INTO THE MOTHERLANDS Publisher Cancels Plans

Andrews McMeel Publishing, which also publishes Daniel Fox's Zweihander tabletop RPG, and was going to publish the Afrofuturist game Into the Motherlands, is apparently no longer going ahead with plans to produce that game.

AMP also publishes the OZ and Neverland campaign settings (which will continue to be published by them).

While Andrews McMeel itself has not made any kind of announcement, the Into the Motherlands creators confirmed the news on Twitter:

We come bearing some disappointing news for you all. Despite keeping up our end of the bargain and doing all of our work in good faith to get AMU a final manuscript by their deadline; they informed us they are no longer publishing RPG's despite having a contract with us; and terminated it during a meeting to inform us of shutting down the RPG division. We've been searching for a new publisher, and have another meeting this Thursday.

Pending the outcome of that meeting we will either have an announcement soon or we may have to turn to self publishing. It's unclear what this means for delivery of the printed books but a PDF should be in hand before the end of the year. We had budgeted for self-publishing from the beginning and have the money set aside, but our goal for working with a publisher has been to make the game available far and wide, in as many locations and outlets as possible.

This is not news we'd hoped to give, but we wanted to keep you all up to date with as much info as we can provide at this time. Thanks for understanding.

Andrew McMeel was announced as publisher for the game in May 2022. The game itself funded successfully on Kickstarter, making over $360,000, in June 2021.

Daniel Fox, creator of Zweihander, announced his departure from Andrews McMeel in December but indicated that AMP would continue to publish Zweihander. This week, Fox indicated that "my former employer wound down RPGs", so reports right now appear to be conflicting. The company is currently advertising Blackbirds, a Zweihander powered game, on its front page.

 

[Cergorach]

Having backed an OMG number of RPG products on Kickstarter, I categorically disagree. The overwhelming majority of campaigns fulfill their orders and, pandemic supply chain issues aside, almost always on time.

I'm not saying that those campaigns don't deliver, I'm saying that when they launch on KS they do not have a completed product (yet).

 

[MGibster]

I wasn't really interested in the setting, but they were going to have a class called a Spinebreaker which I thought was pretty darn cool. Even if I was interested in the setting, I wouldn't have backed the game because they hadn't even finalized the rules, and what if I hated the rules? But then I likely wouldn't have backed them because I only back Kickstarters from known entities. I essentially use it as a pre-ordering system where I buy games from established companies like CMON, Pinnacle Entertaining Group, and Arc Dream Publishing.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I'm not saying that those campaigns don't deliver, I'm saying that when they launch on KS they do not have a completed product (yet).

And I'm saying that's not true over the last four or so years. Very few people show up unprepared nowadays.

From two current campaigns I'm backing:

Although The City Watch is ready to go, The Wizards of the White Tower is still being play-tested. So far the new adventures have gone down a storm, but I do need a little more time to get them to be as good as they can possibly be. That said, I have done this before and I know I can do it again.

With predominantly digital products the risk of non delivery is minimal. Much of the book is complete and the artists and graphics designers we are working with are well established and have helped us complete a number of Kickstarters. Printed books will likely be done regionally, minimising the risk of delivery and postage that would arise through with centralised production.

Neither of those will fulfill pledges at the end of the month, but they'll deliver within the year.

 

[Aldarc]

I'm not saying that those campaigns don't deliver, I'm saying that when they launch on KS they do not have a completed product (yet).

Kevin Crawford dropped a 167 page 0.7 Beta document in the opening day of his Kickstarter this week. When did Motherlands have anything concrete to show about the game or the game book?

 

[bedir than]

It's sad that Andrews McNeel dropped its RPG division, because they were able to get RPGs into spaces that are traditionally difficult for small presses. They have worldwide reach and power, which is why their dragons for D&D book is all over the place.

 

[Philature]

Some of you see kickstarter projects too much as a storefront for pre-order and, as the message tell you before you back a project, it is not really that.

Some of these project is about supporting artists and not necessarily about buying a product.

Into the motherland was clearly an artists collective deciding to do an RPG. If you backed them it was clear that you were going into some unknown but if they didn't make the kickstarter it would have never happened and they wouldn't get the experience to do a better kickstarter next time.

I think that they have been good with their funds. The fact that they still have money set aside for self publishing is a good sign.

 

[eyeheartawk]

I'm honestly not surprised.

I can't imagine a big time publisher making much if any money on games where the underlying rules engine is a more fiddly WFRP retroclone.

If they made any money on these, it probably still wasn't a good spend on resources, they can probably more easily make more money putting resources into other books.

 

[CubicsRube]

Some of you see kickstarter projects too much as a storefront for pre-order and, as the message tell you before you back a project, it is not really that.

Some of these project is about supporting artists and not necessarily about buying a product.

Into the motherland was clearly an artists collective deciding to do an RPG. If you backed them it was clear that you were going into some unknown but if they didn't make the kickstarter it would have never happened and they wouldn't get the experience to do a better kickstarter next time.

I think that they have been good with their funds. The fact that they still have money set aside for self publishing is a good sign.

It's not about being a preorder.

Projects have prototypes. It's expected in all fields. This doesn't need to be a finished product, but a sample of what they can provide. They did not show they were professional and organised. They did not show that they were co-ordinated.

 

[Bagpuss]

Having backed an OMG number of RPG products on Kickstarter, I categorically disagree. The overwhelming majority of campaigns fulfill their orders and, pandemic supply chain issues aside, almost always on time.

I've rarely seen a Kickstarter I backed arrive on time yet, the vast majority are late. Although delays have usually only been a matter of months.

Some examples.

Starforged - Campaign claimed March 22, Arrival Nov 22.
The Expanse - Campaign claimed Jan 2019, July 2019.

Only seen one completely fail (and it was on gameontabletop, Dark Conspiracy which seemed like they took the money and disappeared), I have one I'm losing hope for although it still gets occasional updates. The shipping cost surprise has pretty much stopped me backing Kickstarters recently.

 

[Jer]

Some of these project is about supporting artists and not necessarily about buying a product.

I've done a few of those in the past. I prefer a Patreon personally, because I'd rather support them at a smaller dollar amount but over the longer term.

Starforged - Campaign claimed March 22, Arrival Nov 22.
The Expanse - Campaign claimed Jan 2019, July 2019.

If those are the examples of "late" kickstarters you've backed I'm impressed by your luck I have had a couple that stretched on for years after their original date (though one of them was in the "artists I was supporting and not really caring about the deliverable" category discussed above, so that one wasn't really a surprise that it was 3 years later than the projected delivery date). Everything I backed since the middle of 2021 has been late due to shipping and printing issues.

I have been lucky that there have been zero that I've backed that have completely just dropped off the map entirely. Even the ones that went on long past their original delivery date kept up with regular apologetic posts about why they were running late just to make sure we knew they hadn't run off with the money and ghosted us.