You did it! Another passenger unlocked!
over 7 years ago – Tue, Nov 29, 2016 at 04:50:32 PM

Amazing 12 passengers!

Let's go for gold, we're only 2K away from the upgraded box!

The Final 48 hours! New languages and the final goal!
over 7 years ago – Tue, Nov 29, 2016 at 12:18:39 PM

As I sit hear eating Choco-bons (my favourite after a Walnut Whip) I am truly astonished at the love and support you have given me and this little project.

I think I've mentioned this before but I'll say it again, I couldn't have done this without you! Yes you reading this! It's been a team effort. Let's give us the send off we deserve. 

By now Kickstarter has sent out it's reminder email to people, I have no idea how many people this has gone out to so let's try to make as much noise as possible. Share by whatever means you can, facebook, twitter, your game group, the person next to you on the bus, the bus driver... well maybe not while they're driving. 

Smashing it!

So far we've added 2 new passengers to the game, we're less than £500 from a third, bringing us up to 12. Not to mention we're only a few tweets away from adding a new inspection card. In all the excitement I forgot to mention in the last update that we hit the 7K stretch goal for upgraded art, I'll now be able to ask the very talented Dan to do a few more bits and bobs to really add that final polish.

The final goal I have is a real stretch but together we can make it. If we hit 10K I'll be able to upgrade the game box to something nice and sturdy. It will be crammed full of gaming goodness!

Multiple languages

Something people have been asking for since the start of the campaign is multiple languages, I'm happy to say that I'll be able to offer downloadable rules online post-campaign in French, German and Italian.

The playmat layout

Anthony our graphic designer has been working on the layout for the playmat. Please bear in mind this is a very early look at a work in progress.

To make sure there's plenty of room for 6 players we've come up with this beast. Once we've finalised the layout, Dan can then get to work creating a brand new piece of art for this, together with Anthony's design we'll have something really great. As part of the post-campaign updates I'll take you through the entire process of designing the playmat. 

Remember the playmat is available only as an add-on or with the deluxe edition. 

Final note

Last night I was fortunate enough to playtest an in development version of Alley Cat Games new game (it's great). They also have a Kickstarter currently running, so if you fancy getting some swag in time for the Holiday's check it out. 

Until next time!

300 Backers! A new passenger unlocked!
over 7 years ago – Sun, Nov 27, 2016 at 04:41:16 PM

You did it! 300 backers!

That means there's another new name up for grabs. I'll add one more to that backer tier.

 As the final days approach there are a couple more things I'd like to share with you;

The lovely people at Seize The Bean recorded this video explanation at Essen this year. You can check it out here.

I was also contacted by Best Play to do a guest post about the story of how Nothing To Declare came together. You can read that here.

We're also dangerously close to unlocking a new inspection card. 20 more tweets should do it. So please tweet thank you here.

Until next time!

Final Week! One ambitious goal and another true story
over 7 years ago – Wed, Nov 23, 2016 at 02:20:27 PM

One week! 7 Days! 168 hours!

That's all that's left so let me thank you *virtual hug* for all your support we're now over 120% funded! We've unlocked 3 stretch goals! So awesome! 

Here's a quick run down of what's unlocked and what we have left;

We are less than £300 away from £7K and 13 backers away from 300 backers!

That's two stretch goals well within reach! Together we can smash this! I have one more ambitious stretch goal that I'm going to put out there. 

£10K = upgraded box

I would love us to have a strong hardy box to keep Nothing To Declare in. If we hit £10K I'll be able to upgrade the box, I have a few ideas in mind. If we reach this I'll do a survey to let you decide which box type you want. 

Speaking of surveys make sure you've voted on your favourite items here.

I've made a few tweaks to the page and changed the twitter button to the TSA one to help us reach that goal.

 

Another True Story

Dried caterpillars. In 2013 tens of thousands of insects, shrink-wrapped in plastic and stuffed into four hessian bags, were found in the luggage of a 22-year-old man who had travelled from Burkina Faso, in west Africa. The man claimed the 94kg of caterpillars were for "personal consumption". But the insects breached controls on the importation of "products of animal origin" and were destroyed. Experts said the insects were likely to be mopane worms, the larvae of emperor moths, which are commonly eaten throughout Africa. 

"These kind of dried caterpillars of the moth Gonimbrasia belina are already sold through outlets in the UK, so I can't see that there is a tangible threat to our food chain," Stuart Hine, an entomologist at the Natural History Museum, in London, told The Independent. "That said, once this kind of insect foodstuff becomes more common in the UK, either imported or otherwise, it will eventually be subject to UK food standards. At the moment, its sale and use is deemed somewhat as a novelty and food standards are not necessarily invoked." Ingrid Smith, at the UK Border Agency, said: "This was an unusual seizure but the vigilance of our officers has stopped these dried insects from entering the UK and possible posing a risk to our food chain." Import restrictions apply to products made from meat, dairy, fish, eggs and honey as well as some fruit, vegetables and plants. The man responsible for the caterpillars was given a warning. The online retailer Firebox offers 40g bags of mopane worms for £16.99, saying that they have three times the protein of beef. At that price, the insect haul would have been worth £40,000.

Until next time!

Stretch Goals! Deluxe Edition!
over 7 years ago – Mon, Nov 21, 2016 at 05:29:29 AM

Firstly my apologies, I've been away for the weekend and haven't been able to get to a computer.

Stretch Goals

I need to update the page correctly but here's a run down of what we've unlocked and what's still to come. If you're not familiar with stretch goals, basically the more funding we get the more we can add to the game, it's that simple :)

Unlocked

• 200 backers - new passenger unlocked (this takes us up to 10)
• FUNDED - we hit our target so now the deluxe version is available to back
• £6K - upgraded card stock unlocked (going from 270gsm to thicker blue core 300gsm)

Next Up

• 300 backers - another new passenger will be unlocked  
• 100 tweets to the TSA - a new inspection card will be added
• £7K - upgraded artwork (there are some things we'd like to enhance and improve, this will allow us to do that) - plus we're only £500 away!
• £8K - new passenger cards!

The wider the audience we reach the higher the likelihood we'll be able to hit these!

Deluxe Edition

Since the last update I've added a new reward tier. This deluxe edition adds the playmat to the game. You can add it separately if you choose, but I figured a new tier makes it easier as I've already done the math for you ;)

Playmat

Our team are working hard at coming up with some mocks for the playmat so I can show you what it will look like and what to expect. As soon as I have something I'll share it, believe me you don't want to see my sketch. The one thing I can tell you is that this won't be a normal sized playmat. Because Nothing To Declare supports up to 6 players this will likely be a double-sized playmat. Making sure you've all got room to place your cards.

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True Story

Some of you might doubt the legitimacy of some the weird and wonderful items included in the game. So each update I'm going to post the story behind one of the items. Starting with Cow Brains.

In 2012, officials in the Cairo airport seized more than 400 pounds of frozen cow brains that were brought in by three travelers from Sudan in large freezer boxes. While it seems like a strange thing to bring into another country, this smuggling move has happened multiple times, as Egyptians like to eat cow brains and the brains are inexpensive in Sudan. Officials destroyed this undeclared contraband.

Thank you for all your support so far. I'll update the page as soon as I can with stretch goal details, along with playmat designs and another story of an item.

Until next time!