Playing Grounded's 2023 Kickstarter is Now LIVE!!
about 1 year ago – Wed, Mar 22, 2023 at 07:00:48 AM

Greetings Kickstarters!

In case you missed the multiple updates about our upcoming  Kickstarter that have been piling up in your inbox, today is the BIG  day! Fantasy Anime Art of Fuzichoco Puzzle Collection is now LIVE⚡!

This will be the final reminder you receive from this project. Phew! 😌

We hope to see you there!

All the Best,

Eric & Lara

One Week Till Launch!!
about 1 year ago – Wed, Mar 15, 2023 at 07:04:41 AM

Greetings Kickstarters!

With the bulwark of the Kickstarter preparations now near completion, we are excited to share the final draft with you, our loyal supporters, who have eagerly awaited the coming day of our 2023 Fuzichoco puzzle project.

K.I.S.S.

We received a good deal of feedback from those who have previewed the layout, and everyone seems to appreciate the simple, straightforward  approach. We did quite a bit of tweaking. Not being graphic designers, we wanted to make it look as clean and professional as possible, with an attention to detail and few, if any, distractions. Keep It Simple Stupid—that’s our mantra for this one.

A Little Extra Love

It’s those little things that can make all the difference. As a show of our gratitude, we always want to offer you something special that gives you that extra boost of enjoyment for participating in our projects.

For this campaign, we did things somewhat different. For our signature postcards, we did close-ups of all three maidens, that really brings out these beauties and accentuates the illustrations that Fuzichoco is famous for. For the certificates, we used our first (original) design and topped it off with a splash of our more recent ones. We liked the certificates we did for our previous campaign, with a ghosted image in the background, but we also wanted to incorporate the design for our original certificates that have a classic look and feel. All in all, we think that both—postcards and certificates—look very attractive and have that “collectable” desirability. We hope you agree.

The Heart of the Matter

This campaign represents our growth (i.e. learning) as a puzzle company. We’ve had successes, we’ve had failures. We’ve made some good calls, but we’ve also made some fabulous foul-ups. So with this project, we decided to return to our roots, both with our original artist and our original concepts. Where we go from here is up to you.

At the risk of repeating ourselves, the first two days of the campaign are the most crucial, it’s when we need the most support.  If you are a veteran Kickstarter, then you know how important it is to stay on the top of the list of the trending or most popular projects for at least a  couple of days. If we can manage to do this, we’re sure that this campaign will be a success.

We hope to see you at launch, Wednesday, March 22nd @ 10am EST. If you aren’t following the project already, now is a good time to start: https://bit.ly/3xCq8Hy

More updates to come... Until then, take care.

All the Best,

Eric & Lara

Kickstarter 2023 Announcement- Fantasy Anime Art of Fuzichoco Puzzle Collection!
about 1 year ago – Fri, Feb 24, 2023 at 12:18:51 PM

Greetings Kickstarters!

We’re here with some wonderful news! After our last update, we received an explosion of positive responses. Thank you for taking the time to send us your honest feedback and encouraging words. Your faith in us, and the fact that you truly appreciate what we do, is humbling. We value your input and have much to think about for the future of our company.

Since so many of you expressed your enthusiasm and want us to continue producing puzzles, we’re thrilled to announce the upcoming launch of the Kickstarter for our latest Fuzichoco puzzle collection.

We invite you to preview the project and sign up to be notified at launch.

As many of you veteran Kickstarters know, the first two days are the most important when determining a campaign’s chances of success. The amount of backing acquired during that time can literally make or break a project. So please, should you choose to back our campaign, we urge you to do so in the first 48 hours. This will give us the initial boost we need and help the project get more exposure.

Keep in mind, with each successful project, we’re able to bring you more beautiful puzzles featuring all different varieties of anime style art. And remember, Playing Grounded would not exist without you and your support!

We sincerely hope to see you there. As always, feel free to message us with questions, comments, or feedback. We love to hear from you!

Wishing You All the Best,

Eric and Lara

P.S. If you get bombarded with updates and newsletters about this, we apologize. We're just trying to get the word out to everyone. 

Kickstarter 2023! What will it be? Should we go for the goal?
about 1 year ago – Wed, Feb 08, 2023 at 12:02:32 PM

Greetings Kickstarters!

I know it’s been a while since our last update. Maybe you thought you’d never be hearing from us again after last year’s unsuccessful attempt at creating some new puzzles without the standard Kickstarter campaign method. We took a chance, and, honestly, with three Fuzichoco puzzle titles, we thought it would be a cinch to get enough pre-orders directly through our website. We were wrong and, frankly, a bit disheartened. So, after multiple disappointments and losses, we decided to call it quits (not quite) and liquidate (donate) a good bit (most of it) of our stock of previous titles.

It’s been a bitter sweet journey. We’ve had some good experiences: discovering new art, having the opportunity to turn it into one of our favorite pastimes, being able to share it with those who have similar tastes in Japanese-style anime art and, best of all, the fun of being able to piece together the very puzzles that we produced with your help.

We met wonderful and supportive people who walked the path with us along the way, even during those tough times when a lot of mistakes occurred that, for all intents and purposes, could have ruined our reputation. But honestly, I think that I’ve been better at that than anyone. Still, even after the pre-order project failed, we had a lot of people come out later, although a bit too late, eager to see the project to fruition.

And so here we are, faced with a dilemma and finding it very hard to let go of something that we worked so hard on and loved so much.

My Confession

Being an individual who speaks his mind in a collective world is probably not the best idea, and most likely turned off some if not most of you. I tried to introduce art that kind of broke the genre and was not well excepted as much as I would have hoped. Chalk it up to inexperience and, certainly, a good bit of ego (we’ve all got one).

I’m just a guy who probably thinks too much, and, as a result, I inject my own personal struggles, of trying to understand the world I live in, into my business, which is a big no-no if you ever want to be successful at marketing a product. Making something that no one asked for is quite a risk and usually ends in failure.

So I offer my apologies, simply because I was wrong. I forgot the reason that you decided to support us in the first place. I’m the one who changed the path and its direction. You had no idea that this would happen. In the end, it’s only natural to turn around and walk back the way you came in.

A Fresh Start

Having said all that, we’ve decided to give it a final go and either breathe new life into our puzzle company or, at least, we’ll have closure with no regrets. So, we’re laying it on the line here. We’re willing to run a Kickstarter for the two new Fuzichoco puzzles, Higan Bride and Garden of Color, plus, the rerelease of our most popular selling puzzle, Altar in the Forest.

The issue is, we need to raise $13,000 to make all three puzzles. It’s all or nothing. And for international backers, this will be your ONLY chance to get these three puzzles. Otherwise, you will have to hire a package forwarder to have them ship it to you from the US.

As usual, we are offering multi-puzzle discounts so you can get the titles you want at a better price than after-market, and we’ll have a better chance of reaching our goal quicker. The puzzles will be the same quality that you’ve come to expect from us. The art is beautiful. Wouldn’t it be a shame not to turn it into something equally as beautiful?

But Before That...

Running a Kickstarter is a time and energy intensive process. It’s hard work that usually winds up being a month long emotional roller coaster. In a word, it’s stressful. We’re happy to put in the effort if you think it’s worth it. Each message, comment and email we receive from our customers and backers is valuable to us. We take everything that you say into account when running our business. We do value your opinion. And now, more than ever, we really need your feedback!

Please, if you get a moment, send us a quick message at [email protected] and let us know what you think. Do you want these puzzles? Would you like to see more from Playing Grounded? Or, is too late? Have you lost interest? Should we just call it quits?

Even if it’s just one word, “yes” or “no,” anything would be appreciated.

Thanks Always,

Eric

Call in the Reinforcements - Project WMBB Puzzle Objective
over 2 years ago – Mon, Oct 18, 2021 at 09:45:18 AM

Hey Everyone!

Just a quick update with a little plea for help.

24pt Upgrade Unlocked

Hooray! Thanks to our backers we have unlocked the premium paper stock for  the 5"x7" prints. And when we say premium, we mean thick (but not too  thick as to be easily damaged) layered paper stock with a nice velvet  finish. So these cards will be good and sturdy for handing out to  friends and family or framing for yourself.

Stretch Goals Reduced

For those of you who have been following along, you’ll notice in the stretch goals that we swapped out the token for the 8”x10” print, but we lowered the goal for the print to $825. We also lowered the goal to unlock the puzzle from $5500 to $5000.

Get More Exposure

As you know with these campaigns, things often  quiet down after the first few days and projects like ours are sent to  the bottom of the list. Numbers talk. We still have 15 days to go. We know many of you want to see that 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle unlocked as much as we do!

Theoretically, if we could get a lot of people to pledge for just $1,  we would get more exposure. Many, if not all, of you have been sharing  our project. Thank you, this really helps! Please continue to do so and  feel free to share the image above on your social media pages. And if  you can get some people to put in a $1, that'd help this project along.

That's all for now. Until our next update, take care and have a great week everyone!

All the Best,

Lara & Eric