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As our first series of Destined Legends is now available for pre-order, I thought I'd take some time to reflect back on our journey in creating Destined Legends.
Presenting "Funded by Kickstarter," a five-part retrospective on the conception, development, and production of Destined Legends. I hope you enjoy this look behind the scenes.
Growing up in suburbia, It's pretty easy to spend a lot of your time indoors. I, like every other bona fide nerd in the nineties, wanted to make my own RPG videogame. I had a seemingly unlimited creative drive at that point in my life. That, combined with what seemed like to be unlimited free time at my disposal, didn't bode well. I would play RPGs all the time. They were my jam. However, playing them was just the beginning of the experience.
Legendary Dreams
I was a dreamer in high school. I convinced myself that if I were only given the chance, I would make the ultimate RPG. Denis and I called that kernel of an idea, "Dragon Hearts." Nothing would come from that, as the conversation would invariably turn into us critiquing the current fair of RPGs. We believed RPGs peaked with Final Fantasy VII, and went downhill ever since.
"I now have a more realistic and less naive expectation of that dream."
As I was the less sociable of the the pair, Dragon Hearts lived on as a hobby of mine. Somehow, I came up with the replacement title of "Destined Legends" to escape the putrid cheese of "Dragon Hearts". I spent countless hours at home after (and sometimes during) school, drafting character bios, lore, and ability names. I'm pretty sure I even drew a map in my sketchbook at some point-- complete with terrain markers and kingdom names. I was convinced for the longest time that I would become a the next great video game designer with this one. Not that the prospect is dead, but I now have a more realistic and less naive expectation of that dream. It kept my creative juices flowing, but how did that become Destined Legends as we know it today?
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In The Beginning
In junior high, I was pretty huge into Pokemon, especially the trading card game. I would line up every week with my brother at our local mall's hobby shop, preying that we'd be able to score 2 packs of cards before the store sold out for the week. I loved it because it was the first true hobby I had that I can remember. I collected and played the crap out of those cards, and I didn't care who knew it. My obsession took me so far to begin creating my own fake Pokemon Trading Cards on a crappy piece of 90's PC software called Announcements.
I'm pretty sure it came free with our printer. It was literally used to make greeting cards and envelopes, but I got it to work for my purposes. This was probably my first venture into the world of Graphic Design. I would cut out all the elements I needed from card scans of the real cards I would find on the internet and compose them together with new stats and Abilities. I even printed some out and convinced my friends that they were the latest bootlegs from Japan.
"I collected and played the crap out of those cards and I didn't care who knew it."
That eventually matured into me creating my very own card game from scratch based off of my other teen-hood obsession, Final Fantasy. I actually created cards based off my favorite Final Fantasy characters, summons, and abilities. I came out decent form something I made in High School. I even came up with some rudimentary rules. Nothing really came of that-- it was more just for fun. The whole idea spent the better part of a decade in a file in the corner of my computer.
One day, while spring-cleaning my computer's Hard Drive, my brother Shawn and I stumbled across my old Final Fantasy TCG folder as well as my old Destined Legends folder. The resulting feeling was like a freight train to our faces. We knew what my next project was going to be. We had the skills, the creative energy, the industry know-how, and we would soon discover that we could have the funds to make it happen, for real.
In This Series
Funded with Kickstarter Part I: Too Much Free Time 6/2 - The conception of Destined Legends, beginning over 10 years ago.
Funded with Kickstarter Part II: Anything You Can Do 6/9 - The process of officially developing Destined Legends.
Funded with Kickstarter Part III: The Campaign 6/16 - The most exhilarating and stressful 30 days of our lives.
Funded with Kickstarter Part IV: I Heart Logistics 10/8 - The processes of manufacturing, importing, and fulfillment.
