Ticket to Ride creator Alan R. Moon and debut designer Bobby West plan to shake things up – literally – as they rebuild San Francisco and Venice in the wake of an earthquake

Words by Matt Jarvis

SHOCK AND AWE

When the creators of Aftershock launched their board game about recovering in the wake of an earthquake on Kickstarter earlier this year, they probably hoped it would cause ripples among players. Instead, they found themselves dealing with a shaky start of a very different kind.

“Aftershock is my first game on Kickstarter,” says co-designer Alan R. Moon. “Lots of people warned me that the experience would be full of negativity. But I’m still surprised. Seems like some people make a pledge just to make negative comments, and then cancel their pledge just to make it look like the game is getting lots of cancelled pledges. I know these people are the very vocal minority, and I’ve certainly experienced trolls on the internet before, but this still amazes me. I don’t understand why they want to spend so much time ranting about a game they don’t like. Why don’t they go and spend their time writing about games they enjoy – or better yet, playing games they enjoy?”

Two days after its campaign launched in late January, Aftershock achieved its crowdfunding target of £15,000. Less than a week later, the Kickstarter was suddenly cancelled, with publisher Stronghold Games blaming a lack of ‘resonance’ among players. At the end of February, Aftershock returned with the added subtitle of San Francisco & Venice – one of several changes made to the game to deal with the wave of backlash at the epicentre of its previous campaign, which had included criticism over its naming similarity to educational board game Aftershock: A Humanitarian Crisis Game. Its foundations strengthened, Aftershock: San Francisco & Venice went on to gather almost £24,000.