Freight Update #2: Messenger's Melody
over 5 years ago – Fri, Aug 31, 2018 at 01:32:03 AM

Hi Everyone!

We hope you are having a great week, in this update we want to update you on the status of the vessels as well as how the fulfillment will take place.

Gonzalo has also created a little video showing the unboxing of the game and all of it's editions, please sit down, take a cup of tea and enjoy:

Vessels are really near their respective destinations and so on monday we sent a final 48 hour notice to anyone who have completed the survey up by that point, if you missed it because it landed on your spam folder please send us an email to [email protected] with your new address if the one that appears in the email is different or if you never received such email, but first, please check your spam folder.

Freight

North America: The Vienna Express is scheduled to arrive in Jacksonville, FL on September 13th by Hapag-Lloyd, if customs are cleared the same day as usual it should be reaching Maitland, FL the next day, fulfillment would begin the following week for the US.

During that time a truck will be departing to Snakes & Lattes in Toronto, Canada as well

Europe: The Hangzhou Bay Bridge is scheduled to arrive in Valencia, Spain on September 4th, at 20:00 hours by Ocean Network Express, if customs are cleared before the afternoon on the next day as usual, the cargo will reach Tarazona (Spain) by Friday, where they will work over the weekend to prepare everything to be fulfilled in certain countries and separate the pallets going to Germany.

After that a truck will go to Merseburg, Germany where fulfillment will start for other countries, more details on this in the fulfillment section of this update.

Australia/NZ: We expect to have confirmation of cargo received by next week, fulfillment will start immediately after that.

Asia: We are currently importing into China from Hong Kong, fulfillment will start during the next 2 weeks.

Fulfillment

Fulfillment for this project will be as streamlined as possible and will occur in 2 batches during september, here is how it will work:

The first batch will be composed of every backer who didn’t select the Collector’s edition, for several countries there is more than 1 fulfillment center in charge, if you are curious and want to know which fulfillment center and which carrier will be in charge of your game you can take a look at this spreadsheet.

For the second batch, composed entirely of the Collector’s Edition, Michael and Natalie will travel to Germany (See Europe in the section above) to sign them, Gonzalo will also attend and will take a couple of videos showing the process!

Immediately after, pallets will be sent by Air to the US, Canada (or truck from the US) and Australia, other regions will be served directly from Germany in reinforced boxes, see the spreadsheet linked above if you want to know who will fulfill your country.

Thank you for reading through this update, and we will see you very soon when the first batch is going out, until then.

Sincerely,
Everyone here at ThunderGryph Games.

Freight Update #1: Sea Butterflies
over 5 years ago – Thu, Aug 02, 2018 at 01:44:00 AM

Hello Everyone.

We hope you are having a great week, we have some news on the freight of Spirits of the Forest, since we now have more information as we didn't want to say anything while misinformed, so we first needed to be sure of this, our most sincere apologies if this caused any trouble.

We encountered an issue on the pallets and the person in charge at the factory didn’t want to commit any errors as our person of contact was outside of the factory for a week.

We had to delay the original booking, but now everything has been checked and ready to go. here are the vessels transporting the games to their final destinations:

The Vienna Express (V. 056E) will be in charge of the United States and Canada, departing from Yantian and Arriving in Jacksonville, Florida.

Estimated Departure Date: Aug 9th.

The Hangzhou Bay Bridge (V. 028W) will be in charge of Europe, departing from Shekou and arriving in Valencia, Spain where the games will be then transported to Merseburg, Germany by Truck for the final fulfillment.

Estimated Departure Date: Aug 7th.

We are currently in the process of clearing customs for export and filling the paperwork for the import of both shipments.

If there are any changes in the booking by the carrier for any reason, vessels will be updated accordingly in a follow-up update.

Thank you for your understanding.

Sincerely,
Everyone Here at ThunderGryph Games.

More photos and freight information!
almost 6 years ago – Tue, Jul 10, 2018 at 12:16:10 AM

Hello everyone! Hope you are all having a wonderful day.  
This will probably be the final update before we start sending the games to you. 

Production  

Our production went quite smoothly. Everything is starting to work better in terms of organization for us as a team.

As you know, in the last update we showed a few changes we decided to apply to some components in Spirits of the Forest. We did some tweaks to the add-ons too and that took away a bit more time to the production schedule, but we feel these changes were fundamental for the final look of the product. We are pleased and excited on how everything came out, we are sure you will love it too!  

Here are some pictures of it.  

Freight  

On July 15th the games will be shipped by sea freight to different warehouses in 4 continents. We will update you with the link to track the vessels as soon as they are provided. We expect to start sending the games two weeks after that in Asia, around four weeks in USA and five weeks for EU, Australia, Canada and ROW.  

This will leave us with a delay of around 3 weeks on our estimated time. We have made the proper tweaks to the Schedule of our next games to be sure to deliver in time or in advance if we won't have to change the components.  

We want to thank you for your patience and incredible support! We have really put all our love into the game.  

Tang Garden - Final 24 hours!  

Our latest game is in its final hours on Kickstarter! We have unlocked 42 Stretch Goals and we are very near to unlock Black Core Finish for all the decorations and panoramas.  

If you back the game you will receive the Swan decoration card for free and everything unlocked so far! Build an imperial garden by creating the landscape and placing the scenery in a Zen-like euro game. Play solo or up to four players.

Sincerely yours,
Everybody here at ThunderGryph Games

Production Update #3: Assembly and Freight
almost 6 years ago – Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 01:31:54 AM

The production of the game is pretty much ready at this point and the factory is currently assembling everything, we expect to have everything ready for international transit to our fulfillment centers in two or three weeks.

In the past update we showed everything we had done to improve the game. In case you missed those photos, please visit this link.

Freight and Fulfillment

Tang Garden Kickstarter Launch

 
We just launched Tang Garden on Kickstarter!

Tang Garden is a Zen-like game that will take you to the first golden age of China, where players will progressively build a garden by creating the landscape, placing the scenery and projecting their vision through vertical panoramas. During the construction, noblemen will visit the garden to admire the surroundings and the way the natural elements coexist in the most breathtaking scenery humankind has ever laid their eyes upon.

As a Spirits of the Forest backer, by backing Tang Garden you will get 3 swan decoration cards and 2 swan decoration tokens as an appreciation gift from us, moreover if you pledge in the first 72 hours, you will receive the Wayfarer, which includes a miniature, a character card and a tuck box for storage

Production Update #2 - Final look at the components!
almost 6 years ago – Tue, May 15, 2018 at 02:32:53 AM

Hi everyone! Hope you are doing great! We couldn’t wait to tell you more about the production for Spirits of the Forest!  

We’ve been working in the production of the Deluxe and Collector's Edition. While the first iterations were good, we decided to add little touches to make your game experience better. We are in a stage where we are quite pleased with the result so let’s talk about it!  

Simple and better logistics  

In the past campaigns, we’ve learned that while unlocking new content is one of the best feelings, we need to understand that every new item adds a logistical problem.  

This time around, we planned our Stretch Goals in a way that could be all bundled in the same box, that way we are making sure you will be able to store everything much more easily than before and to reduce the amount of missing items in packages as well.  

Here are some photos of the Retail Edition Expansion box, this will be also included in any extra game copies you might’ve added as an add-on in Backerkit.  

For Deluxe edition instead, we are managing to fit everything in the same box. Here is the almost final layout. The illustration on the back of the insert is missing but we have more pictures below for the Collector’s edition.  

Wooden pieces and add-ons  

While we’ve shown the tiles in previous updates, we just finalized the colors and shapes of our wooden pieces. Here are all the discs including the air spirit and the wooden leaves expansion set. We really like how the colors came out and the feeling and handling of the wooden pieces is amazing.  

Regarding the bags, here are the final colors and sizes for both the Oversized bag and the Collector’s exclusive included in the life bundle.  

GemStones and Metal Tokens

We decided to add a couple additional changes to the gemstones. We applied a mat finish to enhance the details and the stone-like feeling and we added some weight for a better experience while playing.  On the left you can find the first iteration and on the right the final matte look. 

This year we want to step up our collectible coins look and feeling. From now on you can expect this quality from all our metal coins exclusive to our KS backers.

Collector’s edition box  

We wanted to make this box as special as we could. We worked with our manufacturer to apply a Scodix finish which gives them a texture to the surface and a shiny look that makes contrast with the darker background.  

We decided to move the collector’s number inside of the box since it was breaking the art of the cover.  

Finally, we wanted to give a sense of deepness in the box. As you remove the components, you will feel a sense of continuity of the forest living inside the box. Hope you like it!  

Stretch Goals Expansion Rules  

Here is the final look at the expansion rules compendium that you will find inside the box. For the golden fireflies you will have to wait until you receive your boxes, something interesting is happening!  

Coloring Book  

The coloring book is finally done and under production. We are doing a very limited print run of them so we are placing a limit to the copies that can be sold in the next 48 hours.  

Backerkit Closing Time

48 hours from now (May 17th at 22:00 CET) we are closing our pledge manager. If you want to upgrade or add any additional items this is the last call. After that the credit cards will be charged and you will only be able to update your address if necessary.

Thank you very much for your incredible support and talk to you again soon!

Sincerely yours,
Everybody here at ThunderGryph Games