards. And if you see errors, I hope you'll tell me, in case I haven't already caught them. Then, I can correct the files before they go to print. And as one of the final steps after the proofs and product shipment, I get to try to input the complex shipping rates into Backerkit.
What Else?
Last month, I announced the beta release of Rust Never Sleeps: a solo grunge rpg about doomed mech pilots.
The beta was free through April when I sent out the announcement. Now it's $6.99, and I'm slow-funding a final, physical version while I write out mission modules and mission generators.
If you missed it while it was free, send me a chat on Bluesky. I'll send it to backers for free.
