Welcome to Pocketopia— a celebration of creativity and collaboration from a diverse group of creators collectively running portable, easy-to-learn, tabletop game crowdfunding projects in March 2025 🎲
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⭐️ 2 FREE Cross Collaborative Freebies for every cross collab project pair you support
🔥 1 FREE Limited Pocketopia 2024 Reward if you back FIVE [5] or more projects
*Only pledges to physical reward tiers or main digital offerings (if no physical items are offered) qualify towards earning these limited FREEBIES. Please refer to individual campaigns for unlock requirements.
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The results are in… our adventure officially begins at Pooh’s House! 🏡
Looks like you all felt right at home in this cosy hideaway! We can’t wait to bring this little nook to life - just imagine the honey pots & comfy chairs. To celebrate, here’s the latest stamp for your collection!
Tales in The Hundred Acre Woods - Stamp Collection
🎯 Introducing - Follower Goals! 🎯
Every 500 new followers we’ll unlock a new community reward, and you’ve already smashed through 3,000! 🎉 To say thank you, all backers at a physical pledge level will now receive a freesticker set featuring all the poll stamps you’ve chosen so far - and the ones still to come! 🙌
Follower Goals
Next up at 3,500 followers -a brand-new “How to Play” comic, brought to life with gorgeous custom illustrations from our art team! But we need your help to unlock it. Share the project, spread the word, and let’s hit that next milestone together! 🚀
✨ New Poll: Choose Your Trinket! ✨
No adventurer sets off empty-handed! So now that we know where our adventure begins, it’s time to pack for the journey. What will you bring? Vote below and help decide what stamp comes next! 👇
While you can play the Demo Kit right now to give the game a go, we've gotten some questions asking to describe what Plot Books are and to reveal the four Plot Books not available in the Demo Kit!
Unlike a lot of other TTRPGs, in Despair Dilemma, you don't take on the role of a single character. Instead, you'll be responsible for achieving the goals of a certain "narrative concept" or to otherwise play a "mastermind with certain goals for the Death Game". Plot Books define the core concept you'll be trying to achieve and help to guide you through creating an exciting Death Game.
Basically, this means Plot Books act as your "Class" or "Playbook" while playing Despair Dilemma. Depending on the Plot Book you play, you'll have unique abilities that let you complete control the narrative in unique ways, as well as unique goals that unlock even more abilities if they're achieved.
The Eight Plot Books
We've designed the eight Plot Books in Despair Dilemma to cover a wide breadth of Death Game's, and depending on the ones you and everyone else at the table pick, you'll create different stories and play an almost entirely different game. These Plot Books are:
The Massacre’s Edge This plot book introduces murder plots and motives to the game, increasing the number of deaths significantly. Characters will get mad at each other, use the death game as an excuse to kill, and die in horrible ways.
Play this Plot Book if you like:
Arguments between characters.
Angst and stupid decisions.
Lots and lots of killing and death.
The Detective’s Trial This plot book introduces a special character called The Detective who works to solve the mysteries and murders of everyone around them. The Detective will take center stage, and the mysteries of the game will become a lot more prominent.
Play this Plot Book if you like:
Playing the main character.
Creating and answering mysteries.
Holding trials to punish the killer.
The Traitor’s Sabotage This plot book gives a single character in the game the secret role of The Traitor, tasked with creating havoc while hiding their identity until the perfect moment. Wrack the cast with distrust, and sabotage plans left and right!
Play this Plot Book if you like:
Keeping a secret from everyone else.
Messing with people’s plans.
Creating interpersonal drama.
The Challenge’s Inevitability This plot book forces the characters into playing games that are more specific than just “can you survive”. The victims of the game will be trapped in rooms where they must solve puzzles and challenges, with their lives on the line each time.
Play this Plot Book if you like:
Making Locations meaningful.
Tricks and Faustian Bargains.
Bringing the spoils to the victors.
The Witch’s Spell This plot book introduces a supernatural element to the game and forces characters to question what's real and what's fiction. Characters will become believers, and some will do impossible unexplainable things.
Play this Plot Book if you like:
Magic, sci-fi, or the supernatural.
Going beyond the ‘possible’.
Creative solutions to mysteries.
The Mastermind’s Mask This plot book introduces a face to represent the people who made this Death Game and lets them directly manipulate the game. The Mask will cause chaos, and if they die, reveal the true mastermind of this game.
Play this Plot Book if you like:
Being the true owner of this game.
Mascot characters having fun.
Watching the world burn.
The People’s Hope This plot book gives the characters a real chance at unifying together and fighting the game head-on. Characters will have lucky breaks, find solidarity in each other, and maybe even get out of this with everything okay in the end.
Play this Plot Book if you like:
A silver lining in harsh times.
The strength of people working together.
A little bit of luck on your side.
The Mob’s Will This plot book introduces a large number of background characters to the game. These extras aren't the main characters and don’t have unique names or truths, but do control the way the game plays out.
Play this Plot Book if you like:
Making choices for other players.
Creating new characters.
Starting a revolution.
-- We're working hard to get the game ready for you to play as soon as the campaign finishes. In the mean time, we'd love to hear which Plot Book you're most excited to play when the full game releases!
I hope you have a fantastic week, Nora Jean Haynes
Thank you to everyone who made it for the first Pocketopia Showcase Stream, it was a blast! If you missed the chance to join us, we have a VOD set up on our YouTube Channel here so you can get a quick look at some of the TTRPG Projects available in Pocketopia! Be sure to join us next week for the Card & Board Game showcase too!
With that all said, lets follow up last weeks update on the Plot Books with a look at the Death Game Sheets available in Despair Dilemma!
The Five* Death Game Sheets Books
The Death Game Sheet you choose at the start of your session represents the core setting for the Death Game you and your friends will be masterminding! Each of the five options we've included in the core book follow unique story lines and many have special mechanics associated with them to help fulfill the type of setting they represent. These five Death Game Sheets are:
Old Locke Mansion ( ☠︎︎ ) Characters are trapped in a mansion and must kill to escape.
The S.S. Opportunity ( ☠︎︎ ) Those down on their luck are entered into a death game on a cruise.
Oubliette Academy ( ☠︎︎☠︎︎ ) The world's premiere students are forced into a game of life and death.
Brimstone Island ( ☠︎︎☠︎︎ ) Shipwrecked and without a way back home, characters must kill to survive.
Hikyougawa Village ( ☠︎︎☠︎︎☠︎︎ ) Locals and visitors are trapped by a supernatural force in a rural village
The skulls next to each sheet represent how many extra mechanics the Death Game Sheet adds and how much of an impact they'll make on your play session. For example, Old Locke Mansion adds no special mechanics but Oubliette Academy adds a Special Skills system to show off the victims expertise Hikyougawa Village adds taboos that can kill characters when crossed enough times!
With that said, the Death Game Sheets we've made aren't the only Death Game Sheets you'll be able to play with! Despair Dilemma comes with a set of Death Game Sheet Creation tools to help you make any kind of Death Game you can imagine! Additionally, we have a number of stretch goals planned to commission Death Game Sheets from Content Creators across the Death Game fandom!
The first of these will be a Death Game Sheet by the developer of the fan game Danganronpa: Antebellum, Rippile! We're very excited to see what she's going to make for Despair Dilemma, and this is only the start of some pretty exciting collaborations we have in the works as we reach higher and higher stretch goals!
I'm excited to show y'all more as we get closer to launch! Nora Jean Haynes
Thank you to everyone who voted in our last poll - more than a third of you chose Eeyore as your favourite! 🎉 We’re not surprised - Eeyore is undeniably adorable! We love him too, so we’ve made him a special "poll winner stamp" just for you to celebrate his win!
Tales in The Hundred Acre Woods - Stamp Collection
And this is just the beginning - there’ll be more stamps to collect as we countdown to launch. Each one will be custom illustrated, based on your poll choices! So, get ready to collect them all! 📚💌
✨ New Art Reveal ✨
This one’s special. We’ve been so excited to share this with you - a first look at The Hundred Acre Woods map!
Map of The Hundred Acre Woods
Whether you're setting off on a grand adventure or simply pausing for a quiet moment beneath an old oak tree, the Hundred Acre Woods is yours to explore. Wander, discover, and tell the stories that matter to you.
📊 POLL: Where will your adventure begin?
Which part of the Hundred Acre Woods do you want to explore first? Cast your vote below to decide on the next stamp! 👇
This week I've been working on cover designs for Blood In The Margins and I've narrowed it down to three choices. I've just created a poll so that you can vote for your favourites, but I wanted to talk about the design choices and process a bit more too. If you're not interested in that and just want to go and look at the designs and vote for one, skip to the bottom of this update!
Digital mockups of three zines with different potential covers for Blood In The Margins
My aim with the cover for this game is to evoke the fiction that has inspired it, whether that's the "magic school" end of dark academia or the crime fiction side of things. Those two genres have quite different approaches to cover design, and figuring out how to strike a balance has been hard. For two of these covers I've fallen back on my favourite approach in recent years, which is to have the graphic design be driven by interesting typography. Option 1 makes use of the floral design I drew for the banner image of this campaign. Option 3 tries to evoke Penguin's clothbound classics line (and hopefully doesn't come so close to aping their style that I'll get sued. This design is subject to change!).
The second option is making use of a stock image from Adobe that I sincerely hope isn't AI generated. It doesn't look it to me, and it isn't marked as being AI generated, but it's becoming harder and harder to tell.
Let me know what you think, and if you have a favourite! There's every chance that I'll play with more covers between now and launch, but in the meantime this is what I'm working with.
Right then, gather 'round, gather 'round! Our Pocketopia cross-collab partner – the utterly splendid Grimwood Games, bless their cotton socks – have been kind enough (read: fantastic!) to invite the mind behind our cards-based TTRPG system, Monsters & Myths, for a virtual chinwag, live no less. (Deep breaths. It'll be fine. Probably.)
So, if you fancy a bit of pre-campaign banter (and who doesn't?), join us tonight, February 18, 2025, at 8/9 PM EST/AST. Hit this link [Link to Stream], and then click the little bell icon – you know the one – to be notified when the digital curtain rises.
Oh, and did we mention fabulous prizes? Yes, indeed! There are shiny, desirable things up for grabs for both existing campaign backers and any fresh-faced sign-ups who join us live. Consider it a little reward for your excellent taste in TTRPGs (and your even more excellent taste in live streams). Think of it as… well, think of it as a virtual grab bag of awesome.
Tell all your friends and 2.5% of your opposition!
