The game WyshMaykers has finally been released after... well... quite some time in development. For those of you curious about such things, we wanted to give you some behind the scene things that made the game you )hopefully) have downloaded from DriveThruRPG (http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=94202&affiliate_id=229603).  

** Inspiration ** 
The Inspiration of WyshMaykers came from 2 things, really: an old RPG experience and some modern-day classics. 

First, Aaron started thinking about the coolest, most deadly magic spell he and his brother came across back in their old role-playing game days: the Wish. Back in the day, there was an adventure in which a character in the party got a chance to make a wish. the player went off and honestly crafted exactly what he wanted his character to say for the Wish. The character said this well crafted thing and, of course the person running the story found a loophole and used it somewhat against the amazing, multi-part request. In truth, a good time was had by all.  

Second, we (Aaron and Stephanie) were reading (respectively) The Dresden Files and Harry Potter books for leisure. Both books were about modern-day wizards in cool, fleshed-out worlds. While discussing the respective books, Aaron started reminiscing about that old wish spell and how interesting it would be to see modern-day wizards with that god-like ability. 

The two ideas (the wish with modern-day wizards) began to gel, some ideas were played out, a quick Setting was drafted, and viola, WyshMaykers was born. 

Next Designer Notes:  Some of the Whys

If you have ever made a wish when blowing out your birthday candles, or when tossing a coin in a well, or when a star flew by in the heavens, then we have a new story telling game for you: WyshMaykers.

WyshMaykers - the Game of Magical Stories is now available for download at DriveThruRPG.com (http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=94202&affiliate_id=229603). In it, we've put in a  complete, rules-lite game Powered by -U- the Game of Stories game system, and a mystical modern-day Setting about people that can make anything they wysh come true.  

This is our first full game Powered by -U-, and we're glad to see the final product hit the digital shelves. Enjoy the game and tell us what you think!

So, the 2nd Edition of all of our 100 Points games are out (see http://ansr-entertainments.weebly.com/100-points-card-games.html). But what's different? What's changed? A few things. 

** The Most Changed:  While a good potion of the games stayed the same (BlackJack, Hold'em, and Four Square), two games got a near-complete overhaul: Rummy and Prediction. Rummy and Prediction required a single deck of cards per player and used the cards to keep score of their wins. We thought that was kind of an odd "mechanic" for a family card game, in retrospect. Plus, we made a concious decision that any 100 Points game should be able to be played with a single deck of cards. This was very important in our 2nd Edition redesign philosophy. Also, we changed Predition from using a six-sided die in the game to using a four-sided die. The game works much better now. 

** 36 cards:  The new editions of the 100 Points card games are all based on a single deck of 36 cards. In 1st Edition, they revolved around 48 cards (for Four Square, Hold'em, Poker, and BlackJack) or more (for Rummy and Prediction). We moved from 48 to 36 to take advantage of the Game Crafter update to the way they cut cards. It is cheaper to cut 36 than 48. Plus, we found that the math of 36 cards made for a more compelling game in all categories. For instance, in Poker, the hardest combination of 100 Points cards to get used to be 50, 20, 20, 10. Now, it is 40, 20, 20, 20. This changed the way you play 100 Points Poker drastically, and made it more unpredictable and fun. In a round about way, the new cutting rules forced us to find a leaner, better way for our games. 

** Tokens:  In some games, we used tokens and in others we did not. We liked the tokens, so for those games that needed it (Rummy and Prediciton), we added the use of tokens as score keepers. The only game that doesn't need tokens is Four Square and it's priced at $6.99 on TheG. 

** More fun:  In general, these games are just more fun to play. We believe that less is more effective, and these 2nd Editions prove true to that mantra.

We are pleased to announce an unexpected surprise in this year's schedule: 100 Points 2nd Edition! If you've been reading any of the posts lately, you already know that the Game Crafter (the folks we print our physical copies of cards with) redid their site. One of the cool things they did was go from 16 cards per sheet to 18 cards per sheet. When they did that, it made our games cost a little more than we like. So, we took the opportunity to redo all of the 100 Points card games we had to fit in the new rules. In truth, we were planning on doing this anyhow, this just sped up the process. 

Check out the Printed and Print2Play editions of our 100 Points line of games at: http://ansr-entertainments.weebly.com/100-points-card-games.html.

Well, like most US gamers this weekend, we are GenCon bound. Don't look for a booth, though. We are there to simply have fun (like the last few times we've gone.) We're looking forward to fun and shopping and seeing all the pretty booths. Of note, we really can't wait to shake hands with DriveThruRPG and TheGameCrafter companies that publish our games for us. Great sites and great folks.

Speaking of http://www.TheGameCrafter.com, if you poke around on their site, you will see the new 2nd Edition versions of all our 100 Points card games. We wanted to get this out on Game Crafter before we went to GenCon so that it wouldn't be bugging us in our (lack of) sleep at the Con. Feel free to get in on the new 2nd Edition goodness now, before we go and market it for the rest of the world (and update our website accordingly). You can get 100 Points Four Square for $6.99 + shipping now!