Two days ago I talked to Edmund and Danielle McMillen over Skype about their Binding of Isaac Card Game. The Kickstarter hadn’t gone live yet. Edmund was uncertain that the Kickstarter would get funded. He talked about internet forum posters who were aggressively saying “no thanks” to the very idea of a board game, rather than a game of the electronic variety. Edmund was nervous.
Well, the game is 1000 per cent funded now. In the video you can witness a fascinating time capsule of Edmund’s uncertainty.
The Binding of Isaac: Four Souls (yes, that’s a The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords reference) is a four-player cooperative card game that integrates lore (a lot of naked babies, demons, turds and blood) and game design mechanics (sweet, hot randomness) from The Binding of Isaac.
Everything you need to know about the way the game plays is written on its Kickstarter page.
My interview with the McMillens, thus, focuses on details such as the origin of the flu with which Edmund was sick when he drafted up the game’s design.
You’ll learn the name of the office supply store in Santa Cruz, California where he bought the index cards upon which he scrawled the first prototype.
He’ll implore you to pirate the game instead of paying for it.
We’ll discuss whether or not US military installations outside the US use pennies in cash transactions (they don’t), and I’ll finally come within three degrees of separation from Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.
I had a lot of fun doing this interview. Edmund and Danielle are good at talking. Maybe that has something to do with their success.
The Kickstarter has 29 days to go. It’s already funded. Don’t back it if you don’t want to. As Edmund himself says in this interview, you can just draw all the cards yourself with a Sharpie on some index cards.
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