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SQUIRMISH: The Card Game of Brawling Beasties

Back in 2014, my oldest daughter became obsessed with Pokemon cards. I enjoyed the creativity of the cards, but when we sat down and figured out how to play the game, I found it pretty disappointing… but inspiring! The things that I did not enjoy about that game got me thinking about how a better card-battling game could be designed… and thus SQUIRMISH was born.

After spending a year or so developing, illustrating and testing the game, I initially self-published it using the print-on-demand service The Gamecrafter. I’m more of a maker-of-things than a seller-of-things, though, so I decided I wanted to find a publisher for it. My favorite game publisher, Gamewright, had an open submission policy, so I decided to send a copy of it their way. They were enthusiastic about it, and picked it up to publish in 2018.

Here is the promotional video I made for the game:

https://youtu.be/VnJEdfev7As

As the audience for the game has grown, it has received a number of reviews. Here are a few of them:

“There is a ton of replay ability here… All of the boys, including Dad, are fans of Pokémon and Squirmish has provided a fresh and simple take on card battling games. The variety that is found within the game is really amazing.” – 8 0f 10 Stars at The Dice Have It.

“It’s really fun to play, really funny cards, and really fun to see all the different types of abilities and how you can try to utilize those during each game.” – Landon Squire at How Lou Sees It

“Squirmish is a fun, family-friendly game which surprised me a bit with the depth of play. When I read the rules, I thought that it would be too kiddy-like. While the artistic style and the humorous text on the cards makes it appropriate for kids, the actions on the cards does give the gamer something to work with! … If you’re looking for a game to introduce the concepts of individual card actions and combat, this would be a good choice. It also will be a good filler for gamers looking for a few laughs mixed in with their gaming.” – Dale Yu at opinionatedgamers.com

Squirmish was one of 16 games picked as one of “The Best New Puzzles and Games in 2018” by The Noise on Toys. Squirmish made #58 on the top 100 list of games at Benjamin’s Board Game Blog!

You can learn more about SQUIRMISH at the website for the game that I built here.

You can download the rule book for SQUIRMISH here.

Currently I am working both on creating an expansion to the initial game, and on a SQUIRMISH video game that I am developing in collaboration with Faust Logic.

For a more thorough summary of the process I went through making SQUIRMISH, you can read this article I wrote about it on Board Game Geek.

Here is a video I made on how to play SQUIRMISH:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hZnYDmMAgQ&feature=youtu.be

Whiteboard Animation for the i.e. network

I had a fun, quick project last month doing a whiteboard animation for the i.e. network. Technically, I didn’t use a whiteboard, though… I used big sheets of paper, and shot frames of me drawing and moving around post-it notes (or did they move themselves?). It is always a treat to get away from the computer for a while and actually shoot some stop-motion animation. Rick Kupchella at the i.e. network provided me a script to work from, and gave me a generous amount of leeway collaborating on coming up with the visuals. You can see the results below.

 

HTML5 Kung Fu Panda and Fruity Pebbles Banners and Social Networking Video

html5_cereal_banners

I recently built some fun HTML5 banners for Kung Fu Panda and Fruity Pebbles breakfast cereals in collaboration with creative director Brian Hurley and designer Erin Julin. Grab a bowl and a carton of milk and view some of them at the links below.

300×250 Kung Fu Panda Cereal Banner
300×600 Kung Fu Panda Cereal Banner
300×250 Fruity Pebbles Cereal Banner
970×90 Fruity Pebbles Cereal Banner

Along with these projects, I also built a fun little Fruity Pebbles New Years video in collaboration with Brian Hurley and Chris Henderson for the client’s social networking purposes on the holiday, which you can view below.

 

 

Banner Bang for the Buck

 

 

Pull up a chair, youngsters, and let me tell you about when I started making flash banner ads… back when there was a 30 kilobyte limit! Yes, you heard me right, you had to fit every bit of banner juice you had into the wee thimble of 30 kilobytes. It eventually crawled up to a fat 40 kilobytes, causing much celebration and unrealistic hailing of a new day… and there it remained for over a decade.

In these days of supercomputers in your pocket and cars that drive themselves (drive THEMSELVES! Where do you suppose they go?), HTML5 banner ads have largely replaced flash ones, and necessitated vendors re-examining file size… they seem to be settling around 150k-200K for them. Which is great… but…

40 kilobytes was not a lot to work with. But working within limitations can be fun. Here are some examples where I felt I won the 40k challenge in a big way, stuffing these suckers’ little kilobytes to bursting like a goddamn Thanksgiving turkey.

Flash is going the way of the dinosaur in a little while here, so I’ve converted them to video… and now they are no longer clocking in at those teeny little file sizes. They don’t look as good as they used to, either, lacking Flash’s vector crispness. Progress!

I assure you, this stuff was pretty impressive back in the day. I guess you had to be there.

Target Weekly Ad
Target Quaker Oats Star Search
Target Purina Friskies
Target Purina Friskies 2
Target Turbo
Target Videogames
Target Pantene
Phillips UV Vodka Banner
Northwestern Mutual Golf Banner

The Beer Drinker’s Hall of Fame

The Beer Drinker's Hall of Fame posterThe Beer Drinker’s Hall of Fame is a limited edition poster I illustrated and designed (printed by the enormously talented folks at Burlesque of North America) for the first annual Posters and Pints show. It featured images of the last 42 honorees that would have been inducted into that noble institution, had it actually existed.

The show featured 40 posters by 40 different drunken Minnesota artists, along with a number of breweries from the area sampling their wares. You can see a high-resolution image of the completed poster here. You can read more about the show at postersandpints.com.

 

Target Fashion Banner Ads

target_fashion

Although my personal idea of fashion veers towards Hawaiian shirts, I worked on a number of banner, rich media and other campaigns selling the work of the many designers that Target collaborates with. Below are a handful of examples of the many Target fashion and design-related Flash banners I built (now converted to .mp4… RIP Flash). These were all built in my time at Olson, and were made in collaboration with a number of talented designers there (such as Tate Leyba, Montana Scheff, and Kristen Hasler).

C9
Dror Benshetrit
Feed USA
Harlem Designers
Jemma Kidd 1
Jemma Kidd 2
John Derian
Josie Natori 1
Josie Natori 2
Liberty of London
Target Kaleidoscopic Fashion Spectacular

Strip Mall

stripmall_cover

My latest webcomic strip is a collaboration with my good friend Ben Zmith about the denizens of a Strip Mall. In a moment of inspiration, we decided to call it Strip Mall.

stripmall_minisBen and I both write and draw the whole thing and then forget who did what.

In addition to putting it online, we are also currently printing it as a series of mini-comics… we have three issues printed so far of a projected ten, after which it will be a book.

Ben and I also collaborated on a previous webcomic about monsters and angry science called Monkey’s Paw, which we completed a couple years ago. We’re hoping to find the right publisher for that sometime soon. Currently, it can be read in its entirety online.

 

stripmall_thumb

Target Bullseye Animations

bullseyeI had a number of Flash projects where I had the opportunity to animate illustrations of Target’s canine mascot, Bullseye, for banner ads, rich media and websites… generally under the unforgiving limit of 40 kilobytes or less (unfortunately, I am not aware of who did the charming illustrations these animations were based on). I think I did a pretty good job of breathing life into the cute little corporate shill. You can see many examples below.

Squirt Gun and Diver
Balloons
Bicycle
Painting
Baseball
Chess
Feather Boa
Umbrella
Rollerskates
Cake
Elephant
Clown
Bone
Pirate
Train
Cheerleader
Princess
Rockstar
Scrubbing