Rival Restaurants: SPORKS Out (Reprint + Expansion)

Ohana means family. And in Wahine’s Hawaiian Restaurant, everyone is family.
4 months ago – Sat, Aug 17, 2024 at 10:42:37 AM

Did you know that Hawaii is the only US state that grows coffee? Or that surfing originated there? Or that Wahine Poi Poi Kanakakuke throws the best luaus? If you didn’t know, let us introduce you to the one they call “The Umami Mommy” as well as her restaurant, Green Eggs and Spam.

Whoever said “there’s no such thing as a free lunch” clearly hasn’t met Wahine! Her power is all about drawing chefs to a specific market by placing the Luau Table (her SPORK) on it and letting others decide if her party is worth attending. For every chef that attends the Luau (Wahine excluded), she gets to draw one shelf ingredient. If a drawn ingredient matches one of her recipes, Wahine’s in luck - she gets to choose one to keep! But if she doesn’t draw a match, then everyone else who attended the Luau gets $300 (Wahine excluded)! The more people she can lure to her luau, the better her odds, but also at the risk of lining her rivals’ pockets with cash. No matter what, someone is guaranteed to walk away from the luau with something and that’s the Mahalo way!

Green Eggs & Spam

We know what you’re thinking - “Hawaii isn’t a country” - and you’re right. But if you’re ever lucky enough to find yourself on the Big Island, we’re sure you’ll agree that it pretty much is a magical land of its own. Where else can you find Kalua Pork Nachos as an appetizer, a Lau Lau Plate Lunch for your entrée, and Shave Ice (yes, it’s “Shave” and not “Shaved”--look it up!) for dessert? And if somehow you still have room for more, wash it down with some P.O.G. juice. 

 To Sleeve or Not To Sleeve

We’re not here to convince you to sleeve or not to sleeve – that’s like telling someone how they should have their eggs in the morning. However, if you do like to sleeve your games, here’s a breakdown of which pack is right for you:

The Complete Sleeves Pack ($25) is for those who don’t have any sleeves for Rival Restaurants currently. It has 450 total sleeves, enough to cover the Base Game and Both Expansions. Note: this pack is already included in the $194 Everything But The Kitchen Sink (All-In) Pledge Tier.

Mini Sleeves Pack ($15) is for those who already have poker-sized sleeves (the most common size for most games) and just need a set specifically for our custom-sized ingredient cards (1.5” x 2.25”). If you already have another brand of mini sleeves, the ingredient cards should fit but just not as snuggly.

Lastly, the Poker-Sized Sleeves ($5) are for returning backers who own the original Rival Restaurants Sleeve Pack. This provides the additional sleeves (and then some) you’ll need to cover the SPORKS Out Expansion.

And finally, as a bonus treat, we also want to feature some Designer Q&A with lead game designer, Rob Chew. We have some questions pre-planned, but feel free to throw out some questions in the comments and we’ll do our best to answer them!

Designer Q&A

Q. Which game mechanics do you have the most fun with in a board game?

A. I enjoy board game mechanics in which you can see growth. I love watching my small nation go from caveman to the atomic era while playing ‘Through the Ages,’ or watching my steam-powered Time Machine become increasingly more productive as I meander through the time stream in ‘Steam Time,’ or see how my amusement park has grown from a tiny kitty carnival to a full-blown competitor to Disneyland in ‘Unfair.’ I guess, then, it's no surprise that I wanted to make sure that there was some sense of growth in Rival Restaurants with all the different restaurant power-ups and upgrades. I think that power spikes in board games feel the most meaningful when you can remember the experience of being weak and poor 😀

Are you Havana good time? Papa Tio and his Cuban restaurant sure hope so! 😁
4 months ago – Thu, Aug 15, 2024 at 07:33:08 AM

Hello Rival Restaurateurs (and no, there’s no ‘n’ in that word 😅)!

We’re just 48 hours into our campaign and already we’re so amazed at how much love Rival Restaurants and SPORKS Out has been getting! We read every comment and message and love responding to each and every one! We can’t wait to share all the behind-the-scenes work that has gone into making SPORKS Out a reality. But first, let’s answer the question that’s on everyone’s mind…

What exactly is a “SPORK”? 

In Rival Restaurants, chefs typically have predictable and passive powers (like Phyllis using meats interchangeably) or active powers tied to a chef’s location (think Lovehandles blocking the counters or Antoine inflating prices wherever he is). You can use them every turn and you more or less know what the outcome will be. When we designed SPORKS Out, we wanted to add a level of drama and unpredictability that would spice up games for even the most seasoned Rival Restaurants players. 

We knew we needed a new mechanic… but what? And then it dawned on us… our new chefs needed secret weapons… aka SPORKS!

S.P.O.R.K. is an acronym for Super Powerful Object to Revolutionize the Kitchen. SPORKS are chef-specific, wooden meeples (3D tokens) that not only add table presence but more importantly allow you to unleash brand-new strategies and mayhem. But are they too powerful? We never want a singular strategy to dominate the game, so we playtested the new powers against each other, as well as with the original chefs, resulting in over 500 hours of playtesting by Rival Restaurants superfans! Without getting too deep into the calculations, we were able to maintain the same expected point total and win rate, while still allowing their strategies to catch players off guard. As an added bonus, by introducing a new mechanic to the game, it gave us the opportunity to explore new components. We’ve never worked with meeples before, so being able to craft very custom designs that are both aesthetic and functional has been a real joy. 

We’ll explore each SPORKS Out chef and their corresponding power in greater detail over the course of the campaign, starting with none other than PAPA TIO.

When designing his ability, we wanted to create a sense of a slow build-up while still maintaining the spontaneity of the attack. Playing as Papa Tio will cause you to pay close attention to the markets, hedging your bets, and monitoring everyone’s portfolio of ingredients. To build up the 3-Piece Nuclear Missile (S.P.O.R.K.) you simply draw a shelf ingredient and predict what it is out loud. If you’re correct, you keep it and add a missile piece to the Nuclear Silo. If wrong, discard it … but you can try again. Your first attempt is free, but subsequent attempts will cost you! Once the missile has been assembled… you’re now ready to unleash the ultimate weapon of mass deliciousness! Launch the missile to strike one opponent (forcing them to discard 5 ingredients), then watch the mushroom cloud affect the remaining chefs (forcing them to discard up to 2 ingredients from a market of your choice). Playing as Papa Tio requires careful planning and patient waiting. Like a crock pot simmering all day, “El Chefe” likes to take his time before he strikes. He doesn’t strike often, but when he does–everyone will feel it!

Why Cuban cuisine? 

With 195 countries to pick from, landing on what makes it into the game is often more challenging than designing the game itself. So when we pick a restaurant we ask ourselves 3 questions:

Question 1: Is the cuisine diverse and exciting? 

While we only need 7 dishes per country, finding an assortment of recipes that incorporate our existing ingredients, while also maintaining overall balance is a beautiful puzzle. But it’s not just about the numbers - it’s about the food! We want to highlight dishes from around the world that hopefully challenge you to go out and try them. Living in Los Angeles, we have access to just about every cuisine imaginable, and Cuban food is no exception. From the traditional Cubano Sandwich to Ropa Vieja and Lechón Asado w/ Plantains, every dish that comes out of a Cuban kitchen is oozing with flavor (looking at you Porto’s)!

Question 2: Are there unique visual elements? 

France has the Eiffel Tower, China has the Great Wall, and Brazil, Christ the Redeemer. There is a level of detail Audrey Jung, our amazing artist, puts into each restaurant that deserves a closer look. Havana Good Time’s color scheme is inspired by the colorful streets of Havana, an homage to both the vintage cars as well as the Caribbean's vegetation. 

Question 3: Can we think up a good pun? 

We’ll be honest: being able to unleash our arsenal of “dad jokes” is one of the reasons we got into making board games in the first place 😝. But enough about us! We know that we have some really creative and funny backers on this campaign. If you had carte blanche, what would you name our Cuban Chef and Restaurant? 😁

Now that’s what we call a GRAND OPENING!
4 months ago – Tue, Aug 13, 2024 at 08:39:43 PM

If Kickstarter gave out Olympic medals for Backers, you guys would have won GOLD today 🥇. We hit our funding goal of $15,000 in less than 30 minutes 🤯. That might not be an Olympic record, but it definitely broke the Gap Closer Games record! And not only that, but in just our first 12 hours, we’ve already reached over 1,000 backers!! 

Thank you all–both new and returning backers–for your generosity, encouragement, and overall positive spirit. As we reflect back to 2018 when our journey into board game publishing began, we never could have imagined how far you would take us. From being invited to demo at premier conventions like Comic Con, being sold out multiple times across the globe, and having 3 blockbuster campaigns to our name (and now, maybe a 4th!), you have turned our little “side hustle” into something that brings joy to others through the power of board games and fellowship. We literally couldn’t have done this without you and we can’t wait to share this journey with you.

Let’s Talk About Expectations

NO STRETCH GOALS

If you’re new to Kickstarter, Stretch Goals are basically milestones you (as a collective community of backers) can help unlock. And while they are great for drumming up excitement and driving up pledges, with an expansion they can start to feel a bit … forced. Also, seeing as how you all have shown us tremendous support in the past, we decided to return the favor by going ahead and upgrading everything from the start. We’re going to pack SPORKS Out with the most glorious content possible–the kind you’ve come to expect from Gap Closer Games 😁. As the campaign progresses, we’ll continue to share more details about the expansion (primarily through updates) and help you get a better understanding of SPORKS Out and what’s new.

COMMUNICATIONS 

You've got questions, we've got answers (hopefully). If you have any questions, please check out the Kickstarter FAQ first. If you can’t find your answer, feel free to message us or leave a comment and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can—typically within 24 hours. 

A Deluxe Sized Error!

We thought we had crossed all of our "t's" and dotted all of our "i's", but we still managed to miss something at launch. As some of you caught it, the Deluxe Upgrade Pack ($18) was not an available add-on at launch, but that has been corrected. If you were looking for it, it's there now. You're welcome to upgrade your pledge now, or simply wait until the campaign is over and do so through the pledge manager.

That's it for today. Once again, thank you all for an EPIC first bite. Here's to an equally epic rest of the campaign!

Always eating,

Team GCG